The Swan Nebula, also known as the Omega Nebula, Checkmark Nebula, Lobster Nebula, and the Horseshoe Nebula is catalogued as Messier 17 or M17 or NGC 6618, is a bright HII emission nebula in the constellation Sagittarius.
I have created a hybrid Ha/OIII Bi-Colour, near true colour image.
The seeing held to the typical Eagleview standard over the two nights of data collection (FWHM mostly in the 1.6"-1.8" range) and man, for a 12" F3.8 Newtonian, operating at 0.84"/pix, heck, I must say, I'm very happy with the outcome, what a nebula!
*NB: No Blur Exterminator or other AI based sharpening, was used on this data.
Orion Optics UK AG12 F3.8
Starlightxpress TRIUS PRO-694 Midi Combi PRO Blue Edition incl.CFW & OAG unit
FLI Atlas Focuser
HaOIII RGB = 280min 120 30 30 30min combined exposure 8.2hrs
Astronomik 6nm NB filters
-20C chip temp, flats used but no dark frames.
Focal length 1120mm
Image scale 0.84"/pix
Guide Camera: Starlightxpress Lodestar PRO
Data collected 18 and 22 July 2024, full Moon, good to excellent seeing
Seeing (FWHM) quality at Eagleview:
Excellent: <1.6"
Good: 1.6" - 1.9"
Acceptable: 2.0" - 2.3"
Poor: >2.3"
Taken from Eagleview Observatory:
pbase.com/strongmanmike2002/eagleview_observatory
Equipment setup:
pbase.com/strongmanmike2002/image/173097781/original
Some links to equipment used to take this image:
Sidereal Trading
www.siderealtrading.com.au/
StarlightXpress CCD Cameras and imaging equipment
www.sxccd.com/products
Finger Lakes Instrumentation CCD cameras:
www.flicamera.com/
Gerd Neumann and Astronomik filters:
www.astronomik.com/en/home
www.gerdneumann.net/
MSB Software & Astroart Camera control and Image processing software
www.msb-astroart.com/ 