Celestial hemisphere:  Northern  ·  Constellation: Cepheus (Cep)  ·  Contains:  B175  ·  HD210401  ·  HD210640  ·  HD210884  ·  HD210902  ·  HD211319  ·  HD211867  ·  LBN 531  ·  LBN 538  ·  LDN 1217  ·  LDN 1219  ·  PK111+11.1  ·  VdB152
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Processing 0.4 m Insight LRGBHa Data: Bok Globule, HH object, reflection nebula, ancient supernova remnant & emission nebula, Rick Veregin
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Processing 0.4 m Insight LRGBHa Data: Bok Globule, HH object, reflection nebula, ancient supernova remnant & emission nebula

Getting plate-solving status, please wait...
Processing 0.4 m Insight LRGBHa Data: Bok Globule, HH object, reflection nebula, ancient supernova remnant & emission nebula, Rick Veregin
Powered byPixInsight

Processing 0.4 m Insight LRGBHa Data: Bok Globule, HH object, reflection nebula, ancient supernova remnant & emission nebula

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Description

This field is not just a pretty picture, it is a fascinating combination of many different types of nebula and objects that are still not that well understood!

This image (South is up, east is right) contains the dark nebula Barnard 175 (a.k.a LDN 1217), also known as a Bok globule, where cold gas and dust condenses to form protostars. The nebula is dimly illuminated by far-ultraviolet light, yielding a reddish glow of Extended Red Emission (ERE), a dust-related photoluminescence process that is still poorly understood. Note I'm not sure why the AB labelling is showing Barnard 175 where it is, it doesn't jibe with the identification with LDN 1217.

A part of Barnard 175 is the reflection nebula van den Bergh 152 (vdB 152, a.k.a. Cederblad 201), which is reflecting the light of a hot blue star. It exciting star appears to be a stray, not part of the nebula, as it is moving very differently. The entire complex is about 7 light years across and 1300 light years away. 

Embedded in the right (east) side of the nebula (near the reflection nebula) is the Herbig Haro object HH 450, a jet emitted from a newly forming star. Please see my comments below for a closer, labelled view.

A little further right, running at a diagonal are red ionized hydrogen filaments from an ancient supernova, SNR 110.3 + 11.3. The SNR is at about the same distance as the nebulosity from us, but it currently not clear if the SNR is interacting now, or will interact in the future, with the nebulosity. It was thought that the object just to the right of HH 450, an oval  (HH 450X) part way between HH450 and the SNR, and perpendicular to that direction, was a shock front where the two were interacting, but it is now known that this is a distant  galaxy. Again, see my annotated image below.

Finally, at the lower right is the nebula Dengel-Hartl 5. It was originally thought to be an ancient planetary nebula, but now it is known to be an emission nebula, an estimated 1,300-1,600 light years from Earth, so at a similar distance perhaps to Barnard 175. This emission nebula is a dense part of the interstellar medium (ISM) that is ionised by a hot white dwarf star in the area, rather than a PN formed from that white dwarfs prior history.

Processing
This was the most difficult processing I have done so far, I guess because I had not tried anything like this before. This is my sixth attempt, I trashed the other five, and I'm pretty sure I did not leave a lot on the table in the processing in the end.

I used the calibrated LRGBHa raw data, which I registered and stacked in DeepSkyStacker using a k-s median rejection (k=2, n=5). 

In StarTools I did a light crop to remove edge problems, a background wipe, and a slight 71% bin. I then used AutoDevelopment, HDR, a small deconvolution, color, an inverse gamma contrast enhancement, and then added the Ha using the NB accent module. 

In Photoshop, I used StarXterminator to remove stars, processed that starless layer with  multi-scale unsharp masking in APF-R (as used by NASA), then did selective color/color saturation, and NoiseXterminator to reduce noise. I added the star layer back in with linear dodge (add).

Data from Insight Observatories
R=G=B=13 x 5 m = 65 min each
Lum = 14 x 5 min = 70 min
Ha = 12 x 5 min = 60 min
Total = 5 h 25 m
Telescope: Dreamscope 16" f/3.7 Astrograph
Mount: Software Bisque Paramount ME
Camera: FLI Proline 16803
Location: Beryl, Utah USA (Utah Desert Remote Observatories)

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Processing 0.4 m Insight LRGBHa Data: Bok Globule, HH object, reflection nebula, ancient supernova remnant & emission nebula, Rick Veregin