Image Data :
Camera : SBIG ST2000XM
Telescope : Williams Optics 72mm Magrez APO
Mount : Paramount ME
Total Exposure : 1 hour
Sub Frames : 12 x 5 min
Auto Guiding : No
Filters : Deep Sky Filter
Image Capture Software : CCDSoft
Processing Software : CCDStack, Iris
Other Designations : None Date : 4th January 2009
 Image Data :
Camera : SBIG ST2000XM
Telescope : Williams Optics 72mm Magrez APO
Mount : Paramount ME
Total Exposure : 55 min
Sub Frames : 4 x 10 min and 1 x 15 min
Auto Guiding : Yes
Filters : Ha
Image Capture Software : CCDSoft
Processing Software : CCDStack, Iris
Other Designations : None
Date : 26th July 2009
 Image Data :
Camera : SBIG ST2000XM
Telescope : Williams Optics 72mm Magrez APO
Mount : Paramount ME
Total Exposure : 3 hours 25 min
Sub Frames : 55 min Ha (4 x 10 min and 1 x 15 min), 80 min OIII (8 x 10 min), 70 min SII (7 x 10 min)
Auto Guiding : Yes
Filters : Ha, OII, SII (Astronomik)
Image Capture Software : CCDSoft
Processing Software : CCDStack, Iris, Photoshop CS2
Object Information : The Elephants Trunk is a mixture of dust and non-luminous gas winding through the Emission Nebula IC 1396 in Cepheus. The trunk is faint in this image and can be seen as vertical a dark lane in the centre of the image. The second image above was taken with a Ha filter and the clear difference in quality and detail can be seen. The 3rd is the Hubble set completed in September 2009. This is my first colour image and my first Narrowband image. I expect as my image processing improves so will this picture.
The Elephant's Trunk nebula is a concentration of interstellar gas and dust in the star cluster IC 1396 and ionized gas region located in the constellation Cepheus about 2,400 light years away from Earth. The piece of the nebula shown here is the dark, dense globule IC 1396A; it is commonly called the Elephant Trunk nebula because of its appearance at visible wavelengths, where it is a dark patch with a bright, sinuous rim. The bright rim is the surface of the dense cloud that is being illuminated and ionized by a very bright, massive star that is just to the west of IC 1396A. The entire IC 1396 region is ionized by the massive star, except for dense globules that can protect themselves from the star's harsh ultraviolet rays. The Elephant Trunk nebula is now thought to be site of star formation, containing several very young (less than 100,000 yr) stars that were discovered in infrared images in 2003. Two older (but still young, a couple of million years, by the standards of stars, which live billions of years) stars are present in a small, circular cavity in the head of the globule. Winds from these young stars may have emptied the cavity. The combined action of the light from the massive star ionizing and compressing the rim of the cloud, and the wind from the young stars shifting gas from the center outward lead to very high compression in the Elephant Trunk nebula. This pressure has triggered the current generation of protostars. Information care of Wikipedia | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||