Celestial hemisphere:  Northern  ·  Constellation: Aries (Ari)  ·  Contains:  B1  ·  B202  ·  B203  ·  B204  ·  B205  ·  B206  ·  HD21483  ·  HD21864  ·  LBN 740  ·  LBN 741  ·  LBN 746  ·  LDN 1448  ·  LDN 1450  ·  LDN 1451  ·  LDN 1452  ·  LDN 1455  ·  NGC 1333  ·  PGC 1894237  ·  PGC 1906169  ·  PGC 1908070  ·  PGC 1963647  ·  VdB16
Getting plate-solving status, please wait...
NGC 1333 and environment with OSC, Alan Brunelle
Powered byPixInsight

NGC 1333 and environment with OSC

Revision title: Revision 4/2023

Getting plate-solving status, please wait...
NGC 1333 and environment with OSC, Alan Brunelle
Powered byPixInsight

NGC 1333 and environment with OSC

Revision title: Revision 4/2023

Equipment

Loading...

Acquisition details

Loading...

Description

Revised 4/2023:
A fairly basic revision.  Using the original subs, restacked using drizzle, 2x.  New methods applied.  Somewhat different stretch.  I liked the original, but it does suffer from some excessive noise, poor stars (on close inspection) and the color is shifted a bit.  Stretched with the hope of yielded better signal in the clouds, yet still trying to maintain that deep dark distance space where there are no clouds.  Stars not really reduced.  The stars are a real highlight here.  I was able to pick up some additional faint but obvious and delicate reflection nebulosity broadly below 1333, itself and also lower right in the image.  Wisps and quite extensive...  I do believe that there is less obvious reflection components that seem to exist almost throughout this frame.  Some star defects still visible upon close inspection.  So don't look!  Best to appreciate at full screen.  I do believe that I have achieved a more 3D perception with this revision than the original, which looks kind of flat to me.

Original Description:
I have been wanting to try NGC 1333 for some time and last week opened up a two night window of opportunity. Of course, given months of no opportunities, this was not the only thing I wanted to get, so that limited my time on any one object. Also, having to set up and tear down between "sittings" does not help.

This area is particularly interesting to me, not just because of its unique beauty, but because it offers a lot of interesting objects and activity, much of which is actually not even visible in a normal telescope because of wavelength limitations. But this is not just a field of dark clouds and IFN with a bit of bright nebula thrown in, it is a particularly young and active star-forming region in what appears to be a very dusty and metal-rich area, which affects the types of stars forming. Upon investigation, I have learned that this area includes multiple Young Stellar Objects. There are Infra-red, Far Infra-red, Sub-millimeter, Radio and X-ray sources in NGC 1333 and the other dark Barnard clouds throughout the field of view presented here. There are obviously some very hot blue stars, which lead to three significant areas of reflection nebula, but there are also Peculiar Stars, Eclipsing Binaries, and heck, even a couple high Proper Motion stars! The area is strewn with Harbig-Haro objects, which no doubt correspond to some of the object types I listed above. In NGC 1333, itself, there are striking groupings of "stars" that I conclude must be young, because it appears they are still closely encased, yet open to view by us, by the thick dust that likely gave rise to them. Unlike many other similar star groupings seen in other nebula, there seems to be a dearth of Ha signal. This from neither the nearby hot blue star of 1333 or from the new stars. The new stars, or forming stars of 1333, are maybe not destined to be hot blue stars, so not a lot of UV to excite hydrogen. But my guess is that there is just too much dust intercepting that UV from the really hot star(s). Either way, I now want to get or build an IR dedicated telescope so I can start teasing out some of the hidden treasures in these dark clouds.

This is essentially a full-frame image from my OSC camera. I wanted to get more in the field o f view than just NGC 1333 and thought that the reflection nebula to the south (right) would fit nicely. For me, the tradeoff as it is right now on my setup is a bit of artifact from tilt that limits some detail near the edges. But then this is not meant to be viewed at high multiples. This, as with many other shots I have posted will hopefully be revisited in the future for longer integration times. But some other images posted here of very wide-fields around NGC 1333 makes this area a rich area to explore in the future (to me anyway).

Comments

Revisions

  • NGC 1333 and environment with OSC, Alan Brunelle
    Original
  • Final
    NGC 1333 and environment with OSC, Alan Brunelle
    B

B

Title: Revision 4/2023

Description: See update description

Uploaded: ...

Sky plot

Sky plot

Histogram

NGC 1333 and environment with OSC, Alan Brunelle