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Hi all,
A new version (3rd, one in wide field and two in HiRes) of Messier 17 has been uploaded. I finally decided to capture this nebula with the usual (and very reliable) CDK 20″. The image was taken in narrowband (Halpha and OIII, mapped to natural color). You can find it at:
Enjoy!
Josep
Hi all,
I promised another post when these new bubbles had been confirmed. Three astrophotographers, Andrealuna Pizzetti, Tel Lekatsas and Christian Sasse have, independently, taken Ha pictures of this region, in order to try to confirm the existence of this bubbles. The integration of all their 19x600s images (see image here), taken with another 20″ telescope, shows the same bubbles’ position and shape, confirming them.
Next step will be the process of trying to get this nebulosity registered in any kind of catalog. I will keep you posted.
Best regards,
Josep
Hi all,
A new image has been uploaded. This time, a planetary nebula, NGC 6302, also called the Bug Nebula or the Butterfly nebula, has been the chosen object. This nebula presents several unique characteristics, such an extremely hot central white dwarf (250,000 ºC, one of the hottest recorded). The central star had not been seen or photographically captured until 2009 (Hubble Telescope) due to a very dark central dust torus. The image has been taken in narrowband and mapped to natural colors.
You can find it at:
Enjoy,
Josep
Hi all,
A new image has been uploaded. IC 2220 is an unusual reflection nebula, it is not blue but reddish orange. This is due to the fact that the nebular gas is reflecting the light of a Red Giant. But this image has an additional object around IC 2220, a bubble-like nebulosity that is extremely faint and only captured in images taken with an Halpha filter (very unusual to capture reflection nebulae). I have not yet found any mention, image or reference to these bubbles. I will keep you posted if I find anything. As my daughter Anna (10 years old) was the first one to notice it, I have dubbed these bubbles: Anna’s Nebula (also with some father’s pride…).
You will find the image and the explanations at:
Enjoy,
Josep
Hi all,
This time, the image that has been uploaded depicts a galaxy. NGC 4945 is not that far away, 11 Mly and, therefore, it shows a great deal of detail. It definitely resembles NGC 253 due to its dust lanes and angle of vision from here. This galaxy has a very active nucleus (it is considered to be a Seyfert 2 galaxy). You can find it at:
Enjoy,
Josep
Hi all,
A new image has been uploaded. This time, it is a very young open cluster (NGC 3293) surrounded by the nebulosity that originated it. Remarkable in this nebulosity is that the highly radiating stars in the cluster have not yet had enough time to carve/modify the nebulosity’s beautiful filamentary structure.
You can find it at:
Enjoy,
Josep
Hi all,
After uploading yesterday the beautiful NGC 6164, today we have another nebula that is also the result of the strong mass ejection by a massive star. This nebula has a completely different shape compared with NGC 6164, but the mechanism of formation is very similar. Neither of these nebulae are planetary nebulae, despite their appearance.
This image is a very deep one (23 hours of exposure) and shows RCW 58’s structure with fine detail. You can find it at:
Enjoy!
Josep
Hi all,
A new image, this time of the beautiful emission nebula NGC 6164 and NGC 6165 has been uploaded. This is a beautiful nebula that is the result of a massive ejection of gas (in two steps) from the central star HD 148937 (40 solar masses). This star belongs to an infrequent star type (O6.5f), with only five such stars known to us (three in our galaxy and two in the SMC). It is one of several such “bubble-like” nebulae that we can se in the sky, originated from mass ejections from massive stars like this one. More to come…
You can find it at:
Enjoy!,
Josep
Hi all,
I have uploaded a new image. In fact this image had been taken a year ago and should have been part of a 2×2 mosaic of the Eta Carina nebula. As I finally decided not to pursue this larger mosaic, but I liked this region, I have processed it and posted in the web site. The interesting part of this image (this time, also exceptionally, color mapped with the Hubble Palette) is that it contains as many as 10 Herbig Haro objects (all of them visible in the annotated copy), many YSOs and lots of filamentary dark nebulae. You can find it at:
NGC 3372. Caldwell 92. A Fragment
Enjoy! Best regards,
Josep
Hi all,
Another joint project has been uploaded. This time, Aleix Roig and I have joined to get a wide field image (taken with Aleix’s FSQ85) of NGC 2237 (The Rosette) enhanced with higher resolution images taken with the CDK 20″. The different filters have been mapped to natural color.
You can find this image at:
NGC 2237. The Rosette Nebula. HR-Wide Field
Enjoy!
Josep
