Butterfly nebula in Cygnus (IC 1318) (Victor Van Puyenbroeck)

Celestial hemisphere: Northern · Constellation: Cygnus (Cyg) · Contains: IC 1318 · NGC 6910 · The star Sadr (γCyg) · gamma Cyg nebula

Butterfly nebula in Cygnus (IC 1318), Victor Van Puyenbroeck

Powered byPixInsight

Butterfly nebula in Cygnus (IC 1318)

Powered byPixInsight

Butterfly nebula in Cygnus (IC 1318)

One of my non-astronomy friends joined me during this imaging session. I drove to my old dark-ish site, about 20 minutes from home. The SQM there is usually 19.0-19.5 which is not great, but much better than home (~17.5). Apart from my imaging gear, I also brought my old Orion ST-80 refractor and an alt-az tripod. We had a lot of fun observing the Moon, planets, a flyby of the International Space Station and even some deepsky (M13, M31).

Meanwhile, the camera was snapping pictures of the diffuse emission nebulae around the bright star Sadr (γ Cygni). These clouds of ionized gas (IC 1318) are partially obscured by a dark dust lane, and often referred to as the butterfly nebula due to its shape.

In the original image, I just used the NBRBGCombination script to blend the H-alpha data in the red channel. The resulting image had a very dominant red color, and a minor contrast boost.

I tried to improve the image by constructing a synthetic luminance from the RGB and starless H-alpha data. That really enhanced the visibility of the nebulous structures of the initial NBRGBCombination result. Additionally, I shifted to color of the nebula towards blue to simulate H-beta emissions, and corrected the colors of the stars.

Original
B
C
D
Final
E

B

Description: H-alpha channel (autostretch)

Uploaded: ...

C

Description: RGB channels (Photometric Color Calibration + autostretch)

Uploaded: ...

D

Description: Reprocessed with synthetic luminance and fixed star colors.

Uploaded: ...

E

Description: Fixed blue cast + slight star reduction

Uploaded: ...

Beginners AP
Cloudy Nights
ZWO ASI1600MM/QHY163M
Astrophotographers of Belgium
Imaged with APT

Please note: The following tables are updated every 24 hours.

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.
Promotions by Submitters When 3 distinct Submitters promote the image, it moves on to the next stage of the process: evaluation for Top Pick status. This requirement, in addition to anonymization of images and distribution to only a subset of them, prevents biases and ensures that the best images are selected.
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 success
Started	...
Astrometry.net job	2162401
PixInsight job	n/a
PixInsight queue size	n/a
PixInsight stage	n/a

Image Index:

Contribution Index (beta):

Butterfly nebula in Cygnus (IC 1318)

Butterfly nebula in Cygnus (IC 1318)

Equipment

Acquisition details

Description

Comments

Revisions

B

C

D

E

Sky plot

Histogram

In these public groups

		...
You have no new notifications.

Image Index:

Contribution Index (beta):

Butterfly nebula in Cygnus (IC 1318)

Butterfly nebula in Cygnus (IC 1318)

Equipment

Acquisition details

Description

Comments

Revisions

B

C

D

E

Sky plot

Histogram

In these public groups

Notifications

AstroBin is in READ ONLY mode

Sorry :-(

Sorry :-(

Sorry :-(

Are you really sure?

Warning!

Warning!

Are you sure?

Report abuse

Slideshow settings

IOTD/TP stats (last [x] days)

Distribution of astrophotographers

Distribution of subject types

Distribution of data sources

Sorry

Sorry

Share

Upload new revision

Upload uncompressed source (XISF/FITS/PSD/TIFF)

Delete image and all its revisions?

Delete original image?

Delete all other versions?

Delete all revisions?

Delete this revision?

Delete this revision?

Delete this revision?

Delete this revision?

IOTD/TP stats

The following people like this image

The following people bookmarked this image

Warning

Flag malfunctioning thumbnails

Contains

Remove yourself as a collaborator

Plate-solving information