The Fighting Dragons of Ara (NGC 6188, detail) (Paul Lloyd)

The Fighting Dragons of Ara (NGC 6188, detail)

The bright emission nebula, NGC 6188, forms a backdrop to the embedded dark nebulae that inspire
the common name for this region. It can be found in the constellation, Ara, south of the more famous
Scorpius constellation. It is a very active star-formation region lying about 4,000 ly away. The open
star cluster in the bright area is believed to be responsible for the nebula’s illumination. The entire
nebula, in fact, is just a small portion of a much larger nebula, the majority of which emits light
in the (invisible) infra-red band.

While the dramatic shapes of the “dragons” catch the eye, note that much of the nebula exhibits
interesting shapes and folds, resulting from a turbulent history of star birth and death.

Note: The foreground stars have been removed from this image to emphasise the nebulae.

Telescope: Canon 70-200mm EF lens + 1.4x telextender @ f=280mm?
Camera: ZWO ASI183MC Pro, 56 x 300sec, Optolong L-eNhance filter
Bortle 3-4 sky, moonless
Field of View: approx. 1º 45’ x 1º 15’?
Image processed and prepared in PixInsight and Photoshop Elements

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 failed
Started	...
Astrometry.net job	8365639
PixInsight job	n/a
PixInsight queue size	n/a
PixInsight stage	n/a

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