NGC 7293 - Helix Nebula - Don't laugh - 14 minutes & 200mm lens? (Kurt Zeppetello)

NGC 7293 - Helix Nebula - Don't laugh - 14 minutes & 200mm lens?

Link: http://astroquest1.blogspot.com/

NGC 7293 or commonly known as the Helix nebula is approximately 650 light-years away in the constellation of Aquarius. It is a Planetary Nebula approximately 2.9 Light-years which formed as the central dying star blew off its outer layers of gas leaving a small hot dense core.

So I have always wanted to image this but it is really low and we have high trees so I actually never though it was possible at all. Just for giggles after finishing another object I pointed the mount and camera in the direction of the Helix and it was there just above the trees. It soon disappeared however I did get 14 minutes on it before going away. If it were visible for an hour it might be worth imaging with larger setup but for less than a half hour this will do. Actually I was happy to get anything.

I cropped it heavily and was very creative with new noise reduction as it was bad, not to mention the gradients. Also, there were no support frames for this either - not even darks so I had to remove hot pixels by hand. If you are a pixel peeper see how many you can find. I decided to make a gif of the 14 subframes so you get an idea how close the trees are to it - the gif is my first ever attempt and is low quality.

Final
Original
B
C

B

Description: Adjusted the colors but I think I like the detail of the first version.

Uploaded: ...

C

Description: This is a Gif showing it just before it plunges into the trees.

Uploaded: ...

Imaged with APT
N.I.N.A. Users

All - Most Recent First
Planetary Nebula

	Distinct awarded users	Total awarded images
Image of the day
Top picks
Top pick nominations

	Image of the day	Top pick	Top pick nominations	Total submitted
Deep sky
Solar system
Extremely wide field
Star trails
Northern lights
Noctilucent clouds
Landscape

	Image of the day	Top pick	Top pick nominations	Total submitted
Backyard
Traveller
Own remote observatory
Amateur hosting facility
Public amaeteur data
Professional, scientific grade data
Mix of multiple sources
Other
Unknown

Submitted The date and time when you submitted this image for IOTD/TP consideration.	...
Views by Submitters (available since September 19th, 2023) Every image is assigned to 50% of available Submitters. In the event that at least 80% of them don't view the image before its time in the IOTD/TP process expires, it's assigned to the other 50% of Submitters and the process begins anew.
Promotions by Submitters When 3 distinct Submitters promote the image, it moves on to the next stage of the process: evaluation for Top Pick status. This requirement, in addition to anonymization of images and distribution to only a subset of them, prevents biases and ensures that the best images are selected.
Promotions by Reviewers When 3 distinct Reviewers promote the image, it moves on to the next stage of the process: evaluation for IOTD status.
Early dismissal Staff members have a lot of images to inspect on a daily basis, and they can dismiss images if they believe they don't meet the requirements for IOTD/TP selection. If an image is dismissed 5 times, it's removed from the process. This streamlines the process and ensures that any bias present in promotions could be overruled by other staff members.

Status	Advanced success
Started	...
Astrometry.net job	5182060
PixInsight job	TVTHHH7PETMD2TVJ6406ARXZHJ0DUWGB
PixInsight queue size	n/a
PixInsight stage	TASK_LOG

RA (center)	22h29m35s.36
RA (top/left)	22h32m11s.16
RA (top/right)	22h27m03s.65
RA (bottom/right)	22h26m58s.73
RA (bottom/left)	22h32m07s.39

Dec (center)	-20°50′43″.4
Dec (top/left)	-20°25′54″.10
Dec (top/right)	-20°24′32″.2
Dec (bottom/right)	-21°15′23″.1
Dec (bottom/left)	-21°16′47″.1

Image Index:

Contribution Index (beta):