The Starfish Cluster & Co. (M38 and NGC 1907) (estabrook)

The Starfish Cluster & Co. (M38 and NGC 1907)

The Starfish Cluster & Co. (M38 and NGC 1907). When we took up astrophotography a few years ago, a friend and I planned to march through the Messier objects together. That effort has lagged a bit, as we've discovered what everyone on Astrobin knows--that Charles Messier's list is not, by and large, a list of the best astrophotography targets. Although we've made our way through many showpiece objects (M42, M45, etc.), we've understandably neglected the less remarkable open clusters.

M38, however, shows some promise as an astrophotography target, not only because of its neighbor, fellow open cluster NGC 1907, but also because of its proximity to the massive hydrogen cloud complex in Auriga that houses the Tadpoles (IC 410), the Flaming Star (IC 405), the Spider (IC 417) & Fly (NGC 1931), etc. With this project, hoped to add some interest to M38 by framing it with its neighbor (not challenging) and by capturing a bit of that Ha (possibly challenging). I've tried this kind thing (unsuccessfully) before--which is why you've never seen my attempted image of the Double Cluster in Perseus-- but it worked out very well here, with about 9 hours of integration. And with the Antlia Triband filter, I managed to capture both the red hydrogen gas and fairly natural star colors, so I didn't see the need to shoot separate broadband stars (which I admit is a bold call given that the target is an open star cluster). And now I can check another Messier object off the list.

(Captured: Askar FRA500, AM5, ASI183MC Pro, Antlia Triband RGB Filter. Processed: AstroPixelProcessor, PixInsight, GraXpert, StarXterminator, NoiseXterminator, Blanshan/Cranfield Star Reduction Script)

ZWO ASI183/QHY183
Light Polluted skies
Virginia Astronomers and Astrophotographers
ZWO ASIAIR PRO USERS
NOVAC
The OSC Club (One Shot Camera)

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Status	Advanced success
Started	...
Astrometry.net job	9187091
PixInsight job	YR21AHERO6Z4ZBWYQEJTLYA1LVPQFXM2
PixInsight queue size	n/a
PixInsight stage	TASK_LOG

RA (center)	05h28m16s.178
RA (top/left)	05h28m04s.970
RA (top/right)	05h32m15s.470
RA (bottom/right)	05h28m28s.560
RA (bottom/left)	05h24m18s.666

Dec (center)	+35°40′10″.69
Dec (top/left)	+34°49′51″.00
Dec (top/right)	+35°54′02″.20
Dec (bottom/right)	+36°30′30″.28
Dec (bottom/left)	+35°25′50″.44

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