Sunday, September 9, 2012

The Lagoon Nebula

So, I know all my followers of this blog have been waiting for this, a deep sky photo! All of...or maybe one of you (or am I the only?) haha. This hobby is by no means easy, but is rewarding once you get some decent results you are looking for. Last night my mom and I went out and did some night sky viewing and photography. It was one of the best looking night skies I have ever seen, my breath was taken away. The Milky Way stretched all the way from the north east to the south west. My words won't do it justice but...it was absolutley amazing. I've never seen such detail! A little over 30 miles away from city lights, we set-up next to an observatory. I can see why they set up there, haha. It took about 30-45 minutes to get everything set up, aligned and ready to go. By that time, the stars were out and I was itching to get started!

We did some viewing first, the views provided were very very nice, crisp and clear. Staring into the heavens we spotted M13 the Hercules cluster, the Lagoon nebula, the Trifid nebula, the Swan nebula, Helix nebula, M51, Bode's nebula, the Veil nebula, Wild Duck cluster, Andromeda galaxy, and a variety of other spectacular objects. I was like a kid opening presents on Christmas day, literally, I was jumping around in excitement! I tried my hand once again at imaging, going for the Lagoon nebula first (and only picture I got that night that turned out). So here it is, 5x1min exposures at ISO 1000 and 2x30sec at ISO800 stacked in DeepSkyStacker and stretched in CS5.

God is simply awesome and His majesty is revealed in His creation.


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