Further Images

On Thursday 27th February 2025 we had our first successful Observing Session since November 2022!

As well as the scopes and binoculars members had brought, Francis had set up his portable tracking mount with a colour camera on the end of a Samyang f2 135mm lens. This combination gives a really wide view of the night sky. With some nifty software, Francis was accumulating live images of beautiful nebulae. Here's what he captured on the night:

California nebula

Spaghetti nebula

Simeis 147, also known as Sh2-240 or “Spaghetti nebula”, is a supernova remnant. The nebula is quite large and its shape is fairly spherical. It is located between Auriga and Taurus.

M42 - IC434 - M78

A wonderful widefield view of Orion - M42 towards the bottom; the Running Man just above; the Horse Head in the middle, just below the Flame Nebula; and the great swirl of Barnard's Loop on the left hand side.

Rosette - Cone

Here Francis framed the Rosette nebula at the bottom and the Cone nebula at the top

Messier 66 (M66)

Also known as NGC 3627 is an intermediate spiral galaxy in the southern half of Leo. This galaxy is a member of a small group of galaxies that includes M65 and NGC 3628, known as the Leo Triplet. M66 has a morphological classification of SABb indicating a spiral shape with a weak bar feature and loosely wound arms. Text from Wikipedia, imaged by Steve Foulkes in Fownhope near Hereford.

Comet C/2023 A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS

Chris mentioned at our October talk that here is a comet exciting observers at the moment - Comet C/2023 A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS. Visible after sunset, low down in the western skies - our members have reported it's difficult to see without binoculars - but worth it.

David has just submitted this wonderful image of the comet taken at about 7:30pm at home in Clyro. David used a ZWO ASI 533 camera with his 80mm f4.8 triplet scope. To build this image he took 27x 30 second photos stacked and processed.

We have been treated to some wonderful Auroral displays this year. Several members managed to capture the recent display on 10th October.

Francis took this series of images from Kingstone sports field where the display started as a green/slightly blue dome to the north then gradually reds appeared from the east and spread across the sky until fading in the west. He used a static Nikon DSLR on a tripod with no filters. Exposures ranged from 6 to 30 seconds and varied depending on the ISO setting used. Aperture remained at f3.5:

and Chris Baddiley took this series of images using his mast mounted all sky camera running continuous 30 second exposures:

Keith took a time sequence video of the last display on 10th October:

Keith has been peering (using suitable equipment) at the sun during the current "solar maximum" activity. Here's a lovely image of a solar flare with an overlaid image of earth to appreciate the scale of these eruptions!

Here Keith has created an animation of a big and bright CME:

Francis has sent in a stunning image focusing on the Squid Nebula sitting inside the Flying Bat Nebula. This is a tough imaging target - one of Francis's longest imaging runs requiring 14.25 hours of scope time. With his dual imaging rig, this "only" took 7 hours of his time to capture the data. One scope captured Ha and OIII narrowband data, the other scope captured SII and OIII narrowband data.

The image is built up from 171 sub frames of 5 minutes each. These are all processed and stacked using PixInsight software. To make the Squid really stand out, Francis created a mask the same shape as the squid to allow him to hold back or enhance the processing of the squid and it's background. Francis's processing workflow has him removing the stars from the stacked image early on so that he can get the nebulosity looking good, then adding the stars back in at the end to produce the final image. Fabulous! We've shown both the final image and the starless version below:

The Flying Bat Nebula (Sh2-129) and Squid Nebula (Ou4)

The Squid is a fairly recent discovery by French amateur astronomer Nicolas Outters in 2011. The blue emission is from doubly ionised Oxygen atoms the red is from Hydrogen. Sh2-129 is about 1,300 light years away with Ou4 sitting behind some 2,300 light years away. They are located within the Cepheus region.

Keith has been out under the stars again and was lucky enough to have clear skies to view the wonderful Auroral displays in August. He's also been under Francis's tutelage to learn how to enhance a nebula image using PixInsight - dramatic improvement in clarity of the nebula. Lastly, Keith has captured the Tulip nebula SH2-101 in Cygnus:

NGC6888

Crescent Nebula is an emission nebula in the constellation Cygnus.

Keith has used PixInsight to process his original image (left) to significantly reduce the intensity of the stars and so reveal far more detail of the nebula itself (right).

SH2-101 Tulip Nebula

Sharpless 101 (Sh 2-101) is a H II region emission nebula located in the constellation Cygnus. It was catalogued by astronomer Stewart Sharpless in his 1959 catalogue of nebulae. (Wikipedia)

Francis has been busy again and looking forward to longer and darker nights. He's sent us two images taken earlier in July using a dual mount rig. Francis has two Askar 120 APO refractors with 0.8x reducers giving 672mm focal length and f5.6 focal ratio. To capture the nebulosity Francis has used a dual Ha/OIII 6nm narrow band filter. Francis took 22x 120s subs (44 mins) for the Veil nebula and 26x 120s subs (52 mins) for the North American nebula:

Veil Nebula near and including NGC6960

The Veil Nebula is a cloud of heated and ionized gas and dust in the constellation Cygnus.

It constitutes the visible portions of the Cygnus Loop, a supernova remnant, many portions of which have acquired their own individual names and catalogue identifiers like NGC6960. (Wikipedia)

North American Nebula NGC7000

The North America Nebula (NGC 7000 or Caldwell 20) is a large emission nebula in the constellation Cygnus, close to Deneb. It is named because its shape resembles North America. (Wikipedia)

In this image, you can see how the nebula gets its name - Mexico and Central America at the bottom, Gulf of Mexico to the right and a rather stubby Miami to the right!

James has sent in some great photos of the sunspots that led to the wonderful auroral displays viewed across the UK in May. It shows you don't need to spend thousands of pounds on equipment - James took these photos on a normal camera using his home made 6" Dobsonian telescope. He made a simple projection box that projects an image of the sun from the eyepiece onto tracing paper - then simply take a photo of the image on the projection box! Great photos even though it was beginning to cloud over.

June 2024: After months of dull, wet, cloudy weather Francis and Keith have been busy imaging.

The first image is a glorious wide field of M8 and M20 from Francis:

"Long wait for this pair to clear some trees and then almost too late as the sky brightened far too quickly. I know Martin likes some blurb so there's the teckie bits... Scope: Askar 120 APO with a 0.8x flattener/reducer fitted giving a focal length of 672mm and a focal ratio of f5.6 Camera: ZWO. ASI 2600 MC Duo gain 101 with an offset of 50, uncooled (I forgot to set the cooler!) Mount: an iOptron CEM 60 (non EC) pier mounted and housed in a roll-off-roof observatory. These are the lowest objects I can capture from my observatory and probably next year they will be obstructed by a cherry tree right on my meridien line..."

M8 - Lagoon Nebula & M20 - Trifid Nebula

The Lagoon Nebula (aka Messier 8, NGC 6523, Sharpless 25, RCW 146, and Gum 72) is a giant interstellar cloud in the constellation Sagittarius. It is classified as an emission nebula and has an H II region. The Lagoon Nebula was discovered by Giovanni Hodierna before 1654 and is one of only two star-forming nebulae faintly visible to the eye from mid-northern latitudes. Within the nebula is the open cluster NGC 6530.
(Wikipedia)

M20

The Trifid Nebula (aka Messier 20, NGC 6514) is an H II region in the north-west of Sagittarius in a star-forming region in the Milky Way's Scutum–Centaurus Arm. It was discovered by Charles Messier on June 5, 1764. Its name means 'three-lobe' - disappointingly it's not named after John Wyndham's "The Day of the Triffids"!

The object is an unusual combination of an open cluster of stars, an emission nebula (red), a reflection nebula (blue), and a dark nebula (the apparent 'gaps' in the former that cause the trifurcated appearance). The cover of the King Crimson album “Islands” depicts an image of the Trifid Nebula.
(Wikipedia)

June 2024: A few days later, Francis was again out all night under the darkish skies:

"The night started off with a long wait, waiting for a reasonable level of darkness and then some waiting for objects to rise over my neighbour's roof line but that gave me a chance to image the Coathanger cluster (Cr399) with NGC6802 to its left. I've included it in many widefield images but in all the years I've been imaging this is the first time I can remember actually imaging it in its own right. To see it as a Coathanger, you need to view upside down. The Coathanger was imaged simply with a UV/IR cut filter. Next to clear the roof was NGC6888 this was imaged with a dual narrow band filter in H-Alpha and Oxygen III wave bands (6nm each) I've processed this with and without its starfield to show the bubble nebula better. M16 and M17 had now cleared the trees to the south so I have a quick session with them before packing in around 2:45 with a smile on my face for once..."

Cr399 - Brocchi's Cluster

Cr399 is a distinctive cluster in the south of the constellation Vulpecula, near the constellation Sagitta. Depending when you were born ... it was known as Al Sufi's Cluster (964), Brocchi's Cluster (1920s), Collinder 399 (1931) or now, more commonly, as the Coathanger. None of these ten stars are believed to be gravitationally bound to each other, thus they are not a star cluster, a fact established by the Hipparcos measurements 1997.
(Wikipedia)

NGC 6888 - Crescent Nebula

The Crescent Nebula (also known as NGC 6888, Caldwell 27, Sharpless 105) is an emission nebula in the constellation Cygnus, about 5000 light-years away from Earth. It was discovered by William Herschel in 1792. It is formed by the fast stellar wind from the Wolf-Rayet star WR 136 (HD 192163) colliding with and energizing the slower moving wind ejected by the star when it became a red giant around 250,000 to 400,000 years ago. The result of the collision is a shell and two shock waves, one moving outward and one moving inward. The inward moving shock wave heats the stellar wind to X-ray-emitting temperatures. Francis' processing to show the nebula without its starfield emphasises the different elements in the nebulosity (H-Alpha red, Oxygen III blue)
(Wikipedia)

M17 - Omega Nebula

The Omega Nebula, also known as the Swan Nebula, Checkmark Nebula, Lobster Nebula, and the Horseshoe Nebula (aka Messier 17, NGC 6618) is an H II region in the constellation Sagittarius. It was discovered by Philippe Loys de Chéseaux in 1745. Charles Messier catalogued it in 1764. It lies in the northern two-thirds of Sagittarius.
(Wikipedia)

M16 - Eagle Nebula

The Eagle Nebula (aka Messier 16, NGC 6611, Star Queen Nebula) is a young open cluster of stars in the constellation Serpens, discovered by Jean-Philippe de Cheseaux in 1745–46. Both the "Eagle" and the "Star Queen" refer to visual impressions of the dark silhouette near the center of the nebula, an area made famous as the "Pillars of Creation" imaged by the Hubble Space Telescope. The Eagle Nebula lies in the Sagittarius Arm of the Milky Way.
(Wikipedia)

June 2024: We rather take the Moon for granted. Astrophotographers bemoan its presence as it washes out the faint details of deep sky objects. Thankfully Keith reminds us that it is a really interesting photographic object in its own right with this beautiful image of a faint glimpse of the crescent after New Moon. Keith imaged the Moon using his Altair Wave 130mm refractor and ZWO 585MC Pro camera. The moon is such a bright target that individual exposures are very short and you use software to pick out the best/clearest images to stack: 1000 x 5ms subs, "lucky imaged" 2%. Keith then processed that lost using Pixinsight and Photoshop Express.

Next Keith shows us a starless view of the Rosette nebula with really rich artistic colouring and wonderfully fine detail in the nebulosity. Keith imaged the Rosette Nebula using his Celestron 11" RASA scope. Keith's image of M63 combines data captured through his Celestron 11" Edge reflector and an Altair Wave 130mm apochromatic refractor.

C49 - Rosette Nebula

The Rosette Nebula (aka Caldwell 49) is an H II region located near one end of a giant molecular cloud in the Monoceros region of the Milky Way Galaxy.

The nebula has been noted to be having a shape reminiscent of a human skull, and is sometimes referred to as the "Skull Nebula."
(Wikipedia)

M63 - Sunflower Galaxy

The Sunflower Galaxy (aka Messier 63, NGC 5055) is a spiral galaxy in the northern constellation of Canes Venatici with approximately 400 billion stars. M63 was first discovered by the French astronomer Pierre Méchain, then later verified by his colleague Charles Messier on June 14, 1779. In the mid-19th century, Anglo-Irish astronomer Lord Rosse identified spiral structures within the galaxy, making this one of the first galaxies in which such structure was identified.
(Wikipedia)

February 2024: Francis has taken advantage of the recent clear nights to take some more wonderful images that show what you can do with recent image processing software. For those interested in the more technical side, he has included some notes on how he took and processed the images. Enjoy!

M42 The Great Orion Nebula

The Orion Nebula (also known as Messier 42, M42, or NGC 1976) is a diffuse nebula situated in the Milky Way, being south of Orion's Belt in the constellation of Orion,and is known as the middle "star" in the "sword" of Orion.

It is one of the brightest nebulae and is visible to the naked eye in the night sky with apparent magnitude 4.0. It is 1,344 ± 20 light-years (412.1 ± 6.1 pc) away and is the closest region of massive star formation to Earth. The M42 nebula is estimated to be 24 light-years across (so its apparent size from Earth is approximately 1 degree). It has a mass of about 2,000 times that of the Sun. Older texts frequently refer to the Orion Nebula as the Great Nebula in Orion or the Great Orion Nebula. (Wikipedia)

M42 "Starless"

Francis' notes:

M42 The Great Orion Nebula. Captured on February 26th 2024.

The telescope: an Askar 120mm refractor focal length 840mm reduced to 672mm with a 0.8x reducer. An Astronomic L2 UV-IR blocking filter was used along with an ASI 2600 MC Duo camera for the captures.

These comprised: 25x 60s subs, 20x 25s subs, 20x 10s subs and 15x 5s subs (circa 38 mins total exposure).

All the sub exposures were grouped together and registered in PixInsight (PI) software then merged to form an image including the stars. Stars and background were then separated with PI, further enhanced and finally recombined for the final image.

February 2024: Keith managed to image one of the brightest comets as it comes to visit us every 71 years - terrific image showing the structure in it's tail. Keith has lovely dark skies between Hereford and Hay-on-Wye and was lucky enough to see the recent aurora - captured on his "all sky" camera. Enjoy!

Comet 12P Pons Brooks

12P/Pons–Brooks is a periodic comet with an orbital period of 71 years. It fits the classical definition of a Halley-type comet with an orbital period between 20 and 200 years, and is also one of the brightest known periodic comets, reaching an absolute visual magnitude ~5 in its approach to perihelion. Comet Pons-Brooks was discovered at Marseilles Observatory in July 1812 by Jean-Louis Pons, and then later recovered in 1883 by William Robert Brooks. (Wikipedia)

Aurora Borealis

An aurora is a natural light display in Earth's sky, predominantly seen in high-latitude regions (around the Arctic and Antarctic). Auroras display dynamic patterns of brilliant lights that appear as curtains, rays, spirals, or dynamic flickers covering the entire sky.

Ed: check out the AuroraWatch UK app from Lancaster University’s Department of Physics. It gives you live updates and alerts of high geomagnetic activity.

January 2024: Keith's answer to all the cloudy nights is to look at the sun instead. Here are a couple of images of the sun using an Altair Starwave 80mm Triplet APO refractor with a Herschel wedge and 7nm Ha filter for the whole disc.

Keith took close up images of the sun using a Quark Express Ha tuning etalon on his Altair Starwave 80mm Triplet APO refractor. Amazing the detail you can see of the surface and prominences. If you don't have much time between the clouds at night, try imaging the planets. Here's Keith's first go at processing an image of Jupiter - fab view with the bands, GRS, Io and Io's shadow cast on Jupiter's disc.

Keith's been processing some older deep sky images with lovely results:

Horsehead Nebula

The Horsehead Nebula is a small dark nebula in the constellation Orion. The nebula is located just to the south of Alnitak, the easternmost star of Orion's Belt, and is part of the much larger Orion molecular cloud complex. (Wikipedia)

To the left of the Horsehead in Keith's image, is NGC 2024, the Flame Nebula. The Flame Nebula is a bright emission nebula lit by the bright star Alnitak.

M1 Crab nebula

The Crab Nebula is a supernova remnant and pulsar wind nebula in the constellation of Taurus. The common name comes from a drawing that somewhat resembled a crab with arms produced by William Parsons, 3rd Earl of Rosse, in 1842 or 1843 using a 36-inch telescope. The nebula was discovered by English astronomer John Bevis in 1731. It corresponds with a bright supernova recorded by Chinese astronomers in 1054 as a guest star. The nebula was the first astronomical object identified that corresponds with a historically-observed supernova explosion. (Wikipedia)

September 2023: Francis has been busy and produced another set of wonderful images. For those interested in the more technical side, he's included some notes on how he took and processed the images. Enjoy!

Sharpless 122 (Sh2-122)

The Sharpless catalogue is a list of 313 H II regions (emission nebulae). The first edition was published in 1953 with 142 objects (Sh1), and the second and final version was published by US astronomer Stewart Sharpless in 1959 with 312 objects. Sharpless also includes some planetary nebulae and supernova remnants, in addition to H II regions.

Near the bright star Markab in Pegasus, SH-122 sits in a rich area of small galaxies. (Wikipedia)

Francis' notes:

10x 300s sub frames Orion Optics VX10 f4.8 newtonian reflector. Camera ASI2600MC DUO one shot colour camera cooled to -5°C.

An Askar Ha/OIII 6nm narrowband filter was used for this image to lift the nebula from the background. Frames were sorted, aligned and stacked in PI. the stars were then removed from the image and the background and star images worked on separately. Masks were also used for the background nebula image to maintain and enhance the colour contrast gained with the filter. The star image was given a saturation boost before being recombined with the background.

M20 - The Trifid Nebula

The Trifid Nebula (catalogued as Messier 20 and as NGC 6514) is an H II region in the north-west of Sagittarius in a star-forming region in the Milky Way's Scutum-Centaurus Arm. It was discovered by Charles Messier on June 5, 1764. Its name means 'three-lobe' (botany). (Wikipedia)

Francis' notes:

Comprised 10 x 300s subframes through UV/IR Baader filter and an Altair RC8 reflector.

Processing in PixInsight. No masks just use of saturation and curve transformations to accentuate the different parts of the nebula.

NGC 7331 and Stephan's Quintet

NGC 7331, also known as Caldwell 30, is an unbarred spiral galaxy about 40 million light-years (12 Mpc) away in the constellation Pegasus. It was discovered by William Herschel in 1784.

Bottom right you can see Stephan's Quintet, a visual grouping of five galaxies of which four form the first compact galaxy group ever discovered. The group was discovered by Édouard Stephan in 1877 at the Marseille Observatory. (Wikipedia)

Francis' notes:

10x 300s sub frames Orion Optics VX10 f4.8 Newtonian reflector. Camera ASI2600MC DUO one shot colour camera cooled to -5°C.

Frames were sorted, aligned and stacked in PI. the stars were then removed from the image and the background and star images worked on separately before being recombined.

NGC 7000 - The Wall

The North America Nebula (NGC 7000 or Caldwell 20) is a large emission nebula in the constellation Cygnus, close to Deneb. It is named because its shape resembles North America. The dramatic feature of the nebula captured by Francis is known as The Cygnus Wall (Wikipedia)

Francis' notes:

Shorter sub frames (15 x 60s) used for the Wall. Mainly to try and reduce the sky background as this was shot early September with a bright moon, a few days after its full phase.

Processing in PI. Masked for red and blue areas. Red to lift the nebula, blue to suppress the sky background.

LDN 1235 - The Shark Nebula

LDN 1235, the Shark Nebula, is a dark/reflection nebula in the constellation Cepheus. The Shark Nebula is made up of interstellar dust, which is so thick it hides most of the light from behind it. Dark nebulae like this one are often difficult to process because they are extremely faint, and are difficult to bring out from the background medium due to how dark they are. These deep sky objects are also almost colourless, so you really cannot enhance any of the individual colours throughout the image. (Galactic Hunter)

Francis' notes:

Imaged With RASA 8 inch scope. Baader UV/IR cut filter and 60 x 300second sub frames.

Sub frames sorted, aligned and stacked in PixInsight. Colour processing also in PI but using a grayscale luminance mask to control highlights and shadow areas. Reversing the mask to work on either highlights or shadows as required. Final crop and resizing.

June 2023: Francis and Keith caught some terrific images of the recent supernova - SN-2023ixf. Francis' image is left below; Keith has produced a little video that has a "before and after" view of M101 - clearly shows the location of the Supernova.

Supernova in M101 - SN 2023ixf

On 19th May, Koichi Itagaki discovered a supernova in the nearby face on spiral galaxy M101, given the designation SN 2023ixf. The supernova was discovered at magnitude 14.9 and had brightened to 12th magnitude by the night of 20th/21st May.

SN 2023ixf is a type II supernova. These are the end of life of a massive star. The star runs out of fuel for nuclear fusion in its core, which leads to the rapid collapse of the core triggering a violent thermonuclear explosion that destroys the star.

(There's a before/after image on the BAA website to show the exact position of the Supernova: BAA)

Here's the first contribution to the HAS website from another member who's recently taken up astrophotography. David has built an impressive imaging rig in a new observatory and is starting to get some great results. He's allowed us to publish a lovely image from Orion that centres on the Horsehead Nebula but also beautifully captures the reflection nebula NGC 2023 (to the left) and the Flame Nebula (NGC 2024 far left). We're looking forwards to seeing lots more great images from David!

Horsehead Nebula (Barnard 33)

The Horsehead Nebula (also known as Barnard 33) is a small dark nebula in the constellation Orion. The nebula is located just to the south of Alnitak, the easternmost star of Orion's Belt, and is part of the much larger Orion molecular cloud complex. It appears within the southern region of the dense dust cloud known as Lynds 1630, along the edge of the much larger, active star-forming H II region called IC 434. (Wikipedia)

Francis has managed to get out and do a bit of astrophotography. Here's a lovely image of the Headphone nebula (PK164+31.1) or Jones-Emberson-1. He produced this in just 13x 300s sub frames through his RASA scope with the final image processed in PixInsight with a tweak in Photoshop.

Francis has managed to produce an image with normal false colouring for the nebulosity but retained the real colours of the stars and galaxies in the background. Fab job.

Can't help but notice how more of our astro-images now "feature" satellite trails. Multiple sub-frames help to reduce their impact and there are some tools that help us reduce their impact. Is this light pollution, real life or art?

Jones-Emberson 1 (Headphone Nebula)

Jones-Emberson 1 (PK 164+31.1), also known as the Headphone Nebula, is a 14th magnitude planetary nebula in the constellation Lynx at a distance of 1600 light years. It is a larger planetary with low surface brightness. The 16.8-magnitude central star is a very blue white dwarf.

Discovered in 1939 by Rebecca Jones and Richard M. Emberson, its "PK" designation comes from the names of Czechoslovakian astronomers Luboš Perek and Luboš Kohoutek, who in 1967 created an extensive catalog of all of the planetary nebulae known in the Milky Way as of 1964. The numbers indicate the position of the object on the sky. ("PK 164+31.1" basically represents the planetary nebula that when using the galactic coordinate system has a galactic longitude of 164 degrees, a galactic latitude of +31 degrees, and is the first such object in the Perek-Kohoutek catalog to occupy that particular one square degree area of sky).
(Wikipedia)

Before our February talk, Keith showed us some of the brilliant photos he's taken of the comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF).

He's sent us his best photo of the comet taken on 25th January. To produce this image Kieth took over 70 sixty second sub-exposures using an 8” RASA (Rowe Ackermann Schmidt Astrograph) with Altair 26C OSC camera.

C/2022 E3 (ZTF)

C/2022 E3 (ZTF) is a long-period comet from the Oort cloud that was discovered by the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) on 2 March 2022. The comet has a bright green glow around its nucleus, due to the effect of sunlight on diatomic carbon and cyanogen. The comet's systematic designation starts with C to indicate that it is not a periodic comet, and "2022 E3" means that it was the third comet to be discovered in the first half of March 2022.

The comet nucleus was estimated to be about a kilometre in size, rotating every 8.7 hours. Its tails of dust and gas extended for millions of kilometres and, during January 2023, a third anti-tail was visible. (Wikipedia)

Rob has also shared a lovely view of the Lion Nebula. He describes:

"...which took me four and bit year of frustration from first trying to photograph the thing to finally succeeding toward the end of January this year.

Its slap bang in the middle of the milky way....so lots of star.....which became a sort of litmus test of whether I was going to see it on not. Less than 10,000 stars resolved probably meant the skyglow was too bright to reveal the lion. This original stacked image has around eighteen and a half thousand visible (according to pixinsight) which over the years has been a good metric for resolving the whole nebula.

Taken with a 4.5 inch refractor with Ha filter and 10 of 1000sec subs."

SH2-132 (The Lion Nebula)

SH2-132, also known as The Lion Nebula, is a rich HII region with star clusters, emission nebulae, and dark dust regions. Located in the southern portion of the constellation Cepheus, the Lion Nebula is roughly 10,00 light-years away in the Perseus Arm of the Milky Way Galaxy.

This is primarily an emission nebula with some massive stars responsible for ionizing the gas in this region. In particular, two Wolf-Rayet stars have been identified - with the designation HD 211564 and HD 211853.

Wolf-Rayet stars are huge and hot and have a white-blue coloration. These stars are at least 20 times more massive than our Sun and can be hundreds of thousands or even millions of times brighter! In addition, they tend to be eruptive and possess extremely high solar winds.

This whole region is believed to be an area of new star formation. (Patrick A. Cosgrove)

Bubble Nebula by Martin (Reprocessed from multiple data captures)

Martin's finally got around to processing some data he captured three years ago - a lovely view of the Bubble Nebula and the M52 open cluster:

NGC 7635 and M52

NGC 7635, also known as the Bubble Nebula, Sharpless 162, or Caldwell 11, is an H II region emission nebula in the constellation Cassiopeia. The "bubble" is created by the stellar wind from a massive hot, 8.7 magnitude young central star. The nebula is near a giant molecular cloud which contains the expansion of the bubble nebula while itself being excited by the hot central star, causing it to glow. It was discovered in 1787 by William Herschel. Below to the right lies the open cluster Messier 52. It was also discovered by Charles Messier somewhat earlier in 1774. (Wikipedia)

Nebulae by Keith Maslin (July 2022)

Keith was busy leading up to the summer break processing some image data from earlier in the year. It's amazing what image processing software can do - Keith's done a great bit of processing on the Veil Nebula to give two identical views - but one has all the stars removed!

Cygnus Veil Complex

The Veil Nebula - an emission nebulae in Cygnus

A Naked Veil

A dramatic interpretation of the nebula with all the stars removed.

Markarian's Chain

Markarian's Chain is a stretch of galaxies that forms part of the Virgo Cluster. When viewed from Earth, the galaxies lie along a smoothly curved line. Charles Messier first discovered two of the galaxies, M84 and M86, in 1781. The other galaxies seen in the chain were discovered by William Herschel. It was ultimately named after the Soviet astrophysicist, Benjamin Markarian, who discovered their common motion in the early 1960s. (Wikipedia)

M27

Dumbbell Nebula is a planetary nebula (nebulosity surrounding a white dwarf) in the constellation Vulpecula.

(It's great to see how members can improve their skills at (and spend lots of money on...) astrophotography. Here's a photo of M27 that Keith took a year ago!

Nebulae and Galaxy by Francis Milsom (March 2022)

Here are some more lovely photos taken by Francis. First a lovely image of the Rosette nebula taken through Francis' RASA astrograph, followed by a mono image of the open cluster NGC 2244 at the centre of the Rosette and a lovely image of The Hamburger galaxy - one of the Leo Triplet galaxies.

Rosette Nebula

The Rosette Nebula (also known as Caldwell 49) is an H II region located near one end of a giant molecular cloud in the Monoceros region of the Milky Way Galaxy. The open cluster NGC 2244 (Caldwell 50) is closely associated with the nebulosity, the stars of the cluster having been formed from the nebula's matter. (Wikipedia)

NGC3628 'The Hamburger'

NGC 3628, also known as the Hamburger Galaxy or Sarah's Galaxy, is an unbarred spiral galaxy about 35 million light-years away in the constellation Leo.

It was discovered by William Herschel in 1784.

Along with M65 and M66, NGC 3628 forms the Leo Triplet, a small group of galaxies in the constellation of Leo. (Wikipedia)

NGC 2244

NGC 2244 (also known as Caldwell 50 or the Satellite Cluster) is an open cluster in the Rosette Nebula, which is located in the constellation Monoceros. This cluster has several O-type stars, super hot stars that generate large amounts of radiation and stellar wind. (Wikipedia)

Nebulae by Keith Maslin (March 2022)

Here are some more lovely photos taken by Keith.

NGC 1499 in California

The California Nebula (NGC 1499/Sh2-220) is an emission nebula located in the constellation Perseus. The fluorescence is due to excitation of the a Hα and Hβ lines in the nebula by the nearby prodigiously energetic O7 star, Xi Persei (the bright star below the nebula in Keith's photo) (Wikipedia)

NGC 2264 a Christmas / Cone

NGC 2264 describes the two objects happily referred to as the Christmas Tree Cluster and the Cone Nebula. Keith's wide view image has the Christmas Tree in the middle of the image, the right way up but tilting alarmingly to the right with the dark Cone nebula pointing down to the left to where the fairy should be at the top of the Christmas tree!

Sh2-188 a Shrimp / NGC457

In this wide view image, Keith has framed the Shrimp Nebula (Sh2-188) top left with the open cluster NGC457 bottom right.

Sh2-188 is a planetary nebula in Cassiopeia - here imaged with the Hα emission line mapped to red in the colour image. Intriguingly, if Keith had used the Hubble Palette would we have been looking at a raw shrimp (blue/green) rather than a cooked shrimp (red)?

IC2118 a Witch

IC 2118 (also known as Witch Head Nebula due to its shape) is an extremely faint reflection nebula believed to be an ancient supernova remnant or gas cloud illuminated by nearby supergiant star Rigel in the constellation of Orion (you can't see Rigel in this image - it's out of view to the right of the Witch). (Wikipedia)

NGC2392 - an Eskimo

The Eskimo Nebula (NGC 2392) is a bipolar double-shell planetary nebula. William Herschel discovered this planetary nebula from his observatory in Slough on January 17, 1787. This nebula is a tiny object in the night sky - so good imaging Keith getting this much detail! (Wikipedia)

Comets, Nebulae and Galaxy by Francis Milsom (November 2021)

Here are some more lovely photos taken by Francis in November.

Comet 67P Churyumov-Gerasimenko

67P is a Jupiter-family comet, originally from the Kuiper belt. It was first observed on photographic plates in 1969 by Soviet astronomers Klim Ivanovych Churyumov and Svetlana Ivanovna Gerasimenko. It came to perihelion (closest approach to the Sun) on 2 November 2021 (Wikipedia)

IC348

IC 348 is a star-forming region in the constellation Perseus. It consists of nebulosity and an associated 2-million-year-old cluster of roughly 400 stars. Francis has also captured some dark nebulae extending away from the cluster (Wikipedia)

M31

The Andromeda Nebula (Messier 31), is a barred spiral galaxy approximately 2.5 million light-years from Earth and the nearest large galaxy to the Milky Way. Also showing nicely are the two satellite galaxies - M110 above to the right and M32 tucked in close below the centre of M31. To the left showing some blue nebulosity around it is Nu Andromedae (HIP 3881) - now found to be a binary star detected using spectroscopy (Wikipedia)

M42

One of the most viewed and imaged nebulae, the Orion Nebula (Messier 42) is a diffuse nebula situated in the Milky Way, being south of Orion's Belt in the constellation of Orion. It is one of the brightest nebulae and is visible to the naked eye in the night sky (Wikipedia)

Nebulae and Galaxy by Francis Milsom (July 2021)

Here are some lovely photos taken by Francis in mid-July. The night sky doesn't get astronomically dark in mid-summer, so these are great photos.

M17

Swan Nebula is an HII region in the constellation Sagittarius

NGC7331

Caldwell 30 is an unbarred spiral galaxy about 40 million light-years away in the constellation Pegasus

M20

Trifid Nebula is an H II region in the north-west of Sagittarius

Nebulae by Keith Maslin (July 2021)

Keith has been busy too - enjoying the recent clear nights to grab the Cocoon nebula after what seemed like weeks of cloud.

IC5146

Cocoon Nebula is a reflection/emission nebula and Caldwell object in the constellation Cygnus.

M27

Dumbbell Nebula is a planetary nebula (nebulosity surrounding a white dwarf) in the constellation Vulpecula

NGC6888

Crescent Nebula is an emission nebula in the constellation Cygnus

M16

Eagle Nebula is a young open cluster of stars in the constellation Serpens - made famous as the "Pillars of Creation" imaged by the Hubble Space Telescope

Partial Solar Eclipse (10th June 2021)

Unfortunately we were faced with thick cloud for the Solar Eclipse on Thursday 10th June. Some of us were lucky enough to catch a glimpse of the eclipse where the clouds thinned - here's a fab picture from Keith who managed to grap this photo in a 10 second gap in the clouds!

Emission and Dark Nebulae by Francis Milsom (November 2020)

Cygnus Veil Complex - a group of emission nebulae in Cygnus:

NGCC 7822 - a young star forming complex with an emission region featuring some "elephant trunks"!

Lynds Dark Nebula 1251 - a complex nebula in the constellation Cepheus, containing dark structures and faintly glowing / reflecting dust and gas:

Pacman, Wizard and Cocoon by Francis Milsom on 14/09/2020

IC 5146 (Cocoon) in Cygnus:

NGC 281 (Pacman) in Cassiopeia:

IC 5146 (Cocoon) in Cygnus:

Comet NEOWISE by Francis Milsom

July 2020 saw a spectacular naked eye visible comet. For us in the northern hemisphere, it was the brightest comet since Hale-Bopp 23 years ago. Designated C/2020 F3 (NEOWISE) it was only found in March looking at observations made using the orbiting Near Earth Object Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (NEOWISE) satellite.

Francis has taken some more lovely photos of the comet - here's the latest, a close up showing the two tails. The slightly blue ion tail (following the magnetic field lines created by the solar wind) below the white dust tail (trailing behind in the path of the comet):

Here's another lovely photo - this one is the comet much as you might see it with your naked eye:

Total Solar Eclipse - Tuesday 2nd July 2019 by Ken Ball

Two members of the Herefordshire Astronomical Society were lucky enough to see the 2019 Total Solar Eclipse in Chile. Ken is a proper eclipse follower - this was his eighth (?) total solar eclipse. Ken joined a party travelling way up into the Chilean Andes (Google Earth) 1,250m above sea level. Crystal clear sky and low humidity gave Ken a perfect view - both "diamond rings" (second and third contact) and totality:

For Martin this was his first total eclipse. Martin was staying on the coast and with clear skies forecast decided to stay by the beach to observe the eclipse rather than join the thousands of people making their way up small roads into the Andes. Thankfully the skies stayed clear and he too had a fantastic view of the eclipse - and watched the sun set into the Pacific over a glass of wine. Both also went up into the Atacama desert staying in San Pedro de Atacama - Ken before the eclipse and Martin after. Truly stunning night skies - here's what Martin saw:

Flame nebula and the Horsehead nebula by Francis Milsom

Here's another great astro photo by HAS member Francis Milsom. Francis has captured a lovely wide view of the Flame nebula and the Horsehead nebula on Saturday night 6th January. Taken with an unmodified DSLR (Nikon D800E).

The Pleiades by Francis Milsom

Here's a great astro photo by new HAS member Francis Milsom. Francis shot M45 (the Pleiades) on Friday night 5th January 2017.

Taken with a Nikon D5100 through a 115 EDT APO refractor, on an iEQ45 pro mount taking 15 subs: 10x 2 mins and 5x5 mins all 800iso::

Total Solar Eclipse - 21st August 2017 by Ken Ball

Ken Ball took these fantastic photographs of the Great American Eclipse at Snake River Ranch Wilson Jackson Hole Wyoming (43 32 N 110 49 W Altitude 1910m).

Equipment CANON EOS 60D DSLR Lens EFS 18-200mm hand held images cropped.

2nd Contact diamond ring - ISO 400 f9 1/640:

Mid eclipse - ISO 400 f5.6 1/20:

3rd Contact diamond ring - ISO 400 f6.3 1/320

Transit of Mercury - Monday 9th May 2016

Mark, Chris, James and David went chasing after Mercury on Monday and successfully found it initially at the M6 Sandbach Service Area and then far more comfortably outside the Robin Hood at Congleton - here are some splendid photos from their day trip:

Perfect spot to observe the Transit

Chris has spotted the Sun

James captures Second Contact (can you see it - just after 9pm?)

Mark beautifully captures Mercury against the sun's disk

Close up of Mercury near the sunspots

Total Lunar Eclipse - 28th September 2015

Wonderful observing conditions for the total eclipse of the moon in the early hours of Monday 28th September. Here are some photographs taken by HAS members.

Mark took these using his 4" Astro Tech APO refractor on SkyTee 2 mount using a Canon 50D DSLR - a lovely sequence starting with the full moon, gradually being eclipsed by the earth and finally the rusty red and orange eclipsed moon:

Martin took these using his Canon 400D DSLR with a Tamron telephoto lens (an old 500mm cat lens) on a camera tripod, showing the moon at totality and then the brightening edge of the moon as it just begins to move out of the earth's shadow:

The Perseids 2015 by Graham Russell

Graham Russell took this wonderful composite photograph of this summer's Perseid meteor shower - thanks to a break in the clouds around midnight over Kingsthorne:

Image of Comet Lovejoy C/2014 taken on 20th December 2014 by Graham Russell.

Graham used a Takahashi FSQ ED 106mm f5 with a focal length of 530mm at the Siding Spring Observatory operated by iTelescope.Net. It is a single shot 5min luminance exposure taken using the ephemeris data from the Minor Planet Center.

Two photos of sun spot activity - 2014 by Mark Chamberlain

(note they look Green because of the Baader Continuum filter used in taking the photos)

M31 Andromeda Galaxy - 2011 by Martin Stratford

The Pleiades or Seven Sisters (M45) open star cluster - 2010 by Martin Stratford

Mid-Eclipse - 2008 by Mark Chamberlain

Lunar Eclipse - 2007 by S J Watson

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