NGC 2264 - the uni’cone’ nebula (Tom Gray)

NGC 2264 - the uni’cone’ nebula

My last image of a rare run of clear nights in U.K. I thought I’d explore another southerly constellation, and seek out the wonderful nebulae it hides. Unicorns may be rare but this nebula is regularly imaged and produces a lot of interest around the Christmas season.

Lying between the bright stars of Canis Major and minor, Sirius and Procyon respectively, Monceros hosts a number of bright and beautiful nebulae - the rosette, christmas tree and cone nebulae, surrounded by the bright emissions of Sharpless 273. Central to my image is the cone (or 'uni-cone' nebula

a horn of bright hydrogen emissions at 2700 LY from earth (and spectacular from space), which is lit by the star S moncerotis, at the base of the Christmas tree. This nebula extends 30 LY and holds the young star cluster of Collinder 112, surrounded by bright reflections. Below this is a patch of nebulosity known as the fox-fur nebula, with faint overlays of OIII. This gives way to a bridge of dark material from LD 1609-1610. IC 447 on the left of the image is a reflection nebula.

A combination of 300s and 600s exposures has enabled me to go deeper into this region, and expose some of these treasures in the Orion arm of the MW galaxy. Again, the little SA mount has performed admirably giving me an RMS (in RA only) of ~1"/px. Focus was decent, but slight issues remain with backspace, and tilt resulting in some loss of detail. Nevertheless, this is one of the images that I am most satisfied with - a new area to me, a nice variety of objects and good contrast. With a little blue stretch I managed to show up a trace of the OIII which floats across this wintery scene. For a sharp and detailed view of these nebulae, please take a look at @Roy Hagen superb 14 hour integration from his home in Norway - stunning.

Final
Original
B
C
D
E

B

Title: Starless

Description: Starnet ++

Uploaded: ...

C

Title: Annotated (in Siril)

Uploaded: ...

D

Title: Santa's golden grotto

Description: False colour image created with Pixel math R=Ha, O=0.4*Ha+0.6*OIII, B=OIII. Drizzled x 2 and cropped to try and pull some more detail out in the centre. Finished with Depp Sky Detail Astrosharp and Astroclean.

Uploaded: ...

E

Title: Drizzled x2, bin 2x2, cropped - traditional palette

Description: As an experiment to try and pull up the detail, I took a previously drizzled image (~900MB), binned 2x2, cropped and worked on the detail in the starless image with GHS - then put through Astrosharp and Astroclean AI tools (Deep Sky Detail). I used deconvolution on the starmask, then recombined the images, and tweaked saturation. Resized to mouseover the original, I didn't quite get the proportions right, but you get the picture...right?

Uploaded: ...

Altair Astro 183 M/C Hypercams
Optolong L-eNhance filter
UK Astro-Imaging
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Status	Advanced success
Started	...
Astrometry.net job	9230636
PixInsight job	2NYAWOB78X9TWEYG7HY75ZVLQBHGRC39
PixInsight queue size	n/a
PixInsight stage	TASK_LOG

RA (center)	06h41m18s.91
RA (top/left)	06h29m37s.17
RA (top/right)	06h52m03s.86
RA (bottom/right)	06h53m07s.88
RA (bottom/left)	06h30m26s.76

Dec (center)	+09°47′52″.0
Dec (top/left)	+08°04′27″.1
Dec (top/right)	+07°43′55″.0
Dec (bottom/right)	+11°29′34″.1
Dec (bottom/left)	+11°50′13″.8

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