I thought I'd have a go at reprocessing my data from way back in 2015.

At the time, there were only a dozen or so images of this thing around, so I was inspired to have a red hot go at deep exposing an unusual object,

this was shot over 5 nights from my light polluted suburban backyard.

I realize now that it was not nearly enough data, so it was noisy as a school bus on breakup day!

I have used every trick in the book to minimise that this time around.

APP, Starnet++, Nik etc. the whole shebang.

A decent processing challenge during stage 4 Covid-19 lockdown restrictions here in Melbourne, Australia.

Darned if I understand how I got a Malin HM for the ORIGINAL version https://www.parkes.atnf.csiro.au/news_events/astrofest/awards/2015images/deep/HM_DeepSky_Andrew_Campbell.jpg

as I put far better images in this year that all missed out, but anyway, I'm not complaining!

Must have another decent crack at this beasty with my new gear next summer!

WO FLT 110

NEQ6

QSI 683 wsg8

5nm Astrodon HA, O3 & RGB

10 x 120sec RG&B

35x 900 sec O3

10x900 sec Ha

APOD DESCRIPTION: Blown by fast winds from a hot, massive star, this cosmic bubble is huge. Cataloged as Sharpless 2-308 it lies some 5,200 light-years away toward the constellation of the Big Dog (Canis Major) and covers slightly more of the sky than a Full Moon. That corresponds to a diameter of 60 light-years at its estimated distance.

The massive star that created the bubble, a Wolf-Rayet star, is the bright one near the center of the nebula. Wolf-Rayet stars have over 20 times the mass of the Sun and are thought to be in a brief, pre-supernova phase of massive star evolution. Fast winds from this Wolf-Rayet star create the bubble-shaped nebula as they sweep up slower moving material from an earlier phase of evolution.

The windblown nebula has an age of about 70,000 years. Relatively faint emission captured in the expansive image is dominated by the glow of ionized oxygen atoms mapped to a blue hue. SH2-308 is also known as The Dolphin Nebula.