Tuesday, October 29, 2024
Methuselah Nebula, MWP1, project finalized
Planetary Nebulae are like candy of the cosmos, small and colorful treats to the eye.
MWP1 is a Planetary Nebula in constellation Cygnus, the Swan, it's rarely imaged and now I know why.
This is a unusually old, unusually shaped and unusually large planetary nebula, it also was one of the most difficult targets I have captured so far.
When I saw the first 20 min. exposure, it looked like there is plenty of nothing in the frame, this is dim to an extreme. I have added full size 20 min sub frames of H-alpha and O-III at the end of this blog post so you can see yourself how much data there is.
MWP1, Methuselah Nebula
Click for a full size image
Click for a full size image
Photo is in natural color palette from the light emitted by an ionized hydrogen (H-alpha)
and an ionized oxygen (O-III)
MWP1 in O-III light only
Click for a full size image
The structure of MWP1 in light of an ionized oxygen (O-III)
INFO
This is one of the largest planetary nebulae known, it spans about 15 light-years. Based on its expansion rate the nebula has an age of 150 thousand years, a cosmic blink of an eye in the 10 billion year life of a sun-like star. But planetary nebulae represent a very brief final phase in stellar evolution, as the nebula's central star shrugs off its outer layers to become a hot white dwarf. In fact, planetary nebulae ordinarily only last for 10 to 20 thousand years.
The central star of the nebula is on of the hottest stars known. It's so hot that it's producing large amounts of X-rays
Source NASA APOD
Scale in the Sky
The white circle show the apparent size of the Moon in the same scale, this is a large object as a Planetary nebula. Moon has a angular dimension of 30 arcminutes, that's 0.5 degrees.
Animation
Technical details
Processing workflow
Image acquisition, MaximDL
Stacked and calibrated in CCDStack2.
Deconvolution with a CCDStack2, Positive Constraint, 27 iterations, added at 50% weight
Color combine in PS CS3
Levels and curves in PS CS3.
Imaging optics, Celestron EDGE 14" with 0.7 Focal reducer
Mount, MesuMount Mark II
Cameras, Imaging camera Apogee Alta U9000M and Apogee seven slot filter wheel
Guider camera, Lodestar x 2 and SXV-AO Active Optics @ 5hz
filters, Astrodon 5nm H-alpha and 3nm O-III
Total exposure time 24h
H-alpha, 21 x 1200 s, binned 1x1 = 8 h
O-III, 48x 1200 s, binned 1x1 = 16h
A single, full size, 20 min H-alpha and O-III exposure
Click for a full scale image.
Both images below are jpg photos of a single full size, 20 min. FIT-format 16 bit image.
Photos are calibrated with darks and bias corrected flats and are heavily stretched to show even a hint of the actual nebula.
H-alpha
O-III
Sunday, October 20, 2024
A start of the new imaging project, MWP1, the Methuselah Nebula
MWP1 ( Motch-Werner-Pakull 1, PN G080.3-10.4, PK 080-10.1) is a very old, dim and diffused planetary nebula in constellation Cygnus, the Swan. It's one of the largest planetary nebula known, it spans about 15 light years of space. The apparent size in the sky is 15.52 x 13,13 arcminutes. (Full moon has a diameter of 30 arcminutes) The estimated age of the nebula is 150.000 years.
MWP1 is a very usually shaped, unusually large, and unusually old, planetary nebulae. The progenitor star is also one of the hottest stars known, so hot it is producing large amounts of X-rays. There are not very many photos out of this difficult target.
This is a start of the imaging project with my new imaging system. So far I have shot 15 hours of light from an ionized oxygen, O-III. I'll shoot two other emission lines, H-alpha and S-II, when ever the weather allows it. The triple ionized oxygen emits blueish light, in this image the O-III emission is colorized to blue. I can produce a real three band color image after I have collected enough light for ionized hydrogen and sulfur.
MWP1, the Methuselah Nebula
Click for a large image
MWP1 planetary nebula in light of an ionized oxygen only.Technical details
Processing workflow
Image acquisition, MaximDL v5.07.
Stacked and calibrated in CCDStack2.
Deconvolution with a CCDStack2 Positive Constraint, 27 iterations, added at 50% weight
Color combine in PS CS3
Levels and curves in PS CS3.
Imaging optics, Celestron EDGE 14" with 0.7 Focal reducer
Mount, MesuMount Mark II
Cameras, Imaging camera Apogee Alta U9000M and Apogee seven slot filter wheel
Guider camera, Lodestar x 2 and SXV-AO Active Optics @ 5hz
filters, Astrodon 3nm O-III
Total exposure time
O-III, 45x 1200 s, binned 1x1 = 15h
A single full scale 20 min O-III exposure
Click for a full scale image.
Friday, October 18, 2024
NOCTURNE EXIHIBITION
First exhibition for a while, this time in my home town Oulu.
A new Art Gallery, AudioGalleria, has it's second exhibition build around my photos.
The exhibition starts at Saturday19.10 with opening party at 18.00 - 20.00, you all are welcome to enjoy my cosmic nature photographs and complimentary sparkling wine!
Ps.
At Fathers day, Sunday 10.11 at 16.00 I will give a public presentation about my work in Valvesali at down town Oulu. All fathers and other guests are welcome.
After the dry lecture we serve complimentary sparkling wine in nearby AudioGalleria.
Tuesday, October 15, 2024
WR 134, The Rising Phoenix
This is the second light for my new imaging setup, the first light image can be seen HERE
For years I have wanted to shoot a long focal length photo of this amazing mass ejecting star in constellation Cygnus, the Swan. Past five years I have done short focal length imaging with camera optics, now it's time to get closer.
I spent several clear nights to capture light emitted by an ionized elements in this gas formation. (H-alpha, S-II and O-III) For compositional reasons I ended up to a two panel mosaic image. Total exposure time is 23h.
When processing the final image I couldn't be noticing how much this formation looked like a mystical creature, the Phoenix Bird. I rarely use any other than official catalog numbers as a name of my photos but this time I simply had to name this composition to "Rising Phoenix".
When art meets science, the results can be beautiful. It can become something more than either of them on their own can ever be.
WR 134 as a Rising Phoenix
Click for a large image, 2500x1300 pixels photo shows the WR 134 like never seen before.
The photo is in mapped colors from an ionized elements, H-alpha=green, S-II=red and O-III=blue, Original resolution is 12.000 x 7000 pixelsA Closer Look
Click for a large image
RISING PHOENIX PAREIDOLIA
Click for a large image
This image shows how I see the Phoenix Bird in this image
Info about the WR 134
WR 134 is a variable Wolf-Rayet star located around 6,000 light years away from us in the constellation of Cygnus. It's surrounded by a faint bubble of glowing ionized oxygen, blown out by the intense radiation and fast solar wind from the star. The star has five times the radius of the sun and it's 400,000 times more luminous.
My Wide Field Photo of the Area
Click for a large image, ~2500x2000 pixels
WR 134 can be seen just up left from the center, at right from the middle lays the Tulip Nebula,
Sh2-101. I took this narrowband photo with Tokina AT-X 300mm f2.8 camera lens @ full open.
The camera was a Apogee Alta U16 with an Astrodon narrowband filter set, exposure time around 10h. This is a one frame image. Note, the "noise" in the background is not a noise, there are millions of stars
This photo is a part of very large mosaic image,
can you find the WR 134 from THIS massive panorama of Northern Milky Way
WR 134, the Rising Phoenix in visual spectrum
Click for a large image, ~2500x1300 pixels
The photo is in visual colors from an ionized elements, H-alpha=red, S-II=red and O-III=blue
A Starless Image of WR 134 Animated
Click for a large image
An Animation about emission layers
Click for a large image
Click for a large image
In this animation the blue O-III channel can be seen alone without other two emission lines in image, H-alpha and S-II, and in a last frame, without other stars but WR134 visible
Technical details
Processing workflow
Image acquisition, MaximDL v5.07.
Stacked and calibrated in CCDStack2.
Deconvolution with a CCDStack2 Positive Constraint, 27 iterations, added at 50% weight
Color combine in PS CS3
Levels and curves in PS CS3.
Imaging optics, Celestron EDGE 14" with 0.7 Focal reducer
Mount, MesuMount Mark II
Cameras, Imaging camera Apogee Alta U9000M and Apogee seven slot filter wheel
Guider camera, Lodestar x 2 and SXV-AO Active Optics @ 5hz
filters, Astrodon 5nm H-alpha, 3nm S-II and 3nm O-III
Total exposure time 23h
H-alpha, 15 x 1200 s, binned 1x1 = 5 h
O-III, 45x 1200 s, binned 1x1 = 15h
S-II, 9 x 1200 s. binned 2x2 = 3h
A single, full scale, 20 min O-III exposure
Click for a full scale image.
This is a dim target, 1200s O-III exposure doesn't show much about the O-III formation around the star WR 134.
This is one of the test shots after the collimation procedure. Exposure time is 1200s with 3nm O-III filter. Image is calibrated with Dark Frame and Bias corrected Flat Frame. Target is WR 134 in Cygnus. Stars are pinpoint from corner to corner. Optical analysis of this frame can be found at end of THIS blogpost
PS,
Terminator Arrives from the Future
My wife saw the new photo and pointed out, that the blue formation looks like an electric bubble used for a time traveling, as seen in a Terminator movies.
BUY A POSTER
https://astroanarchy.zenfolio.com/
Wednesday, October 9, 2024
FIRST LIGHT FOR MY NEW IMAGING SETUP
After a couple of years I'm able to publish a bran new photo!
This is a first light to my new imaging setup, it took couple of years to get it up and running.
I selected a relatively bright target since I wanted to test the system as soon as possible. The Pelican Nebula in constellation Cygnus, the Swan, is my first target.
The new system has a focal length of 2730mm with a massive 0.7 focal reducer for the Celestron EDGE 14" telescope. The new camera has 12 micron pixel size and it gives me an image scale of 0.91 arc seconds/pixel. (That's perfect for my seeing conditions.) The field of view spans 46.1 x 46.1 arcminutes of sky. (For a scale, Full Moon covers 30x30 arcminutes of sky)
The native resolution of the Apogee Alta U9000M camera is 3056x3056 pixels. I'm using a stacking method that doubles the measures by using the "Drizzle" while imaging. The final image is then 6112x6112 pixels.
Only five hours of light from an ionized hydrogen (H-alpha) is used for this photo. Other two color channels, O-III and S-II, are borrowed from my older long focal length photo of this target taken with Celestron EDGE 11" telescope.
Pelican Nebula
Click the photo to see a 2000x2000 pixel version
Click the image to see a full size version
This photo is in mapped colors from light from an ionized elements, hydrogen = green, sulfur=red and oxygen=blue. (H-alpha, S-II and O-III)
A Full Size H-alpha Frame
Click the image to see a full size version, 3056x3056 pixels
Click the image to see a full size version, 3056x3056 pixels
This is a stretched stack of fifteen 20min. calibrated H-alpha frames. Collimation wasn't perfect at the time so some oval stars can be seen in lower right corner. Now the collimation is under one arcseconds and the whole frame has pinpoint stars from corner to corner. (It's a large CCD, diagonal is 52mm) Optical analysis at end of this blog post,
Herbig-Haro Objects
Herbig–Haro (HH) objects are bright patches of nebulosity associated with newborn stars. They are formed when narrow jets of partially ionized gas ejected by stars collide with nearby clouds of gas and dust at several hundred kilometers per second. Herbig–Haro objects are commonly found in star-forming regions. (Source, Wikipedia)
I have labeled Herbig-Haro Objects in this closeup from my photo.
Technical details
Processing workflow
Image acquisition, MaxiDL v5.07.
Stacked and calibrated in CCDStack2.
Deconvolution with a CCDStack2 Positive Constraint, 27 iterations, added at 50% weight
Color combine in PS CS3
Levels and curves in PS CS3.
Imaging optics
Celestron EDGE 14" with 0.7 Focal reducer
Mount
MesuMount Mark II
Cameras and filters
Imaging camera Apogee Alta U9000M and Apogee seven slot filter wheel
Guider camera, Lodestar x 2 and SXV-AO Active Optics @ 6hz
Astrodon filters,
5nm H-alpha 3nm S-II and 3nm O-III
Total exposure time
H-alpha, 15 x 1200 s, binned 1x1 = 5 h (Data from new setup)
O-III, 3x 1200 s, binned 2x2 = 1h (Older data with 11" Celestron EDGE)
S-II, 3 x 1200 s. binned 2x2 = 1h (Older data with 11" Celestron EDGE
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