Dark clouds over Wall Street
#Manhattan #NewYork #wallstreet

The Bat and Squid Nebula is a relatively faint emission nebula in Cepheus, a neighbor of the larger and more often imaged IC 1396 - Elephant’s Trunk Nebula.

This region is characterized by Ha emission as well as a small, mixed emission and reflection nebula (vdB 140).

What is most remarkable about this region is a recent discovery made in 2011 by Nicolas Outters, called the "Squid Nebula" due to its shape, but more officially called Ou4. This region is characterized by a very faint OIII emission that has a bipolar shape reminscent of a planetary nebula, seen as the teal-colored region just to the left of centre.

Although it was originally thought to perhaps represent a planetary nebula derived from an unknown, dying star, more recent evidence suggests that Ou4 is located within SH2-129 itself and is a bipolar outflow emitting in the OIII spectrum, moving at the same rate as SH2-129, and possibly emanating from a triple star system located in the center of Ou4 (HR8119, visible above as the bright star in the center of the Squid).

This was an absolute chore to deal with. Very faint for a OSC camera with a single filter. Took four nights, thankfully the heatwave had clear skies.

Still very faint but the squid was visible in the G and B channels, thankfully!


250x180s
Bortle 5
Berkshire, UK
FRA 500
PixInsight, Affinity

#astrophotography #astronomy #space #nebula

The Elephant Trunk Nebula. Lots of crazy things going on in the gaseous region. The Elephant's Trunk Nebula (IC 1396A) is a concentration of interstellar gas and dust within the much larger ionized gas region IC 1396 located in the constellation Cepheus about 2,400 light years away from Earth. The nebula is a dark, dense globule that gets its name from its appearance at visible light wavelengths, where there 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 multiple star (HD 206267) that is just to the east of the Elephant's Trunk Nebula . 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.

Bortle 5
Berkshire, UK

#astrophotography #astronomy #space

The Lions Head Nebula.

Sh2-132 is a large emission nebula visible in the constellation Cepheus.
It is located on the southern edge of the constellation, a short distance from the boundary with the Lizard, along the plane of the Milky Way.
Sh2-132 is located at a distance of nearly 3200 parsecs (almost 10400 light-years), thus placing it within the Perseus Arm, in the region of Cepheus OB1, a large and bright OB association. The stars responsible for the ionization of its gas are very hot and massive; in particular, two Wolf-Rayet stars have been identified, known as HD 211564 and HD 211853

123x180s
Askar FRA 500
Bortle 5
Berkshire, UK

#astrophotography #astronomy #Stars #space

What could possibly go wrong…

#skynet

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.

Also visible is the IC4996 Open Cluster deep within the Milky Way and comprising over 50 stars.

Finally bottom left is SH2-124, a hot x-ray emission nebula.

#astronomy #astrophotography #nebula