The California Nebula

The California nebula is in the constellation of Perseus and is an emission nebula that is supposed to resemble the state of California. Its glowing red due to the large star at the top of the image named Menkhib, which is one of the hottest stars in the night sky at six times the temperature of the Sun. Its relatively close, between 1000 and 1500 light years away and only just fits in the frame.
I use an ASTRONOMIK CLS VISUAL Light pollution CLIP-FILTER in front of my Canon 40d astro-modded sensor which blocks light pollution like street lights but allows H-Alpha wave lengths which are red in colour such as ionised hydrogen.

M33 Triangulum galaxy or NGC 598

M33 Triangulum galaxy is sometimes called the Pinwheel galaxy. Its a spiral galaxy 3 million light years away in the constellation of Triangulum. It contains some 40 billion stars and is about 60,000 light years across.Triangulum is the third largest galaxy in our local group after Andromeda and The Milky Way. It is just visible to the naked eye but only with very good vision and  very dark skies.Its currently interacting with Andromeda and in a few billion years may collide with it and us.

NGC 891 (Caldwell 23) Edge on Barred Galaxy

Whilst the Andromeda Galaxy is only 2.5 million light years away, this little gem is 30 million light years away (so the light hitting my telescope has travelled for 30 million years to reach me). Scientists believe that this galaxy closely resembles our own galaxy The Milky Way.
Discovered in October of 1784 by William Herschell its found in the constellation of Andromeda and is part of a group of galaxy's called NGC 1023. Its very faint with an apparent magnitude of 10.8, so cannot be seen with the naked eye.
This image was taken at ISO 800 with a total exposure time of 1hr 44 minutes.

Moonrise at Knowlton Church Ruins

 Knowlton Church is a ruined Norman church built within a neolithic henge monument. Its a beautiful place a short distance from Wimborne. Supposedly one of the most haunted places in Dorset with stories of a galloping horse and rider as well as a praying nun kneeling within the church.

Andromeda Galaxy M31

It was a moonlit night so I decided to aim the scope in the other direction and chose this beautiful Galaxy. I always shoot deep sky at ISO 1600, normally around 240 seconds but on this night I thought I would change the ISO to 800 and extend the exposure time accordingly.

After a few test shot I decided 6 minutes (360 secs) brought the histogram peak to just past a third of the way along the base line.I normally expose like this at the start of the session.

As the sky gets darker the peak moves slightly back past the third point.






Reducing the ISO value reduces the sensitivity of the sensor and decreases the noise in the image.
As the scope was guiding accurately and the wind was minimal, tracking a star for 6 minutes was easy. After stacking 16 x  6 minute sub together with Flats, Darks and Bias frames there seemed to be more data in the image for stretching. This could be because my camera has been astro modified and has a light pollution filter but I will definitely be using ISO 800 again.

The Pelican Nebula (IC5070 & IC5067)

The Pelican Nebula taken this morning. Its 1800 light years away and 22 light years across in the constellation of Cygnus. Millions of years from now this enormous, hot, gas cloud will look completely different from the way it looks now. I wonder what it will look like then?
13 x 240 second exposures (52 minutes). 20 of each darks, Bias and Flat frames.
Equipment :
* Sky-Watcher Evostar-80ED DS PRO telescope with 0.85 focal reducer.
* Modified Canon 40D with Astonomik CLS light pollution filter.
* Sky-Watcher ST80 Guide scope & ZWOASI120mc camera.
* DIY Dew heaters and DIY Controller with dew sensor.
* Sky-Watcher HEQ5 PRO SynScan mount.
* EQASCOM software for remote mount control.
* Backyard EOS imaging software.
* Stellarium Scope & Stellarium software for Scope control  .
* PHD Guiding, Guiding Software
* Team Viewer to enable sitting indoors with you feet up!!

Lake Pier, Hamworthy with Milky Way

I had been planning this shot for some time and would have preferred to take a few weeks earlier when the Milky Way was in line with the pier but the weather or other commitments got in the way.
On the 22nd of August I decided to set my scope up at home and shoot the North America nebula and leave it running for an hour or so whilst I drove 5 or 6 miles to this location. The roads were very quite at midnight so it didn't take me long. When I arrived it was dark and very peaceful. The sea was very still with virtually no wind. It wasn't easy focusing as I couldn't see much in the viewfinder. Framing the image was just as difficult as I wanted to get the Pier in the middle. I was at the pier about 35 minutes then made my way back home to find the telescope still guiding perfectly and just coming up to a meridian flip. It all worked out well but next time I'm going to only do one thing at a time so I could spend more than 35 minutes here. I also want to use my home made tracking device so that I can improve the star trailing when using a tripod.

Western Veil nebula

Sometimes called the witches broom, this nebula is on the opposite side of the previous post the eastern Veil.
It is made from 72 minutes of data and for the first time I have mixed two separate days  and 6 minute and 4 minute exposures.
As usual with nebula images I have used my modified 40d and ED 80 scope guided with an ST80 scope with ZWO camera and PHD2 guiding software.

The Eastern Veil Nebula NGC 6992/95

The Eastern Veil Nebula is part of the Cygnus Loop. The loop is a remnant of a Supernova which exploded between 3000 and 6000 years BC. Its estimated to be 1470 light years away and was discovered in 1784 by William Herschel.
Using my Skywatcher ED80 I managed to get only 11 x 240 second (44 minutes) exposures due to some inconsiderate clouds so I'm really pleased with the detail in the nebula. I wonder what this object would look like with over 2 hours worth of data?  There is only one way to find out!!