I've been thinking about winter astronomy season soon becoming a thing of the past and decided to revisit some data I captured in my back yard this past December of the Running Man & Orion Nebula (Sh2-279 & M42). Even though I've imaged these objects numerous times before, they never fail to blow me away with their magnificence.
As I've mentioned before, while I prefer to image from a dark sky location, this image shows that you don't have to drive hours to get reasonably decent astrophotos. For reference, my house is located in the moderately light polluted area called Centre Point (between Skippack and Blue Bell). The camera used for this is a cooled, one-shot-color camera with an internal IR block filter (which was the only filter used for this capture).
Imaging Details:
Running Man & Great Orion Nebula
(Sh2-279 & M42)
December 19 & 20, 2022 (~00:01 to 01:20 EST)
(North is approx. left & East is approx. down)
1 hr, 35 mins Total Exp (33x120s, 22x60s, 30x10s, 30x5s)
OTA: TeleVue TV-85, w/8x FR (480mm FL, 1.6 arcsec/pix)
Camera: ZWO ASI2600MC-P (-20ºC, G=102), Int IR Filter,
Mount: iOptron CEM40
Pre & Post Processing: PixInsight Ver 1.8.9
Noise Reduction, Black Point & Presentation Format: PS CS 5.1
AI Noise Reduction: ON1 Photo RAW 2023
Gary Trapuzzano
Worcester Township, PA
~Bortle 6/7 (SQM ~= 18.8 Typ)
Clear skies,
Gary