IC 1396, In Cepheus
RGB (top image), H-alpha + RGB (bottom image)
IC 1396 is a gigantic hydrogen-alpha-emitting cloud of gas in the northern sky Milky Way that I return to periodically. An earlier H-alpha CCD image with additional details can be seen here and an much older film image is here.
| Date | 2004-08-17, 18 |
| Scope |
Nikkor 180 mm telephoto at f/5.6 on ST-10XME (Mandel Adapter) and CFW-8A color wheel. Piggybacked on the 1200 GTO mount and guided with the internal guide chip. |
| Exposure |
14 five minute exposures with each filter and 1x1 binning with regular Custom Scientific SBIG RGB filters in SBIG CFW-8 filter wheel. |
| Processing |
Raw frames debloomed with Wodaski's Debloomer plug-in. Stacked, combined, in MaxIm 4.03. Stretched with levels and curves in PhotoShop CS. The red master frame was then added as a luminosity layer in Photoshop. Noise reduction with Kodak Digital GEM Pro. |
The above image consists of the RGB frames used in the top image plus H-alpha frames collected on 21 and 22 August. I like the H-alpha + RGB version better.
|
Exposure |
13 ten minute H-alpha exposures plus 14 five minute exposures with the RGB filters; all with 1x1 binning . |