Michael A. Stecker
mastecker@gmail.com



 
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IC 1396 with "Elephant Trunk" on 8-19-2023
 This large emission nebula is over 100 light-years across and 2,400 light-years from Earth.  At the upper right is IC 1396A known as the Elephant Trunk Nebula. The very bright star at the upper left is Mu Cephei "Hershael's Garnet Star" -- a
red supergiant star 100,000 time brighter than our Sun.
 file: IC1396-WO73JRFset3-RGB3A8192023-2a.jpg


Photographic Data
telescope:
William Optics ZenithStar 73 mm f/5.9 doublet refractor (focal length= 430 mm) with William Optics
Adjustable Flat73 for Z73 (P-FLAT73A)
 
mount and guiding
Astro-Physics 1200 GOTO mount with Nikkor 200 mm guide lens using a ZWO ASI120MM Mini
guide camera (2.9 micron pixels)

 imaging camera
ZWO ASI6200MM-Pro monochrome full frame cooled astro-camera

exposures
Hydrogen-alpha (110 min), Red (25 min), Green (35 min) and Blue (40 min).  The color subs were 300 seconds each and H-alpha subs 600 seconds each.
 
processing
H-aRGB acquired and stacked by James Foster.  Post-processed in Adobe Photoshop Elements by Michael Stecker.
 .
photographic site:
James Foster's observatory at Frazier Park California
 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frazier_Park,_California
(Bortle 4 at 5,000 feet elevation)
 
 
 

Crop of "Elephanf Trunk"
 
 
 
Earlier version with different back focus, camera tilt and exposure time


file: IC1396-HRGB-WO73ASI6200MM-fromJRF-1b.jpg