Celestial hemisphere:  Northern  ·  Constellation: Perseus (Per)  ·  Contains:  46 Per)  ·  California Nebula  ·  NGC 1499  ·  The star 49 Per  ·  The star 50 Per  ·  The star 54 Per  ·  The star 55 Per  ·  The star Menkib (ξ Per
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12 panel mosaic of California Nebula, Chris Kagy
12 panel mosaic of California Nebula
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12 panel mosaic of California Nebula

Getting plate-solving status, please wait...
12 panel mosaic of California Nebula, Chris Kagy
12 panel mosaic of California Nebula
Powered byPixInsight

12 panel mosaic of California Nebula

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Description

I think monochrome images are still beautiful and can be appreciated very differently from color.  After doing several 2x2 mosaics this summer, I wanted to push a bit and do a larger one, so I targeted the California Nebula. My aim from the start was a monochrome image, and I wanted to show the nebula in context, surrounded by emptiness.  I didn't expect to find the faint arc of Ha that is in the top left of the photo, so there is definitely more out there to discover.

A mosaic this size can be forgiving - I shot 1 hour each panel in Ha, knowing I could absorb some noise because I would downsize the final image by at least 50%.

The panels were integrated in PI, run though Graxpert for gradient reduction and conversion to .fits, the mosaic itself assembled in AstroPixelProcessor, and then post-processed back in PI.

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12 panel mosaic of California Nebula, Chris Kagy

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NOVAC