Instrument

Takahashi FSQ-106ED @ f/5.0 (530 mm F.L.)  Captured at 3.5 arcsec/pixel.  Shown resampled to 16.1 arcsec/pixel.

Mount

Paramount ME

Camera

SBIG STL-11000 w/ internal filter wheel, AstroDon Filters

Acquisition Data

12/27/2008 to 1/3/2009 Chino Valley, AZ... with CCDAutoPilot3

Exposure

Ha  300 min. (10 x 30 min. bin 1x1,  6 nm filter)

Click here for a natural color version
Click here for a narrow band color mapped version

Software

CCDSoft, CCDStack, Photoshop CS w/ the Fits Liberator plugin and Noel Carboni's actions.

CCDStack to calibrate, register, normalize, data reject & combine sub exposures.

PhotoShop for non-linear stretching.

Comment

North is to the bottom, I think it looks better up side down.

The California Nebula (NGC 1499) is located in the constellation Perseus at a distance of about 1,000 light years from Earth. It is so named because it appears to resemble the outline of the US State of California. NGC 1499 is a classic emission nebula, around 100 light-years long. In true color it glows with the red light characteristic of hydrogen atoms recombining with long lost electrons, stripped away (ionized) by energetic starlight.

Because of its very low surface brightness, it is extremely difficult to observe visually and was discovered by E. E. Barnard in 1884.