IC1848 AKA Soul Nebula

I took this image of IC1848 aka Soul nebula. As a test too see, if I have finely nailed my guiding issues, once and for all.

After spending an hour or so, waiting for the sky to clear (it was supposed to be clear, on Friday, from 1800hrs) I was able to carefully polar align my G11 using my polar scope.

My thanks must go too. The helpful advice, from Chesterfield Astronomer, Paul Collins during PSP211

Paul very kindly told me, where I have been going wrong all these years with my polar alignment.
And in a nut shell, told me. "Stop buggering about, with pointing models, as these don't make any difference to my initial polar alignment".

The Soul nebula. is huge. And I can only get the central part, on the Atik16ic chip.

I am saving to buy a 314L+. And I hope to have this next year, if all goes well.

I think this is one subject, that will fit nicely on that larger chip with the 66mm William Optics, focal reduced x.5

Here is 1 hour & 22 minutes guided image. Taken through my, William Optics Zenith Star 66sd, and guided through my 8" with the QHY5 and PHD.

Focal reduced to 400mm at F2, to better suite my guide settings in PHD.

All exposures are in HA and taken using seven minute exposures.

This was taken on Friday tonight, before the cloud rolled in  

Type	Emission
Right ascension	02h 51m 36.24s
Declination	+60° 26′ 53.9"
Distance	7,500 ly
Apparent magnitude (V)	??
Apparent dimensions (V)	40.0'x10.0'
Constellation	Cassiopeia
Physical characteristics
Radius	-
Absolute magnitude (V)	6.5
Notable features	-
Other designations	LBN 667 - Cluster is IC1848

Messier 76. A Planetary nebula in Perseus.

At this time off the year, Perseus is riding high in the North East.

It is a constellation, full off interesting deep sky object's to see. Both visually and image.

On the evening of Sunday 6th November. I was fortunate to have a clear sky, but the Moon was so bright. 

So- I decided to try a spot of narrowband imaging.

My choice was the Little Dumbbell nebula.

This is an interesting nebula. And it is known by too names. The Cork, and Barbell Nebula.

It was discovered by Mechain in 1780, and included in Messier's catalogue as no 76.

M76 is faint, and some sources quote M76, as magnitude 12.1, whilst other's give a value near magnitude 10.

It is there for, quite an easy subject visually, for modest aperture telescope's.

The size of M76 is. 2.7 x 1.8 arcmin. Whilst its distance is 780pc or 2,500ly.

This picture was captured over a period of just under two hour's. And has been combined from fifty-five times two-minute exposure's.

I was using an Astronomik 13nm Hydrogen Alpha filter, attached to my Atik 16ic CCD camera. Which was attached to my Orion Optics 200-800 F4 imaging Newtonian. The guiding was undertaken with a QHY5 and Willam Optics ZS66sd, and PHD software. All this is attached to a Losmandy G11-Gemini L4.

I hope to gather more data, using longer exposure's once the Moon is in the morning sky. 

click the image to enlarge