Iris Nebula LBN 487, Cluster NGC 7023 and Surrounding Dust (Jeff Rothstein)

Celestial hemisphere: Northern · Constellation: Cepheus (Cep) · Contains: Iris Nebula · NGC 7023

Iris Nebula LBN 487, Cluster NGC 7023 and Surrounding Dust, Jeff Rothstein

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Iris Nebula LBN 487, Cluster NGC 7023 and Surrounding Dust

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Iris Nebula LBN 487, Cluster NGC 7023 and Surrounding Dust

The Iris Nebula is a bright reflection nebula in the constellation Cepheus. The nebula is blue due to SAO 19158, the star illuminating it. As reflection nebulae go, the Iris is bright at magnitude +6.8. Compare that to the Witch Head Nebula, another reflection nebula, at magnitude +13. With that brightness the nebula was easy to capture in my small refractor. The hard part was the dark interstellar dust surrounding it. I was careful to shoot only on moonless nights, and I used only an Optolong L-Pro filter to suppress some light pollution from my Bortle 5 backyard.

I found this data difficult to process; it was hard to bring out the dark dust while keeping the blue reflection nebula at a good exposure. With the help of various YouTube videos and online tips, I brought up the dust without masking the nebula. I used the Color option of Generalized Hyperbolic Stretch, in very small steps, to retain the rich blue. I also was able to enhance the dust while leaving the nebula mostly alone with Power of Inverted Pixels. I then masked the blue and worked alternately on the bright and dark parts of the image with Curves and Color Saturation.

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Status	Basic success
Started	...
Astrometry.net job	8540771
PixInsight job	n/a
PixInsight queue size	n/a
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Iris Nebula LBN 487, Cluster NGC 7023 and Surrounding Dust

Iris Nebula LBN 487, Cluster NGC 7023 and Surrounding Dust

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Iris Nebula LBN 487, Cluster NGC 7023 and Surrounding Dust

Iris Nebula LBN 487, Cluster NGC 7023 and Surrounding Dust

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