African West Coast Nebula in Cygnus: Processing 0.4 m RASC Robotic Telescope Data (Rick Veregin)

African West Coast Nebula in Cygnus: Processing 0.4 m RASC Robotic Telescope Data

IC5068 in Cygnus doesn’t get as much attention, dominated as it is by the North American and Pelican Nebulae. But looking to the east and south in Cygnus, the west coast of Africa, is a very picturesque swath of artistic brush strokes, boldly painted across the sky. Like its more famous counterparts in Cygnus, it is about 1600 light years distant, and dominated by a strong Hα signal.

Initially I tried the standard SHO HST palette, but the Hα was too dominant, and that green refused to be tamed. I switched to an HSO palette, then worked for a balanced RGB image. I was really pleased with the result. I would love to hear what you think of this HSO blend.

The raw images were calibrated, registered, and stacked using DeepSkyStacker. Luminance and color were developed using StarTools. In Photoshop, stars were removed using StarXTerminator, then the nebulosity detail was brought out by APF-R (used by NASA), which is a multi-scale unsharp mask. Noise was reduced using NoiseXTerminator.

The image data is from the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada Robotic Telescope, Sierra Remote Observatories and was taken June-July 2021. It is a combination of 7 h each of Hα OIII and SII, all with exposures of 30 minutes each.

Sierra Remote Observatories, Auberry, California
RCOS 16" f/8.9 (3550mm focal length)
Mount: Paramount ME
CCD Camera: SBIG STX16803 16MP (4096 x 4096)
Filters: SBIG Ha (7nm), OIII (8.5nm), SII(8nm)

The Royal Astronomical Society of Canada Robotic Telescope
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