Observation by Kenneth Medcalf: Heart Nebula mosaic

Uploaded by

Kenneth Medcalf

Observer

Kenneth Medcalf

Observed

2026 Sep 17 - 22:21

Uploaded

2026 Sep 23 - 13:33

Objects

The Heart Nebula (IC1805)
The Fish Head Nebula (IC1795)
NGC1027
Melotte 15

Planetarium overlay









Constellation

Cassiopeia

Field centre

RA: 02h33m
Dec: +61°17'
Position angle: -65°15'

Field size

1°58' × 2°29'

Equipment
  • iOptron RC8 with .75 focal reducer; Baader steeltrack focuser
  • Optolong l-ehance filter; SVBony filter drawer
  • Skywatcher Wave 150i
  • ZWO 2600P25 and ZWO CAA
  • Skywatcher 50ED guidescope with ZWO mini
  • ASIair pro
  • Siril v1.4.4 with Syqon prism deep; Veralux scripts
  • Affinity photo
Exposure

240s at 160 gain -5C

Location

Burwash

Target name

Heart Nebula; Fish head

Title

Heart Nebula mosaic

About this image

This image is a mosaic of 8 panels shot on 3 nights 17; 21 and 22 September.   Each panel has between 21 and 29 useable subs of 240s each so just shy of 12 hours of capture.
I chose to use RC8 with reducer for hi res results; final image after allowing for panel overlap and crop is 11000 x 14000 pixels so this version here is highly compressed to meet the 10MB rule.
I have been experimenting with mosaics for the last 6 weeks and used Siril scripts to assist with potentially complex gradients over each panel.   I shot the central 4 on the first night and then added the top two and bottom two over subsequent shoots.   
I found Verlaux Nox most effective with gradients having painted out the broad shape of the heart and fish head.   I used Syqon Parallax, Prism Deep and Starless for the pre stretch phases then Veralux Alchemy; HMS; Curves; Vectra and Star Composer to support the HSO palette.   On Alchemy HSO I weighted the OIII boost by 1.7x to support the blue tones / teal colouration present in images I found online and that are spread over both G and B channels, a feature of the limitations of OSC/l-enhance capture.   Final touches using Affinity and James Ritson macros.
One of the most pleasing outcomes of this project is that I identified a couple of features in the image that prompted further investigation them not being identified on app star charts.  For example the planetary Nebula WeBo1 which I initially thought was just a capture error / impact of colouring.

Files associated with this observation
Like this image
Copyright of all images and other observations submitted to the BAA remains with the owner of the work. Reproduction of work by third parties is expressly forbidden without the consent of the copyright holder. By submitting images to this online gallery, you grant the BAA permission to reproduce them in any of our publications.