Object: The Soul Nebula (Westerhout 5, Sharpless 2-199, LBN 667) is an emission nebula located in Cassiopeia, a figure in Greek mythology, was queen of Aethiopia and wife of king Cepheus, who long ago ruled lands surrounding the upper Nile river. She was arrogant and vain, characteristics that led to her downfall. Stars are forming in the Soul of the Queen, more specifically, a large star forming region called the Soul Nebula. The Soul Nebula houses several open clusters of stars, a large radio source known as W5, and huge evacuated bubbles formed by the winds of young massive stars. Located about 6,500 light years away, the Soul Nebula spans about 100 light years and is usually imaged next to its celestial neighbor the Heart Nebula (IC 1805).
This image was captured in narrowband and processed in the Hubble palette, where red is ionized sulfur, green is hydrogen-alpha and blue is ionized oxygen.
Taken: October 4, 2019
Telescope: Skywatcher Esprit 80 ED Triplet APO Refractor
Mount: Paramount ME II unguided
Camera: ZWO ASI1600MM-Pro (cooled to -15C; unity gain) Bin 1×1.
Focuser: Starizona Micro Touch Autofocuser
Filters used: Hydrogen-alpha, Oxygen-III and Sulphur-II on a ZWO 8 position filter wheel
Exposures: Ha, O-III and S-II 30×120 sec. each for a total exposure time of 3 hours; calibrated with 100 bias frames, 30 dark frames, 32 flat frames with 32 dark-flats
Seeing Conditions:
Processed with PixInsight and Photoshop CC 2019