The Heart of the Heart Nebula

[Colorado CJ]

4.5 hours of integration isn't enough for this nebula. I may go back and add more integration time later. I am still trying to find the patience to image for longer than a single night before I edit an image, but I am not there yet

This was shot in my Bortle 6-7 backyard last night using the following.

Skywatcher MN190 1000mm F5.2 Maksutov Newtonian
Skywatcher EQ6R-Pro
ZWO ASI183MM Pro Imaging Camera
Skywatcher 72ED Guide Scope
ZWO ASI120MC-S Guide Camera

18, 300 sec Ha at 111 Gain 10 offset
18, 300 sec OIII at 111 Gain 10 offset
18, 300 sec SII at 111 Gain 10 offset

 

[AlanLichty]

Jaw dropping beauty. Looking at your result I almost find it hard to believe that you can get even more out of the scene. Thanks for sharing this.

 

[JimFox]

Super cool Andrew! That’s amazing work. And I am like you, I would have a hard time being patient enough to wait a 2nd day before processing.

 

[Ben Egbert]

Its just amazing that there is so much color and structure that we cannot see with the naked eye. This is just beautiful.

 

[Mike Lewis]

Great image - lots of nice detail there. This is a very fun region to image. This region inside the Heart Nebula is often referred to as Melotte 15, and contains some very active stars with nearly 50 times the mass of our sun that are ionizing the gas in the Nebula and causing it to radiate.

Now that your post processing is getting more sophisticated, have you considered trying to take RGB data to use for the stars, to allow you to have true color stars? It is a technique I have wanted to try out, that removes the magenta ringed stars that frequently occur in conventional narrowband image processing. I have seen some nice results using that technique, and hope to try it out myself at a future date once I am back set up and able to collect data again.

Great image, thanks for posting!

ML

 

[Colorado CJ]

Thanks everyone!

Great image - lots of nice detail there. This is a very fun region to image. This region inside the Heart Nebula is often referred to as Melotte 15, and contains some very active stars with nearly 50 times the mass of our sun that are ionizing the gas in the Nebula and causing it to radiate.

Now that your post processing is getting more sophisticated, have you considered trying to take RGB data to use for the stars, to allow you to have true color stars? It is a technique I have wanted to try out, that removes the magenta ringed stars that frequently occur in conventional narrowband image processing. I have seen some nice results using that technique, and hope to try it out myself at a future date once I am back set up and able to collect data again.

Great image, thanks for posting!

ML

I need to try shooting RGB for the stars. Do you think it would take much time? I would just be getting enough for the stars themselves, so I think maybe 10 shots at 60 seconds each for each filter would be enough?

Then I have to figure out how to blend them. Maybe a starless narrowband and then add the RGB stars?

Lots to read up on, but I should try it out as it will give a much nicer final image.

 

[Mike Lewis]

Andrew,

yes, as far as I know you do not need much exposure for RGB stars. I would also say a starless narrowband blended with RGB stars is a good first cut. As I stated, I do not have much experience here myself, but I have seen lots of good versions of this technique so I think it is worth putting some study in on. Like most things in astro processing, it often gets more complicated in practice than it seems like it should be in theory. But I look forward to what you can hopefully come up with in the future. It is on my list of things to try next time I am able to collect any reasonable narrowband data.

ML