Gamma Cassiopeia is a very interesting region of space. While it's probably well known and imaged for the nebulosity, the star
27 Gamma Cas is the central object of the whole system:
It's a B0IV subgiant star with a surface temperature of approximately
30.000 Kelvin (notice that I usually use decimal comma and point as thousands separator). Compared to our sun, the star's
luminosity is about 3.220 visual and 55.500 total (!!). Also, it belongs to the class of variable stars, although non-periodic. It's maximum magnitude of 1,6 was measured mid 1936. I tried to find the magnitude for the day when I captured the image. From what I found on aavso.org, it should be 2,1m. Based on the
B-V color index of -0.15 we can expect a slight bluish star which is confirmed through my image, although the color saturation on my case is higher due to processing.
Now to the nebulosity. The Gamma Cas nebulae (IC 59 and IC 63) are about 1pc from 27 Gamma Cas and therefore in immediate influence from the star. Hence, they strongly reflect the star's light and also interstellar medium is ionized to provide us with signal from emission lines. Both can be clearly seen in the image.
On the image:
I had captured the data in the beginning of September 2023. My initial plan was to come back and collect more data once the object crosses the meridian at around midnight and when the moon isn't a party killer. In the mood for playing with data, I integrated what I had, in order to see on which channel I should collect more. To my surprise all channels contained a decent amount of signal and noise was pretty low. Therefore, I started a more extensive processing workflow and it turned out to yield a decent image. Thanks to
@Ruediger for an initial review. With his feedback, I could make some final fine tuning.
Integration, background processing and color calibration in PI. Rest of the work in Affinity.
I'd be happy to receive your feedback on the image.
Björn
PS: This is image isn't and won't be submitted to the IOTD process (OUT OF PRINCIPLE).
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