A relatively distant and faint object in the constellation Cepheus, the “Lion Nebula” is a rich area of star formation energized by two Wolf-Rayet stars. Wolf-Rayet stars are extremely hot and millions of times more luminous than our Sun.
This was my second multi-night project, and I spent a lot of time dialing in my proficiency with GHS in PixInsight to stretch the Ha and Oiii channels then combined them using the Foraxx palette to produce the kind of unique, dynamic photos I admire in many fellow astrophotographers’ work.
Full frame photo available at https://app.astrobin.com/i/5usdrm?r=B
Light frames: 60 x 600s, total integration time 10 hours (2 nights).
Equipment:
- Telescope: Apertura 90mm Triplet Refractor
- Main camera: ZWO ASI2600MC Pro
- Filter: Optolong L-Ultimate 2"
- Mount: ZWO AM5N
- Guidescope: Apertura 32mm
- Guide camera: ZWO ASI220MM Mini
Processing:
- Pleiades Astrophoto PixInsight
- RC Astro BlurXTerminator
- RC Astro NoiseXTerminator
- RC Astro StarXTerminator
- Adobe Photoshop 2026
by spidermanbyday