Heart Nebula

Heart Nebula: IC1805 is an emission nebula in the Perseus Arm of the Galaxy, approximately 7,500 LY from Earth. Images were captured using H-alpha, OIII and SII Astrodon filters. Our image is 18 arc-minutes across, while the whole nebula spans 150 arc-minutes (our image is a small portion of the nebula).

NGC: 896
Other Catalogs: IC1805
Right Ascension: 2h 33m 22s
Declination: 61d 26m 36s
Apparent Magnitude: 18.3

Date: November 2019
Equipment:
Telescope: Meade 16" Schmidt Cassegrain with f6.3 reducer
Camera: SBIG ST-10XE
Guiding: Meade 5" refractor; Starshoot Autoguider; PHD

Exposure:
Narrow band:
7x10 min S[II], binned 2x2 (red)
9x10 min H-alpha, binned 2x2 (green)
6x10 min O[III], binned 2x2 (blue)

Processing Notes: Data acquisition with CCDSoft; Reduction, and alignment in CCDStack. Data selection and combination with Sigma Beta Combine. Slight smoothing in dimmer areas. Stars were slightly elongated in the SII narrow band images (from autoguiding issues) and were repaired in Photoshop. Overall sharpening was via unsharp mask. Slight increase in contrast was by a high-pass filter of a desaturated layer applied as an overlay. Star halos were minimized and color-balanced. Curves applied for final color balance.
Scale: 1.06"/pixel on highest resolution

Additional Comments: In the midst of the night we put our hearts into our imagination which lead us to gaze upon the the heart nebula and ponder our souls. Image by Tyler Bellison, Brandon Engle, Seth Minor, Madeline Stalder, and Dr. Charles Hakes,

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