Arachnophobia

I love spider season!
The LMC has so many interesting and unique nebulas to target, and NGC 2070 never gets old. Here I’ve chosen to feature the lesser seen loop below 2070 and the cute little frog guy below. (NGC 2122)

This is the first tricolour narrowband hit out with the new TOA-35 reducer, and I must say I’m pleased with the performance of this frighteningly expensive piece of glass!
All shot under a full moon too, aah the joy of narrowband!

Seems crazy I know but even though this image recently got an IOTD, in this version I’ve reprocessed it from scratch and added RGB stars and more NB data.

This time I used the new star Xterminator plug in for PS instead of Starnet++ and I must say it’s a big improvement, much cleaner and lightning fast! I also got the latest version of Topaz denoise 3.3.2 with offers heaps more control and masking, so you won’t have to worry about generating any artificial artifacts!

Aah, the joys of lockdown and too much time on my hands…

We Southern Sky folks are very lucky to be able to target the Large Magellenic Cloud and the amazing nebulae within.  The LMC has so many interesting and unique nebulas to target, and NGC 2070 aka the Tarantula never disappoints.

I’ve been working on getting “natural” star colours from by Bortle 6/7 backyard, and I’m happy with these star colours now. Seems the solution is to take lots and lots of short subs!

Most of the NB data was shot under a full moon.

Hope you like it. Suburban Melbourne, Australia. October 2021

Winner: SGL 2021 Challenge – Supernova remnants and planetary nebulae. 

About this Nebula

Also known as 30 Doradus or NGC 2070, the Tarantula Nebula, so called because it resembles a web, is a HII region (orange shows hydrogen) about 1,000 light-years in length, located in the Large Magellanic Cloud , a small satellite galaxy of the Milky Way, at an estimated distance of 170,000 light-years from Earth.

Despite the splendor of this image, we are facing an extremely hostile place for life. Here the stars form, evolve, and end their lives rapidly, often violently. The photograph contains stars at different stages of its evolution, some newly formed (about 2 million years old), still hidden in dense, dark gas bubbles, as well as the remnant of giants that ended their cycle in supernova explosions.