Horsehead M27
The Dumbell Nebula
Horsehead

(Click on image for Full Resolution)

(Click here for my C14/ST-9E image from 07/21/2001)


Date: August 10, 2002
Exposure: RGB 35:40:64 : 7 x 300s R, 8 x 300s G, 8 x 480s B
Processing: MaxIm DL/CCD Ver 3.07 for image acquisition, calibration, and medium combine. 10 darks medium combined for each R,G,B and 10 flats medium combined for each R,G,B with 12 bias medium combined. 8 iterations to each R,G,B set in CCDSharp, Maxim for color combine, and Photoshop for final balance and conversion to jpg for website.
Conditions: Clear sky with no wind, all shot on west side of meridian which is my darkest side.
Scope: C14 @ f/7.2 (0.72 arcsec/pix)
Camera: ST-8E w/CFW-8A, and Celestron 6.3 focal reducer
Comments: This one is my nemesis. Something always goes wrong when I go after this one. The focal reducer is at the perfect distance to produce reflections from off axis stars. You can see this in the lower right of the image. This time, when the red exposures rolled around, M27 had dropped low enough to start affecting the guiding. I had to use the red images from a previous night and the orientation was not the same. This left a deficency of red along the top of the image, but thank goodness it did not drop into the image itself. At full resolution, this is still the best I have done on this object so far. There is still time to try once again !!