Fun facts
IC1805 Heart Nebula (also known as the Running dog nebula) is an emission nebula, 7500 light years away from Earth and located in the Perseus Arm of the Galaxy in the constellation Cassiopeia. It was discovered by William Herschel on 3 November 1787. It displays glowing ionized hydrogen gas and darker dust lanes. The brightest part of the nebula (a knot at its western edge) is separately classified as NGC 896 Fishhead Nebula, because it was the first part of the nebula to be discovered.
The nebula’s intense red output and its morphology are driven by the radiation emanating from a small group of stars near the nebula’s center. This open cluster of stars, known as Collinder 26 or Melotte 15, contains a few bright stars nearly 50 times the mass of the Sun, and many more dim stars that are only a fraction of the Sun’s mass.
The Heart Nebula is also made up of ionised oxygen and sulfur gasses, responsible for the rich blue and orange colours seen in narrowband images. The shape of the nebula is driven by stellar winds from the hot stars in its core. The nebula also spans almost 2 degrees in the sky, covering an area four times that of the diameter of the full moon.
Other Catalog Designations: NGC 896, IC1805, Sh2-190
Subtype: Emission Nebula
Distance from Earth: 7500 light years
Visual Magnitude: 6.5
Radius: 165 light years
Constellation: Cassiopeia
{from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heart_Nebula }
Capture Notes
Based upon Ann Chavtur’s suggestion, that she uses the LeXtreme filter whenever she is shooting from her house, I decided to reimage the Heart Nebula (I’ve imaged this target with several other imaging stream configurations (RaBB mosaics, LPro filter) with the new RaSC using the LeXtreme filter. Spending the entire night on the single target
Equipment
Polar alignment: QHYCCD camera (controlled by Polemaster)
Imaging stream: Askar FRA600, Canon EOS Ra with Optolong LeXtreme light pollution filter
Mount: Rainbow Astro RC-135E (controlled by iHubo)
Autoguider: Orion 60mm Multi-Use Guide Scope, Orion StarShoot AutoGuider Pro Mono Astrophotography Camera (controlled by PHD2)
All equipment controlled by HP Probook running Sequence Generator Pro v3.2.0.660.
Capture & processing notes
Sequence plan: ISO1600, 90x300sec; Total=7:30hrs. Captured 20Oct 2022, 1952MDT – 21Oct2022, 0417MDT.
Capture: 20 October 2022
Shooting location: HCH, Colorado Springs, Colorado
Processing: Stacked in APP, using Ha-OIII Color for stacking algorithm, due to LeX LP filter.