Celestial hemisphere:  Northern  ·  Constellation: Cassiopeia (Cas)  ·  Contains:  IC 1590  ·  LBN 611  ·  LBN 615  ·  LBN 616  ·  LBN 621  ·  NGC 281  ·  Sh2-184
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NGC 281 - Pacman Nebula  (HOO), Nicla.Camerin_Maurizio.Camerin
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NGC 281 - Pacman Nebula (HOO)

Getting plate-solving status, please wait...
NGC 281 - Pacman Nebula  (HOO), Nicla.Camerin_Maurizio.Camerin
Powered byPixInsight

NGC 281 - Pacman Nebula (HOO)

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Description

"The Pacman Nebula (NGC 281) is a large emission nebula appearing near the orange giant Schedar in the constellation Cassiopeia. The nebula lies approximately 9,200 light years away and occupies 35 arcminutes of the apparent sky. It is also catalogued as IC 11 and Sharpless 184 (Sh2-184). It was named the Pacman Nebula for its resemblance to Pac-Man, the character in the popular 1980s maze video game. In optical images, a dark dust lane forms the Pac-Man’s mouth.
The Pacman Nebula stretches 48 light years across. It is a star-forming region that contains young stars, large dark dust lanes and Bok globules. Bok globules are small, dense dark nebulae packed with material from which new stars are formed. The dark dust lane spreads unevenly across glowing clouds of hydrogen and its appearance suggests that it being sculpted by a massive star in the background, concealed by the dark clouds." https://www.constellation-guide.com/pacman-nebula/

The final image chosen from all the variations done is a result of a new workflow I tried from AstroEd's  (Thomas Edward Christian).  I have to say that is an awesome proposal and for people like me that use Photoshop is an innovative point of view in how he approaches the development of an astro image. We are very pleased with the result.  There is variation in the channel combination from our own but the details, smoothness obtained and color we like very much.  We hope you like this version.

This image has the following combination:
L= Ha
R= Ha*.5 + R*.5
G= [OIII]
B= B*.8 + [OIII]*.2

As 'combination' we mean the use of the channels from 'normal and drizzled' stack in DSS and Siril of all the frames. From Siril is obtained the Ha and OIII from the same frames stacked before.  The RGB channels are combined with the extracted Ha and [OIII].

The Pacman Nebula let me play around with different combinations showing interesting results. This reflection nebula is fascinating as any other out there: the dust around and  the glowing gases show its own tidal forces that let the formation for new stars.  Some little details entangled us in this nebula that is posted in a last version (Details) we found so fascinating as intriguing.

Version B and C
RGB normal and drizzle Siril stack show the red preponderance colour in the external borders of the nebula zone and some internal and a magenta color wich in this case is [OIII].  In Both images the Hue color was only used, there is no color selection properly.  Also I used Ha as luminance to give contrast to the images.

Version D and E
This images are combined as follow:
L= Ha
R= R*.5 + Ha*.5
G= G
B= [OIII]
The only change was that the Hue colourized orange or more red in those parts of the nebula letting the rest unchanged around while the other color preponderance was the blue from the [OIII].  Unexpected results as must of the time this channel combination give a red-pinkish colourization instead.

Version F
The combination was as follow:
L= Ha
R= R*.5 + Ha*.5
G= [OIII]
B= [OIII]
Is interesting to notice that even the [OIII] is the dominant data, no blue is visible but instead white.
The colourization of the channels was made by Hue/Saturation with this values for each channel:
R= 0  Saturation =100  Lightness= -50
G= 120  Saturation =100  Lightness= -40
B= 240  Saturation =100  Lightness= -40

Version G
This image is combined as follow:
L= Ha
R= R*.5 + Ha*.5
G= Ha
B= [OIII]
This combination give the typical SHO colourization moving slightly the Hue on tones red, orange and yellow and diminishing the green dominance.

Process Oct-Nov 2nd, 2021
https://twitter.com/AstroOtus/status/1455333346880495616

Comments

Revisions

  • Final
    NGC 281 - Pacman Nebula  (HOO), Nicla.Camerin_Maurizio.Camerin
    Original
  • NGC 281 - Pacman Nebula  (HOO), Nicla.Camerin_Maurizio.Camerin
    B
  • NGC 281 - Pacman Nebula  (HOO), Nicla.Camerin_Maurizio.Camerin
    C
  • NGC 281 - Pacman Nebula  (HOO), Nicla.Camerin_Maurizio.Camerin
    D
  • NGC 281 - Pacman Nebula  (HOO), Nicla.Camerin_Maurizio.Camerin
    E
  • NGC 281 - Pacman Nebula  (HOO), Nicla.Camerin_Maurizio.Camerin
    F
  • NGC 281 - Pacman Nebula  (HOO), Nicla.Camerin_Maurizio.Camerin
    G
  • NGC 281 - Pacman Nebula  (HOO), Nicla.Camerin_Maurizio.Camerin
    H

B

Description: RGB 1 Stack normal

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C

Description: RGB 2 stack drizzle

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D

Description: Version R_Ha - G - [OIII] slight orange

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E

Description: Version R_Ha - G - [OIII] slight redish

Uploaded: ...

F

Description: Version Ha [OIII] [OIII]

Uploaded: ...

G

Description: Version R_Ha - Ha - [OIII] - SHO

Uploaded: ...

H

Description: Details

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Sky plot

Sky plot

Histogram

NGC 281 - Pacman Nebula  (HOO), Nicla.Camerin_Maurizio.Camerin