Celestial hemisphere:  Northern  ·  Constellation: Cepheus (Cep)
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SH2-129 OU4, Lorenzo Palloni

SH2-129 OU4

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SH2-129 OU4, Lorenzo Palloni

SH2-129 OU4

Equipment

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Acquisition details

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Description

This is a dear image to me, mainly because it marks a step towards to the itinerant photos instead of those shot from backyard.
Indeed this choice is the result of a quite long path; during all these years I've been fighiting against light pollution (most of all), bad seeing, and the fact I don't see the North and also some parts of East and West due to the buildings around my backyard (leaving the choice of the images to those to South).
I bought a Star Adventurer in 2020, and that was a revelation for me; even if the first shots with camera lens were not so beautiful, I started to understand the beauty of being in the Nature, under a roof of stars. I started to improve the gear little by little, until I was able to use my refractor 80/480 with all the stuff (5kg) on the Star Adventurer.
But, at the same time, as the Sky was better and the focal lenght was getting longer (from the previous camera lens used in the beginning), I realized that I wanted longer exposure to get the best from the Clear Sky, and for the same reason I didn't want to lose precious time in finding and framing the objects for 2 times (due to meridian flip), because my trips are seldom. So here we are, I sold my main scope (10" f/4) and I bought a brand new Eq6-Ri (actually the first mount of this class I bought new, so I was very excited about it).

So this is the story (and the image) of the First Light of my Eq6-Ri under a great Sky.
The "where": I choosed to go to a mountain in Tuscany were I've been lately: a very nice and calm place, on a mountain in  Tuscany at 1.000 meters, Bortle 4, about 1 hour far from my house; a couple of foxes and wild boars were visible during the nights.
The "what": of course a Jewel of the North ( the direction I've been always wishing for, from my backyard). And what it could better than Sh2-129 OU4, to test the limit of the mountain sky and my setup?
The "when": I choosed to go there for 2 nights, as far as I know that this object is as faint as it is beautiful, so I wanted some nice total integration time. I had to sleep in the car in the late hours but also this was the fun I will bring as memory of this image.
The "how": L-eNhance with my refractor 80mm @ 384mm (which makes a great framing for this object), f/4.8, and thanks to the Eq6-Ri finally with subs of 300 seconds at -15°.
During those nights the weather was really great:
- first night: 0% clouds, 12% Moon, 14°, humidity about 60%, seeing 5/5;
- second night: 0% clouds, 21% Moon, 15°, humidity about 50%, seeing 5/5.

Mainly I was amazed and thrilled of the guiding graph of Phd2; I got 0.15 RMS, which is above my expectations, so already this result paid me back of all the efforts of this project.

Later on, in front of my computer, the surprise was also great because I realized that I was able to get the Squid nevertheless the not so narrow band filter (in OIII region) I used.

So this is the (long) story behind this image, which is my most exciting project (also for the future itinerant imaging sessions).

Hope you like both, thanks for watching and for reading.

Comments

Revisions

  • SH2-129 OU4, Lorenzo Palloni
    Original
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  • Final
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B

Title: setup

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SH2-129 OU4, Lorenzo Palloni