Thank you Ron!   It is a wonderful object during a time we don't usually see a lot of clear weather.    

Terri

Although William Henry Pickering was official credited with its discovery in 1889, the Horsehead Nebula was first recorded on a photographic plate taken by Williamina Paton Fleming at the Harvard College Observatory in 1888. The first published description of the Horsehead Nebula was given by E. E. Barnard in 1913, and it was first cataloged by him in 1919.

Barnard 33 is the most interesting feature of a huge region of gas and dust situated 1,600 light years away in the constellation Orion. It is a dark globule of dust and non-luminous gas, obscuring the light coming from the moderately bright nebula IC 434 behind it. The red glow of IC 434 originates from ionized hydrogen gas. The bright, bluish reflection nebula near the Horsehead is NGC 2023.

The underside of the "neck" of the Horsehead is especially dark, and actually casts a shadow on the field below the "muzzle". The entire region is illuminated by the bright OB star Sigma Orionis, which is also responsible for ionizing the emission nebula IC 434. The much brighter Zeta Orionis is a foreground star, not related to the nebulosity.    Sky Safari pro 6

I shot this with a TEC140 scope with AP QTCC reducer/corrector to bring the scope to F5.   The camera is an ASI6200 mono with Chroma filters.  I shot the image in an RGB+Ha palette and did not do any color modification or saturation as the colors seemed perfect after Pixinsight SPCC.

Clear Skies,

Terri

Sh 2-155 (also designated Caldwell 9, Sharpless 155 or S155, or LBN529) is a diffuse nebula in the constellation Cepheus, within a larger nebula complex containing emission, reflection, and dark nebulosity. It is widely known as the Cave Nebula, though that name was applied earlier to Ced 201, a different nebula in Cepheus. Sh 2-155 is an ionized H II region with ongoing star formation activity,at an estimated distance of 725 parsecs (2400 light-years) from Earth.

Sh 2-155 was first noted as a galactic emission nebula in 1959 in the extended second edition of the Sharpless catalogue, being a part of the much larger Cep OB3 Association. Although Sh 2-155 is relatively faint for amateur observation, some of its structure may be seen visually through a moderately sized telescope under dark skies.

I've taken a total of 15 hours of exposures to make this image through a TEC140 with 0.7 focal reducer and ASI6200MM camera and Chroma SHO and RGB filters.  Except for 30 minutes each for R,G and B, most of the exposure is in narrowband.    The palette I used is OHS versus the normal SHO.     I just like it better in this image.

Greg

Terri

Greg

NGC 4244, also known as Caldwell 26, is an edge-on loose spiral galaxy in the constellation Canes Venatici, and is part of the M94 Group or Canes Venatici I Group, a galaxy group relatively close to the Local Group containing the Milky Way. In the sky, it is located near the yellow naked-eye star, Beta Canum Venaticorum, but also near the barred spiral galaxy NGC 4151 and irregular galaxy NGC 4214.

With an apparent V-band magnitude of 10.18, NGC 4244 lies approximately 4.3 megaparsecs (14 million light years) away. A nuclear star cluster and halo is located near the centre of this galaxy.  (Wikipedia)    

What is a nuclear star cluster you might ask:

A nuclear star cluster (NSC) or compact stellar nucleus (sometimes called young stellar nucleus) is a star cluster with high density and high luminosity near the center of mass of most galaxies.

NSCs are the central massive objects of fainter, low-mass galaxies where supermassive black holes (SMBHs) are not present or are of negligible mass. In the most massive galaxies, NSCs are entirely absent. Some galaxies, including the Milky Way, are known to contain both a NSC and a SMBH of comparable mass.

^(wikipedia)

I imaged this object with my TEC180 refractor with 0.9x flattener installed.   The Camera is a QHY600PH-M with Chroma RGB filters.   I've been playing around with doing just RGB instead of mostly luminance with a little RGB.    The RGB only has given me better colors but I know an L is must more efficient in photon capture, so it's all a tradeoff.    I wish we had more clear skies as I'm data starved.    I captured a total of 9.5 hours of exposures, each 8 minutes long using an extended well depth exposure mode on the camera.    

First detected 6/12/2025 astronomers from the All-Sky Automated Survey for Supernovae at Ohio State University, it started with a magnitude of +8.4, as of 6/16 it was +5.7.

Thanks Alan, a great find.    I'm not sure I can see it from my house as I don't get much below 10-15 degrees in the south, and only in specific places between trees.   This doesn't rise much above 5 degrees.    Can you see it from where you are?

Terri

First detected 6/12/2025 astronomers from the All-Sky Automated Survey for Supernovae at Ohio State University, it started with a magnitude of +8.4, as of 6/16 it was +5.7.