This is the second of 4 images to my newly processed mosaic I am releasing. acquired last season from my backyard observatory in Fremont, Michigan using a QHY11 Monochrome CCD/Takahashi E-180. I also combined earlier data using the 12” RC for the Crescent Nebula, seen here with a large portion of The Gamma Cygni Nebula IC1318, Open Star Cluster NGC 6874 and Dark Nebula Barnard 343.
I created my own annotated view you can see here.
www.flickr.com/photos/terryhancock/17588275442/in/datepos...Not your ordinary planetary nebula, which are produced when sun-like stars enter the last phase of their lives by becoming a red-giant and subsequently shedding their stellar atmospheres. The Crescent is, like other planetary nebulae, being ionized by it's parent star's intense radiation, but unlike most other planetary nebulae, The Crescent is also being ionized by the nearby Wolf-Rayet star "WR 136" whose intense winds are colliding with the material blown off by the Crescent's parent star. The end result is a beautiful image of two distinct shock waves colliding with each other in the depths of space, heating the gasses to temperatures so extreme that it emits X-ray radiation in addition to wavelengths within the visible spectrum of light.
Captured using LRGB + H-Alpha filters
Total Integration time 4+ hours
Equipment
QHY11S monochrome CCD cooled to -20C
QHY5IIL Monochrome Guiding CCD
Takahashi E-180 F2.8 Astrograph
Paramount GT-1100S Robotic Telescope Mount
Image Acquisition Maxim DL
Stacking and Calibrating: CCDStack
Registration of images in Registar
Post Processing Photoshop CS5
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