| Date 2017/02/21 Observation place New Mexico |
Technical
| Telescope | Takahashi FSQ 106ED, 106mm, f / 5 |
| Mount | Paramount ME |
| Imaging camera | SBIG STL 11000 regulated at -15o Celsius |
| Image type | L (RGB) (Vs for synghetic green) |
| Exhibition | Luminance (9 x 10 'bin 1 × 1), R and B (4 x 3' bin 2 × 2 each) |
| Pretreatment | Maxim DL |
| Treatment | Photoshop and PixInsight |
| Specific treatment | Create a synthetic green image |
Object description
| Object type | Emission nebula "The Seagull Nebula" |
| Constellation | La Licorne |
| Visual magnitude | +10 |
| Distance | 3800 light years |
| Diameter | 100 light years |
| Dimension seen from Earth | 120 x 40 arc minutes |
| IC 2177 is a large emission nebula. Its dimension, seen from the earth, is about four times the diameter of the full moon. It is called the Seagull Nebula for its great resemblance to this bird. The head of the nebula is also listed NGC2327 in the NGC catalog. This cosmic cloud favors the formation of new stars. It is located 3800 light years from the earth. The nebula has a diameter of about 100 light years. It also contains several open clusters – NGC 2343, NGC 2335, Collinder 465 and Collinder 466. The visual magnitude of this nebula being +10, it is very difficult to observe in a telescope, even in a place with little light pollution. Also, it is obstructed by the very large number of stars that compose it. Thus, the wings of the nebula are virtually impossible to see, even with a large diameter telescope. On the other hand, we can see the head of the nebula (NGC2327) which contains fewer stars. In my image, which was taken in a wide field of view, we can see the wings of the Seagull nebula very well. It is not easy to find these details due to the very large number of bright stars that are part of the wings. I then favored a long exposure time for the luminance image (1,5 hours) to get these details. Subsequently, I had to use techniques to reduce the luminance and the size of the stars, which made it possible to better bring out the details of the gases and dust of the wings of the nebula. |
| Richard Beauregard Sky Astro - CCD My impression: “We cannot be alone in this gigantic universe.” |