| Date/Place | 2020-11-25 at Elijah Observatory | |
| Scope | Takahashi FSQ85ED | |
| Camera | QSI583wsg | |
| Integration | RGB - H-alpha - OIII composition RGB: 18 x 600 sec. and 18 x 10 sec. H-alpha: 24 x 1200 sec. and 24 x 40 sec. OIII: 24 x 1800 sec. and 24 x 100 sec. | |
| Comment | M42, the great Orion nebula, is one of those objects that amateur astronomers who undertake the first attempts at astrophotography try to immortalize, mainly for its brightness (it is easily visible to the naked eye even from a suburban sky). In reality this nebula, having a considerable difference in brightness between the core and the peripheral area, is very difficult to fully render in all its shades. It was also one of my first nebulae when I started with film. The last time I shot it was with the VISAC telescope and the modified Canon 450D, about 10 years ago, so I decided to do it again in a wide field with the FSQ85ED and the CCD. This is an RGB composite to which I have inserted some H-alpha and OIII frames. Also, in order not to saturate the core, I took a series of short photos, which I then added in HDR with the rest of the shots. M42 is located at a distance of about 1270 ly from the Earth, it extends for about 24 ly and is the closest star-forming region to the Solar System. The Orion Nebula contains within it a very young open cluster, known as the Trapezium. Inside the nebula, the Hubble Space Telescope has discovered numerous protoplanetary disks. |
