July’s Nebulae:

I was blessed with two beautiful clear nights around July’s new moon to shoot some classic sky gems!
The Eagle Nebula (taken from our front yard) is an emission nebula in the constellation Serpens about 7000 light years away. The second image is the Western Veil Nebula (shot from the east side of Algonquin Park), a supernova remnant in the constellation Cygnus at only 1470 light years from earth. I shot the East side of the veil 2 years ago so I was happy to complete the pair!
The day I shot the Veil I noted my Bible app “verse of the day”: Ah, Sovereign Lord, you have made the heavens and the earth by your great power and outstretched arm. Nothing is too hard for you. (Jer 32:17)

The Eagle Nebula (M16) - 2.5 hours total exposure

The Western Nebula - 4 hours exposure under light polution free skies

 

IC434 The Horse Head Nebula & NGC2024 The Flame Nebula:

Despite the extreme cold weather this winter, I was able to brave the elements on January 15^th – It only bottomed out at -11c (at 2am in St. Ann’s).

The bright eastern ‘belt’ star in Orion (named Alnitak) is surrounded by these deep sky treasures: The Horse Head and Flame Nebula.

The trick is exposing them with long exposure photography, without blowing out your picture with the strong blue glow of Alnitak!

Careful processing tricks allow you to isolate the bright star glow while teasing out the detail of neighboring dim nebulosity! 3 hours of exposure and almost 4 hours of Photoshop processing went into this image. Ethical processing must respect and maintain the images natural colour and detail. I like to show it the way it was intended to be seen! As you can guess, I admire the Creator and the detail in His artwork!

If you search the internet for Hubble images of the Horse Head Nebula you will be blown away by the detail captured from Hubble!

53 sub frames @ 3.5 minutes each = 3 hours, 5 minutes and 30 seconds total exposure @ 1600 ISO