Monday, July 19, 2021
Voices of Apollo 11
@FORBES
"The Ultimate Tribute To The Fallen Heroes Who Took Us To Moon"
"Metsavainio has created a ‘voices of Apollo 11’ artistic masterpiece to immortalize the mission and its target forever."
The Voices of Apollo 11
are now part of the Moon forever
Click for the larger version of 2500 x 2500 pixels.
Image shows the full Moon made entirely out the text of the transcript of the onboard voice conversations of the Apollo 11 mission. There is nothing else in this photo-based image. Just letters.
The Voices
I downloaded NASA's original full transcript of Apollo 11's onboard voice conversations. The idea was to turn this text into an image of the Moon. After a few weeks of intense work at a feverish pace my tribute was ready. Now the Moon is made up entirely of Apollo 11 voice transcription letters.
This is also a tribute to the entire Apollo 11 team: Commander Neil A. Armstrong, Command Module Pilot Michael Collins, and Lunar Module Pilot Edwin E. Aldrin Jr.
This is also a tribute to the entire Apollo 11 team: Commander Neil A. Armstrong, Command Module Pilot Michael Collins, and Lunar Module Pilot Edwin E. Aldrin Jr.
WHY?
I was most gratified and deeply moved when Michael Collins —the Apollo 11 & Gemini 10 astronaut, author, explorer and artist— tweeted following kind words about my work on April 19th, 2021: https://twitter.com/AstroMCollins/status/1384194949009211393
The news of his passing, just nine days later, hit me all the harder — a very emotional moment for me. Out of the blue, I got inspired to create this artwork. I absolutely had to do it right away, which I did.
Michael Collins was affectionately referred to as “the loneliest man in history” for being the command module pilot who flew solo in space behind the Moon and without radio contact with anyone while his colleagues, Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong, set foot on the Moon for the first time in history. Michael was also an artist. His iconic photos made from Moon orbit are true art and part of mankind's greatest cultural heritage treasure.
A similar solitude gripped me while I was creating this tribute image. For being an astronomical photographer and a visual artist often is a very lonely job. Especially this time as I was deeply emotional throughout my creative process for this artwork. Even though I never met him personally, the end of his Earthly mission meant more to me than I was prepared for. I needed to make this photo-based artwork to process the inner storm of my thoughts and feelings.
The Apollo 11 landing site is marked by two red letters.
4K VIDEO
1-minute 4K video about the "Voices of Apollo 11" artwork. Please watch in full screen for the best viewing experience.
The music "Fly me to the Moon"
Frank Sinatra's 1964 recording of "Fly Me to the Moon" became closely associated with NASA's Apollo space program. A copy of the song was played on a Sony TC-50 portable cassette player on the Apollo 10 mission which orbited the Moon,[44] and also on Apollo 11 before the first landing on the Moon.[45] Source Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fly_Me_to_the_Moon
Material used for the artwork
Apollo 11 onboard voice transcription
Click to download the PDF-document, 5.5 MB
My photo of a Full Moon
Click for a larger image.
Click for a larger image.
I used my twenty-year-old photo of the Full Moon to create this text based artwork.
Wednesday, June 23, 2021
Photo number 8, The Chinese Dragon
Chinese Dragon,
This is the only image in the World showing the constellation Cygnus so deep and detailed
Image is reduced to size of 2600 x 4200 pixels from the original 30.000 x 17.000 pixels. Click for a large image, it's worth it! Mosaic image was shot between September 2010 and December 2020
NEW, a Zoomable image
Location in the Great Mosaic of the Milky Way
Click for a large image, area of interest ids marked as white rectangle
The Dragon, 4K-MOVIE
Duration ~one minute
Duration ~one minute
About this photo
This photo means a lot to me personally. Not only due to large amount of work and time I spent with this area of sky, it also has a deeper meaning for me.When you spent a decade working with a one photo to get it ready, it's like a long marriage. The passionate love is slowly turning to a deeper connection and at the end you'll grow together and can't live without the others company. As in marriage, during the years I have had friction in the relationship, even hate. But after desperate times the love always wins.
I'm a perfectionist, when dealing with my photography. This feature is essential for a great results but it also can cause problems in relationship. There have been times when I almost get a divorce and started looking for another, easier target since I couldn't get out all of the extreme dim and difficult details I wanted to see and show. I didn't even know, if they are there since there wasn't any references to compare. I didn't give up and finally after long nights and hundreds of exposure hours I get what I was after. Now we can grow old together and I know for sure, I will always find something new and existing from my love one, the Chinese Dragon..
Total exposure time is way over 600 hours, they are shot between 2010 and 2020. Some areas of this mosaic panorama required more exposure time than others. There are two very diffused supernova remnants in this mosaic. Both are large and extremely dim. I have used about 170 hours of exposures for them alone! There aren't any deep and large enough photos around showing them well.
I have started this imaging project back at 2010. My aim was to make a high resolution mosaic covering the whole constellation Cygnus. Work like that takes time and patience, especially since I have worked so, that many of the individual sub mosaics or frames can be published as an individual artworks. Here is a poster format presentation about all of the longer focal length images used for this mosaic beside longer focal length panels.
(3300 x 5500 pixels)
A location for each photo is marked at the older version of the mosaic image of the constellation Cygnus at center.
As a result I have now a huge 95 panel mosaic panorama covering 28 x 18 degrees of sky. I have collected photons way over 600 hours during past ten years for this photo. The full size mosaic image has a size of about 25.000 x 15.000 pixels.
Two + one supernova remnants, two Wolf Rayet stars and a black hole
There are two large supernova remnants visible in this photo, first the Cygnus Shell W63 , bluish ring at upper left quarter, secondly the large SNR G65.3+5.7 at utmost right.
Just outside of the field of view lays the famous Veil Nebula SNR at bottom middle.
Just outside of the field of view lays the famous Veil Nebula SNR at bottom middle.
Beside two supernova remnants there are two Wolf Rayet stars with outer shell formations. NGC 6888, the Crescent Nebula at center of the image and the WR 134, it can be seen as a blue arch just right from the Crescent Nebula, near the Tulip nebula.
Next to the Tulip Nebula lays a Black hole Cygnus X-1.
Constellation Cygnus is an endless source of celestial wonders, both scientifically and aesthetically. For me, as an visual artist, this area of night sky is very inspiring There are endless amount of amazing shapes and structures, I can spend rest of my life just shooting images from this treasury.
Please, click the image for full resolution
Note. The third supernova remnant is marked at this image, it's just outside of the actual field of view. I left it out on purpose due to compositional reasons.
Technical details
Original resolution in pixels, 25.000 x 15.000
The NASA astronomer wrote about this image:
A version of this photo was selected as an Astronomical Picture Of the Day by NASA
Original resolution in pixels, 25.000 x 15.000
The NASA astronomer wrote about this image:
In brush strokes of interstellar dust and glowing gas, this beautiful skyscape is painted across the plane of our Milky Way Galaxy near the northern end of the Great Rift and the constellation Cygnus the Swan. Composed over a decade with 400 hours of image data, the broad mosaic spans an impressive 28x18 degrees across the sky. Alpha star of Cygnus, bright, hot, supergiant Deneb lies at the left. Crowded with stars and luminous gas clouds Cygnus is also home to the dark, obscuring Northern Coal Sack Nebula and the star forming emission regions NGC 7000, the North America Nebula and IC 5070, the Pelican Nebula, just left and a little below Deneb. Many other nebulae and star clusters are identifiable throughout the cosmic scene. Of course, Deneb itself is also known to northern hemisphere skygazers for its place in two asterisms, marking a vertex of the Summer Triangle, the top of the Northern Cross.
This is a large area of sky! (28 x 18 degrees) The mosaic photo is in mapped colours, from the emission of ionized elements, R=Sulphur, G=Hydrogen and B=Oxygen. Image has over five million stars visible in it.
I have used several optical configurations for this mosaic image during the years. Up to 2014 I was using an old Meade LX200 GPS 12" scope, QHY9 astrocam, Canon EF 200mm f1.8 camera optics and baader narrowband filter set.
After 2014 I have had 10-micron 1000 equatorial mount, Apogee Alta U16 astro camera, Tokina AT-x 200mm f2.8 camera lens and the Astrodon 50mm square narrowband filter set.
I have shot many details with a longer focal length, before 2014 by using Meade 12" scope with reducer and after 2014 Celestron EDGE 11" and reducer. Quider camera has been Lodestar and Lodestar II.
I have used several optical configurations for this mosaic image during the years. Up to 2014 I was using an old Meade LX200 GPS 12" scope, QHY9 astrocam, Canon EF 200mm f1.8 camera optics and baader narrowband filter set.
After 2014 I have had 10-micron 1000 equatorial mount, Apogee Alta U16 astro camera, Tokina AT-x 200mm f2.8 camera lens and the Astrodon 50mm square narrowband filter set.
I have shot many details with a longer focal length, before 2014 by using Meade 12" scope with reducer and after 2014 Celestron EDGE 11" and reducer. Quider camera has been Lodestar and Lodestar II.
A version of this photo was selected as an Astronomical Picture Of the Day by NASA
Mosaic panels in chronological order
Here is an image about individual panels shot for this large mosaic image.
There are 37 base panels with shorter focal length tools (200mm f2.8 Tokina and 200mm f1.8 Canon) There is also 59 sub-panels used, they are shot with my old 12" Meade and 11" Celestron Edge scopes.
Here is a poster format presentation and a list all of longer focal length images used for this mosaic beside the actual panels, https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2018/11/treasures-of-swan.html
Here is a poster format presentation and a list all of longer focal length images used for this mosaic beside the actual panels, https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2018/11/treasures-of-swan.html
Evolution of the mosaic between 2010 and 2020
Click for a large image
Click for a large image
More info
Friday, May 7, 2021
All my photos from the Spring season 2021
All my photos from the Spring season 2021
Click for a large image
Click for a large image
- "The Space Between Us" https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2021/03/space-between-cygnus-and-cepheus.html
- The Constellation cassiopeia
- From Cassiopeia to Cygnus, https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2021/02/this-gigapixel-mosaic-has-over-900.html
- "Cirrus of Cygnus", https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2020/12/cirrus-of-cygnus-and-supernova-remnant.html
- SNR G65.5+5.7, https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2020/11/g65357-large-supernova-remnant-in_22.html
- Sharpless 132, https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2021/02/sharpless-132-sh2-132-with-new-data.html
- Lower's Nebula, https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2021/01/lowers-nebula.html
- From Taurus to Perseus, https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2021/02/a-new-mosaic-image-from-taurus-to.html
- From Cassiopeia to Cepheus, https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2021/01/mosaic-image-gets-large-400-hours-and.html
- From Cassiopeia to Cepheus, https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2021/01/mosaic-image-gets-large-400-hours-and.html
- The Grand Mosaic of the Milky Way, https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2021/03/gigapixel-mosaic-of-milky-way-1250.html
All my photos from the year 2020
Click for a full size poster (2000 x 2800 pixels)
NOTE, images are not in scale to each other. ore info about the year 2020 can be seen here, https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2020/12/all-my-photos-from-year-2020.html
I have a new logo now
Thursday, May 6, 2021
4K videos about the Grand Mosaic of the Milky Way
The only photo in the World showing the Northern Milky Way in this accuracy and depth.
ABOUT THE 4K-VIDEOS
Original photo has so high resolution, that's impossible to show over the web, I made those videos to bring out even some of the accuracy of the original photo.
Please, use a 4K-display or the TV-set to watch the video, if possible.
It does play nicely in normal HD-display but you'll get much more out of this by using the 4K-display.
4K-VIDEO 1
4K-VIDEO 2
Panoramic photo of the Northern Milky Way
Monday, March 22, 2021
A temporary WEB SHOP OPENED
This is a very temporary Web Shop and I'll shut it down in near future!
You can now buy my photos as a photographic prints
Please, have a look, https://astroanarchy.zenfolio.com/
The reason for the Temporary Web Shop is that my picture of the Great Mosaic of Milky Way, went viral. I can't reply personally to all, who wants to have a photo from my collection.
I'm a professional visual artist and my photos are always a very limited series. In this case, the limitation is done by limiting the sales time. I will inform a day or two ahead, when I'll close this Web Shop permanently.
Thank you,
Astronomical Nature photographer J-P Metsavainio, Finland
Sunday, March 14, 2021
Space between Cygnus and cepheus
I have published several large mosaic image panoramas in a past year. I have made several smaller sub-panoramas, they are working as an independent artworks.
This image shows an area between well known and much imaged objects, I always like to find a new viewpoints to the sky.
The space between Cygnus and Cepheus
Click for a large image, it's worth it
Image in mapped colors from the light emitted by an ionized elements, hydrogen = green, sulfur = red and oxygen = blue.
A closeup to show the resolution
Click for a large image,
Click for a large image,
A closeup from the main image shows the Sharpless 124 at up and the Cocoon nebula with a dark gas stream at bottom.
The mosaic, technical info
Panels used for the mosaic image are marked here, panels are shot between 2010 and 2021
I have used several optical configurations for this mosaic image during the years. Up to 2014 I was using an old Meade LX200 GPS 12" scope, QHY9 astrocam, Canon EF 200mm f1.8 camera optics and baader narrowband filter set. After 2014 I have had 10-micron 1000 equatorial mount, Apogee Alta U16 astro camera, Tokina AT-x 200mm f2.8 camera lens and the Astrodon 50mm square narrowband filter set. I have shot many details with a longer focal length, before 2014 by using Meade 12" scope with reducer and after 2014 Celestron EDGE 11" and reducer. Quider camera has been Lodestar and Lodestar II.
Thursday, March 4, 2021
Nebulae of Auriga and how my mosaic images are done.
I'll like to show the actual resolution of this and other of my large mosaic images by posting a close up from this panorama. Since there are data from so many years (2009 -2021) and it has been shot with various optical configurations, I had to develop a new method to combine frames for a mosaic image.
A closeup from the panorama
Click for a large image
Click for a large image
This closeup is reduced about 80% from the original resolution
In my last blog post I published a panoramic mosaic image showing the sky between taurus and Perseus. https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2021/02/a-new-mosaic-image-from-taurus-to.html
The Mosaic Work
Up to 2014 I was using an old Meade LX200 GPS 12" scope, QHY9 astrocam, Canon EF 200mm f1.8 camera optics and baader narrowband filter set. After 2014 I have had 10-micron 1000 equatorial mount, Apogee Alta U16 astro camera, Tokina AT-x 200mm f2.8 camera lens and the Astrodon 50mm square narrowband filter set. I have shot many details with a longer focal length, before 2014 by using Meade 12" scope with reducer and after 2014 Celestron EDGE 11" and reducer. Quider camera has been Lodestar and Lodestar II.
I took my current toolset as a base tool since it has a relatively high resolution combined to a very large field of view. Also it collects photons very quickly since it's undersampled and I can have very dim background nebulosity visible in very short time (many times 30 min frame is enough)
I do all my mosaic work under the PhotoShop, Matching the separate panels by using stars as an indicator is kind of straight forward work. My processing has become so constant, that very little tweaking is needed between separate frames, just some minor levels, curves and color balance.
I have used lots of longer focal length frames in my mosaic to boost details. To match them with shorter focal length shots I developed a new method.
Firstly I upscale the short focal length frames about 25% to have more room for high resolution images.Then I match the high res photo to a mosaic by using the stars as an indicator. After that I remove all the tiny stars from the high res image. Next I separate stars from low res photo and merge the starless high res data to a starless low res frame. And finally I place the removed low res stars back at top of everything with zero data lost. Usually there are some optical distortions and it's seen especially in a star field. Now all my stars are coming from a same optical setup and I don't have any problems with distortions. (I'm using the same star removal technique as in my Tone Mapping Work Flow)
Sunday, February 28, 2021
A new mosaic image from Taurus to Perseus 2009-2021
I have published several large mosaic images in past six months. This time my mosaic project took about 12 years to get finalized.
49 individual panels are covering 36 x 11 degrees of sky, total exposure time is around 250 hours. Native resolution for the mosaic is 31.000 x 8.800 pixels.
There are several rarely seen objects in my mosaic, they are very dim and majority of the 250 hours of exposures was used for them. There are three supernova remnants in the panorama, Simeis 147 at left, Sharpless 224 and Sharpless 221 are located at center of the image. They all are very dim but the Sharpless 221 is the most difficult one, it has an extremely low surface brightness and I think that my photo of Sh2-221 was the first three band color image out of it. Two large emission nebulae at right end of the mosaic must be the dimmest nebulae I have ever shot.
From Taurus to Perseus 2009-2021
Click for a large image, it's worth it!
Image in mapped colors from the light emitted by an ionized elements, hydrogen = green, sulfur = red and oxygen = blue. NOTE, the apparent size of the Moon in a lower left corner.
Frames used for the large mosaic
Click for a large image
Details and Orientation
Click for large images
Links to some of the individual images used in large panorama
Simeis 147
Sh2-221 & 216
https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2020/04/two-ways-to-go-in-same-field-of-view.html
older version
https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2014/01/sh2-221-supernova-remnant-in-auriga.html
older version
https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2014/01/sh2-221-supernova-remnant-in-auriga.html
Sharpless 205, NGC 1491 and Lynds Bright Nebula 696
Jus H-alpha
Sunday, February 21, 2021
Zooming in to an emission nebula Sharpless 132
Since I have shot many targets with various of focal lengths I'm able to make zoom in series out of my material. This is a nice way to show the fractal nature of our universe, there is always something new to see when the detail level gets higher.
This is also a good method to show the orientation and the scale in a large context.
A zoom in series to the Sharpless 132, Sh2-132
Click for a large image (Note a large image, 1600 x 8500 pixels)
Click for a large image (Note a large image, 1600 x 8500 pixels)
Optical configurations used for this image series, Before year 2015, Canon EF 200 mm f1.8, Baader narrowband set and QHY9 astro camera. For long focal length work Meade GPS 12". After 2015 Celestron EDGE 11", Tokina AT-x 300 mm f2.8, Apogee Ata U16 astro camera and Astrodon narrowband filters.
photos used for the zoom in series
- https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2021/02/this-gigapixel-mosaic-has-over-900.html
- https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2021/01/mosaic-image-gets-large-400-hours-and.html
- https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2020/11/a-new-photo-of-sharpless-132-sh2-132.html
- https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2021/02/sharpless-132-sh2-132-with-new-data.html
Thursday, February 18, 2021
Sharpless 132, sh2-132, with new data
I have shot a large four panel mosaic out of the Sharpless 132 emission Nebula at february 2019. At the time I was using the Celestron EDGE 11" telescope with reducer. Sh2-132 locates in the border of Cepheus and Lacerta at distance of about 10 000 ly.
I shot same object with a shorter focal length instrument, the Tokina AT-x 300mm f2.8 camera optics. Since the system is kind of undersampled, I got a very deep image of Sh2-132 just with four hours of exposures.
I have now combined those two images and the result has the best out of both worlds . All the high resolution details and the high signal to noise elements are from the long focal length photo and the dim background stuff is from short focal length photo. I have a new processing method to do this and it turned to be a very powerful for a work like this. I call it to VARES-method. Variable Resolution imaging. will be good tool when I want to go very deep very fast and have a high resolution details at the same time.
This is a way to combine best out of the correctly sampled and under sampled optical configurations!
I think this image is a good sample what VARES-technique can do.
Sharpless 132
Click for a large image
Sharpless 132 in mapped colors, from the emission of ionized elements,
R=Sulfur, G=Hydrogen and B=Oxygen. (Hubble Palette)
A version with out VARES method can be seen here, https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2019/02/sharpless-132-sh2-132.html
A version with out VARES method can be seen here, https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2019/02/sharpless-132-sh2-132.html
A closeup
Click for a large image
A wide field image of the Sharpless 132
Click for a large image
Sharpless 132 in mapped colors, from the emission of ionized elements,
R=Sulfur, G=Hydrogen and B=Oxygen. Image details can be seen here, https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2020/11/a-new-photo-of-sharpless-132-sh2-132.html
Technical details
Processing workflow
Image acquisition, MaxiDL v5.07.
Stacked and calibrated in CCDStack2.
Deconvolution with a CCDStack2 Positive Constraint, 33 iterations, added at 50% weight
Color combine in PS CS3
Levels and curves in PS CS3.
Imaging optics
Tokina AT-x 300mm f2.8 camera lens
Celestron EDGE 11" telescope with reducer
Celestron EDGE 11" telescope with reducer
Mount
10-micron 1000
Cameras and filters
Imaging camera Apogee Alta U16 and Apogee seven slot filter wheel
Guider camera, Lodestar x 2 and an old spotting scope of Meade LX200
Astrodon filters,
5nm H-alpha 3nm S-II and 3nm O-III
5nm H-alpha 3nm S-II and 3nm O-III
Total exposure time used for VARES-processing
Tokina camera optics
Tokina camera optics
H-alpha, 6 x 1200 s, binned 1x1 = 2 h
O-III, 3 x 1200 s, binned 1x1 = 1 h
S-II, 3 x 1200 s, binned 2x2 = 1 h
Celestron telescope
O-III, 3 x 1200 s, binned 1x1 = 1 h
S-II, 3 x 1200 s, binned 2x2 = 1 h
Celestron telescope
Total exposure time for all of the four panels together
H-alpha, 48 x 1200 s, binned 2x2 = 16 h
O-III, 24 x 1200 s, binned 4x4 = 8 h.
S-II, 18 x 1200 s. binned 4x4 = 6 h
O-III, 24 x 1200 s, binned 4x4 = 8 h.
S-II, 18 x 1200 s. binned 4x4 = 6 h
Monday, February 15, 2021
Zooming in to a heart of the Heart
Since I have shot many targets with various of focal lengths I'm able to make zoom in series out of my material. This is a nice way to show the fractal nature of our universe, there is always something new to see when the detail level gets higher.
A zoom in series to the Melotte 15 in the IC 1805, the Heat nebula
Click for a large image
Click for a large image
Images are in mapped colors from the emission of an ionized elements, hydrogen, sulfur and oxygen.
NOTE, an apparent size of the Moon is marked in third photo for a scale.
NOTE, an apparent size of the Moon is marked in third photo for a scale.
photos used for the zoom in series
- https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2020/01/deep-in-to-my-heart-ic-1805-in-mapped.html
- https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2015/04/my-last-imaging-project-for-this-winter.html
- https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2015/04/melotte-15-new-revision.html
Thursday, February 11, 2021
APOD by NASA, Astro Anarchy gets published
Astronomy Picture of the Day
My shot of the constellation Cygnus was selected today as an APOD (Astronomy Picture of the Day) by NASA. You can see the NASA page here: https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap210211.html
INFO
Original blog post about this image, with technical details, can be seen here:
Monday, February 8, 2021
Cygnus mosaic in visual colors
I have published this image in mapped colors at December 2020, it can be seen here, https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2020/12/cygnus-project-grande-finale-for-now.html
I have started this imaging project back at 2010. My aim was to make a high resolution mosaic covering the constellation Cygnus. Work like that takes time and patience, especially since I have worked so, that many of the individual sub mosaics or frames have been published as an individual artworks. Here is a poster format presentation about all of longer focal length images used for this mosaic beside wide field panels, https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2018/11/treasures-of-swan.html
As a result I have now a huge 37 panel (And 58 long focal length sub-panel) mosaic panorama covering 28 x 18 degrees of sky. I have collected photons way over 400 hours during past ten years for this photo. The full size mosaic image has a size of about 25.000 x 15.000 pixels.
A photo of five million stars*
Great Mosaic of Cygnus (2010-2020)
28x18 degrees, 97 panels and over 400 hours of exposure time
The full size photo is worth to see! (2700 x 1700 pixels)
An apparent size of the Moon is marked as a scale at bottom left of the picture frame.
This is a large area of sky! (28 x 18 degrees) Image is in visual colours, from the emission of ionized elements in the area.
* I actually counted the stars and in this field of view there are little over five million individual stars!
Orientation
Three supernova remnants, two Wolf Rayet stars and a black hole
Please, click the image for full resolution
Three supernova remnants, two Wolf Rayet stars and a black hole
Please, click the image for full resolution
In the orientation image above, there are three large supernova remnants visible, first the Cygnus Shell W63 , bluish ring at upper left quarter, secondly the large SNR G65.3+5.7 at utmost right and finally the third is a brighter SNR, the Veil nebula just outside of field of view at bottom center. (Image is partly overlapping with large mosaic but I didn't want to include it yet due to artistic composition.)
Beside three supernova remnants there are two Wolf Rayet stars with outer shell formations. NGC 6888, the Crescent Nebula at center of the image and the WR 134, it can be seen as a blue arch just right from the Crescent Nebula, near the Tulip nebula.
Next to the Tulip Nebula lays a Black hole Cygnus X-1, it's marked in small closeup image of the Tulip Neula at center right in orientation image above.
Constellation Cygnus is an endless source of celestial wonders, both scientifically and aesthetically. For me, as an visual artist, this are of night sky is very inspiring There are endless amount of amazing shapes and structures, I can spend rest of my life just shooting images from this treasury.
Beside three supernova remnants there are two Wolf Rayet stars with outer shell formations. NGC 6888, the Crescent Nebula at center of the image and the WR 134, it can be seen as a blue arch just right from the Crescent Nebula, near the Tulip nebula.
Next to the Tulip Nebula lays a Black hole Cygnus X-1, it's marked in small closeup image of the Tulip Neula at center right in orientation image above.
Constellation Cygnus is an endless source of celestial wonders, both scientifically and aesthetically. For me, as an visual artist, this are of night sky is very inspiring There are endless amount of amazing shapes and structures, I can spend rest of my life just shooting images from this treasury.
THE MOSAIC
Evolution of the mosaic between 2010 and 2020
Click for a large image
Mosaic panels in chronological order
Click for a large image
There are 37 base panels with shorter focal length tools (300mm f2.8 Tokina and 200mm f1.8 Canon) There is also 59 sub-panels used, they are shot with my old 12" Meade and 11" Celestron Edge scopes.
NOTE I recalculated the total exposure time and it's actually way over 600 hours.
Here is a poster format presentation and a list all of longer focal length images used for this mosaic beside the actual panels, https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2018/11/treasures-of-swan.html
I have used several optical configurations for this mosaic image during the years. Up to 2014 I was using an old Meade LX200 GPS 12" scope, QHY9 astrocam, Canon EF 200mm f1.8 camera optics and baader narrowband filter set. After 2014 I have had 10-micron 1000 equatorial mount, Apogee Alta U16 astro camera, Tokina AT-x 200mm f2.8 camera lens and the Astrodon 50mm square narrowband filter set. I have shot many details with a longer focal length, before 2014 by using Meade 12" scope with reducer and after 2014 Celestron EDGE 11" and reducer. Quider camera has been Lodestar and Lodestar II.
Here is a poster format presentation and a list all of longer focal length images used for this mosaic beside the actual panels, https://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2018/11/treasures-of-swan.html
Equipments used
Couple of close ups to show the resolution
Click for a large image
North america & pelican nebula region
Supernova remnant G65.3+5.7
Cirrus of Western Cygnus
Twit twit
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Melotte 15 in the Heart Nebula for no reason whatsoever.
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