The Heart Nebula

Image Details:

The Heart Nebula is a large HII region located 7,500 light years away in the constellation Cassiopeia, and is well-placed for imaging during late Autumn. This region is home bright star cluster Melotte 15 which has helped form the shape of this nebula due to their combined solar wind. Planetary Nebula WeBo-1 (discovered 1995), located only 5,000 light years away, is also seen near the top and left of center of the photo, Shot as a 2-panel mosaic

Notes on the 2023 Reprocess:

I disliked the color and overall signal to noise ratio in the original edit. The Oiii (blue coloration) was especially noisy when drawn out and the color mix varied too hard towards an orange-red / blue mix. In this new attempt I let the Oiii remained more subdued and blended in the Hydrogen data in a combination which kept it closer to natural pink than glaring red. This was also my first attempt using PixInsight’s Globalized Hyberbolic Stretch which allowed me to pull a lot more of the dim nebula off the background with relative ease.

Equipment:

• William Optics Star71-II Petzval APO (345mm Focal Length, F/4.9)

• ZWO ASI1600MM-P, ZWO Filters

• Celestron CGEM-II

• Autoguiding: Orion 50mm Guidescope + ZWO ASI224MC

Exposures:

• Red, Green, Blue: 187, 187, 187 x 120” (Total: 18h 42m)

• Hydrogen-Alpha 7nm: 456 x 300” (Total: 38h)

• Oxygen-III 7nm: 411 x 300” (Total: 34h 15m)

Misc Details:

• Capture Software: AstrophotographyTool, PHD2 (guiding), Celestron CPWI (mount control), Pegasus Powerbox (dew heater control, power management)

• Processing Software: PixInsight

• Taken from: Wichita, KS, Bortle 4

• Capture Dates: 9, 11-12, 14-15, 18, 23-24 November, 1, 6, 17 December, 2019

Annotation