IC 1396a (Elephant's Trunk Nebula) - closeup in Hydrogen-Alpha (Derek Spratt)

Celestial hemisphere: Northern · Constellation: Cepheus (Cep)

IC 1396a (Elephant's Trunk Nebula) - closeup in Hydrogen-Alpha, Derek Spratt

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IC 1396a (Elephant's Trunk Nebula) - closeup in Hydrogen-Alpha

Powered byPixInsight

IC 1396a (Elephant's Trunk Nebula) - closeup in Hydrogen-Alpha

[Updated 2023-09-09]: added 10 more 300s subs from Bortle 2 skies at Manning Park with much higher S/N and more fine detail, plus improved my PixInsight processing flow to include better noise reduction and sharpening - there is a ton of detail in this image now. I will now spend time imaging at S2 and O3 narrowband to build a colour version.

[Updated 2023-09-07]: after attempting this close-up last week I waited until better transparency and re-ran at 300s subs x 35 with much cleaner results last night - will attempt again from Manning Park Bortle 2 skies this weekend.

After completing my 2 panel 6 degree FOV mosaic of IC 1396 using my RASA8 I attempted to zoom in on the Elephan'ts Trunk area with my RC8 with 150s x 40 subs but the transparency and seeing conditions this weekend in Vancouver have been plagued by thin high clouds and lingering forest fire smoke - making the skies fuzzy - and it shows in this image which really is no improvement on the wide-field view taken with my RASA8 earlier in the week. I won't need a dark sky site for this target but I will need clearer air to see thru. I may get another shot at this target later this week with better conditions and at some point I hope to add in other narrowband frequencies as well ... I will also increase my exposure time to 300s/sub

Original
B
Final
D

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Status	Basic success
Started	...
Astrometry.net job	8453255
PixInsight job	n/a
PixInsight queue size	n/a
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IC 1396a (Elephant's Trunk Nebula) - closeup in Hydrogen-Alpha

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IC 1396a (Elephant's Trunk Nebula) - closeup in Hydrogen-Alpha

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