Bipolar Nebula NGC 6164 - Adam Lundie - Eatons Hill Observatory

Bipolar Nebula NGC 6164

02-Jul-2019
Bipolar Nebula NGC 6164 thumbnail
Bipolar Nebula NGC 6164
4200 light years distant, NGC 6164 is a bipolar emission nebula was created by a massive O-type star, 40 times as larger than the Sun.

This long exposure, narrow-band image data, shows hydrogen (H-α) gas in red and oxygen (O-III) in blue. The stars appear as cyan due to the differing exposure lengths of H-α and O-III.

The inner nebula spans 4 light years comprised of mostly hydrogen, while the faint outer halo, shed earlier in the stars life, is predominately oxygen-III.

Image:

  • 81x 300s 6nm H-α
  • 90x 600s 6nm O-III

Total integration 21 hours, 45 minutes.

Hardware:

  • Celestron 11" EdgeHD
  • Celestron EdgeHD 0.7x focal reducer
  • Skywatcher EQ8 Pro mount
  • QSI 683-ws8 Camera @ -15°C
  • Astronomik 6nm narrowband filters
  • Starlight Xpress Lodestar X2 Autoguider
  • Starlight Xpress Active Optics
  • Innovations Foresight On Axis Guider
  • Starlight Instruments Focus Boss II

Location:

  • Imaged on 5 nights between 23rd May and 29th May 2019.
  • Orange zone in Brisbane, Australia. (Bortle 7)

Software:

  • Planning & camera alignment with Aladin 10
  • Captured with TheSkyX Professional
  • Guiding with PHD2
  • FocusLock live focusing
  • PixInsight: Calibrate, align, stack, deconvolution, pixelmath HOO combination, histogram stretch, curves, HDR multiscale transform, local histogram equalization.
  • Photoshop CC: High pass filter.

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