M97 (NGC 3587; Owl Nebula) is a roughly circular nebula centered about its central dying star, which is becoming a white dwarf (in center of image and slightly bluish). The nebula is about 2,000 light years away from Earth and is located just under the Bowl of the Big Dipper asterism in the constellation of Ursa Major. M97 is believed to be 6,000 to 8,000 years old.
The material contained in Owl Nebula is believed to be slightly over 10% of the mass of our sun and is comprised of several gases including hydrogen, helium, nitrogen, oxygen, and sulfur. In this image, the central core of the nebula is largely oxygen shown in blue-green, while the outer shell is primarily hydrogen gas shown in red.
M97’s owl-like appearance results from an inner shell that is not symmetrical, but rather it forms a barrel-like structure aligned at an angle of 45° to our line of sight from Earth.
Capture Date: 2/20/24
Equipment
Celestron EdgeHD 800 (native fL of 2032mm) with Celestron OAG and ASI174mm mini guide camera
ASIAir Plus, ASI2600MC, ZWO AM5 mount, ZWO 5-position filter wheel
Filter: Antlia Triband Ultra RGB [72 x 300s = 6:00 total exposure]
Processed with PixInsight and Adobe Photoshop for cropping and JPEG generation.
A nicely detailed and colored owl nebula Greg, bravo! I like seeing the other background objects around it so nicely processed!
Terri
@terri Thanks again, Terri! Yes, there are several galaxies (very small) in the background and I started to try and annotate them -- and gave up quickly! 🤣
This is kind of a tough one to process since it always looks 'blurry'. I wanted to reach for a focus knob when I was processing!!
Greg
Hi Greg,
I'm pretty sure that's the most detail I've ever seen in the Owl, and I appreciate your touch with the colors!
-P-
@peter-gillette Thanks so much, Peter! Imaging this at a long focal length was definitely a first for me -- and a bit of a challenge to process.
Greg
