OPEN CLUSTER NGC 2264, THE CHRISTMAS TREE CLUSTER
PLUS THE SNOWFLAKE CLUSTER, CONE NEBULA AND THE FOXFUR NEBULA
BEAUTIFUL NEBULOUS REGIONS NEAR S MONOCEROTIS
(Image taken with an ST-10XME CCD Camera, see below for a different camera's version)
Click on image or Click Here to see full-resolution version (~3.1Mb):
Here is a wide-field view of this region, taken with a larger format camera (STL-11000M):
Click on image or Click Here to see full-resolution version (~9Mb):
Scroll down for an earlier rendition of this nebula.
Image acquisition and processing details - ST-10XME version:
| Telescope: | Takahashi Epsilon 180, f/2.8 |
| Mount: | Astro-Physics AP1200 |
| Camera: | SBIG ST-10XME cooled to -20C and -25C, external guiding with SBIG e-Finder and ST-402ME cooled to -15C. |
| Filters, Exposure Times: | Total exposure time = 22 hours 25 min. AstroDon Generation 2 Red=335 min, Green=285 min, and Blue=245 min (5 min subframes). AstroDon 3nm Hydrogen Alpha 480 min (32x15 min subs). Additional data was obtained but discarded. All images binned 1x1. |
| Dates: | various 10/15/09 to 10/24/09. |
| Moon Phase: | various. |
| Location: | Xanadu Observatory, backyard roll-off in Tucson, AZ |
| Software: | CCDCommander, MaximDL, FocusMax, TheSky, CDDInspector, CCDStack, Adobe Photoshop CS4, Noel Carboni's Astronomy Tools. |
| Notes: | This is a fascinating region which is fun to explore visually as well as with the CCD. I've enhanced the RGB image by adding some Hydrogen-alpha data. |
Image acquisition and processing details - ST-11000M version:
| Telescope: | Takahashi Epsilon 180, f/2.8 |
| Mount: | Astro-Physics AP1200 |
| Camera: | SBIG ST-11000M cooled to -30C, external guiding with SBIG e-Finder and ST-402ME cooled to -20C. |
| Filters, Exposure Times: | Total exposure time = 22 hours 25 min. AstroDon Generation 2 Red=120 min, Green=160 min, and Blue=120 min (10 min subframes). AstroDon 3nm Hydrogen Alpha 315 min (13x15 + 6x20 min subs). Additional data was obtained but discarded. All images binned 1x1. |
| Dates: | various 11/04/09 to 01/13/10. |
| Moon Phase: | various. |
| Location: | Xanadu Observatory, backyard roll-off in Tucson, AZ |
| Software: | CCDCommander, MaximDL, FocusMax, TheSky, CDDInspector, CCDStack, Adobe Photoshop CS4, Noel Carboni's Astronomy Tools. |
| Notes: | This is a fascinating region which is fun to explore visually as well as with the CCD. I've enhanced the RGB image by adding some Hydrogen-alpha data. |
Below are images taken a few years earlier, with the data appropriately obtained on Christmas:
"HaLRGB" image taken 12/25/06 (click on image for larger size):
Here is the H-Alpha data only (click on image for larger size):
Image acquisition and processing details:
| Telescope: | William Optics Zenithstar 105mm APO refractor, f/5.6 with 0.8 FR/FF. |
| Mount: | Celestron CGE, remotely controlled with NexRemote. |
| Camera: | SBIG ST-10XME cooled to -30C, internal guiding. All images binned 1x1. |
| Filters, Exposure Times: | AstroDon Lum 45 min (9x5 min), Hydrogen-Alpha 160 min (16x10 min) Red/Green/Blue 45 min each filter (9x5 min each). |
| Dates: | 25-Dec-2006 |
| Moon Phase: | 26% |
| Location: | Xanadu Observatory, Backyard in Tucson, AZ |
| Software: | MaximDL, TheSky, CCDInspector, CCDStack, Adobe Photoshop |
| Notes: | I took this image on Christmas Eve and early Christmas Morning,
after a wonderful family dinner and before Santa arrived with the
presents. To process this image I combined the H-Alpha and Red filter images in an 80/20 ratio as outlined on Rob Gendler's excellent website. I then made an RGB image using this combination as the "R" channel. Then I added the H-Alpha as a luminance layer, plus I added the Luminance filter data in Lighten mode with 50% opacity. There were some awful reflection artifacts in the blue channel near the middle top of the image. They were in a general background region so I used the Patch Tool to remove them before combining the blue channel. |