M17 - The Swan (or Omega) Nebula (greenbbs)

M17 - The Swan (or Omega) Nebula

"M17 - The Swan (or Omega) Nebula"

Last night, I went on a hunt to image a different nebula than this. Originally, I wanted to image the Eagle Nebula (M16), which is extremely close to this one (if I was using my 70-200mm lens, they'd be in the same field - I was using my WO ZenithStar 71mm short tube refractor instead). I *may* have been juuuuuust a bit off on my star alignment, because when I put in M16, it took me here rather than to M16.

Since I had limited time (I did this after work, and was up and running at about 12:30 AM, and from the deck this area hides behind the house at about 2 am....until I get the pier put in, which should give me more time with everything), I just decided to image this one instead.

M17, or the Swan (or Omega) Nebula is located between 5,000 and 6,000 light years away from Earth. It is located in the Sagittarius arm of the Milky Way (for perspective, Earth is located in the Orion arm- an entirely different part of the spiral banding). It's extremely similar in structure to the Orion Nebula, but the difference is a) this is way farther away; and b) it's seen on edge rather than on face like the Orion Nebula. Astrophysicists and astronomers consider this area one of the most massive star forming regions in the Milky Way.

Nerdy Tech Details:

Sony A6000

ISO 3200

William Optics ZenithStar 71mm f5.9 refractor, Celestron AVX mount

47 x 1 minute images (no guidance...didn't want to waste time)

Stacked in PixInsight

Edited in PS and LR.

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Distribution of astrophotographers

This table shows the number of distinct astrophotographers who have been assigned and IOTD/TP award compared to the total number of images awarded.
	Distinct awarded users	Total awarded images
Image of the day
Top picks
Top pick nominations

Distribution of subject types

This table shows the distribution of awards per subject type, compared to the popularity of images of that subject type.
	Image of the day	Top pick	Top pick nominations	Total submitted
Deep sky
Solar system
Extremely wide field
Star trails
Northern lights
Noctilucent clouds
Landscape

Distribution of data sources

This table shows the distribution of awards per data source, compared to the popularity of images acquired from that data source.
	Image of the day	Top pick	Top pick nominations	Total submitted
Backyard
Traveller
Own remote observatory
Amateur hosting facility
Public amaeteur data
Professional, scientific grade data
Mix of multiple sources
Other
Unknown

The “AstroBin Image of the Day and Top Picks”, or IOTD/TP, is a long-running system to promote beautiful, interesting, peculiar, or otherwise amazing astrophotographs, with a focus on technical excellence. Learn more.

Submitted The date and time when you submitted this image for IOTD/TP consideration.	...
Views by Submitters (available since September 19th, 2023) Every image is assigned to 50% of available Submitters. In the event that at least 80% of them don't view the image before its time in the IOTD/TP process expires, it's assigned to the other 50% of Submitters and the process begins anew.
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Promotions by Reviewers When 3 distinct Reviewers promote the image, it moves on to the next stage of the process: evaluation for IOTD status.
Early dismissal Staff members have a lot of images to inspect on a daily basis, and they can dismiss images if they believe they don't meet the requirements for IOTD/TP selection. If an image is dismissed 5 times, it's removed from the process. This streamlines the process and ensures that any bias present in promotions could be overruled by other staff members.

Status	Basic failed
Started	...
Astrometry.net job	673565
PixInsight job	n/a
PixInsight queue size	n/a
PixInsight stage	n/a

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