We had a few clear nights in a row recently and I concentrated on just one object – IC2169 – a beautiful reflection nebula in Monoceros.  9 hours total exposure time using 4-minute subs from the New Forest Observatory.  Processing by Noel Carboni, Florida, U.S.A.  The little golden open cluster at bottom/left is OCL494 or Trumpler 5.

Another candidate for Star Vistas II

Managed to get today’s Astronomy Picture of the Day [APOD] with the wide field (sparkly colour) image of Kemble’s Cascade.  I like this image so much it is one of the permanent “wallpapers” on my home computer.  The little open cluster sitting on the left hand edge of the cascade makes this image perfect IMO

I acquired another 4 hours of data on this object and Noel put the whole thing together – now totalling some 9-hours of imaging time at f#2 on an 11″ reflector!  This is NGC1333 a beautiful reflection nebula in Perseus and it is surrounded by the most amazing dust clouds as you can see.  This is one of the “busiest” regions I have ever imaged.  Clearly another page in Star Vistas II

Noel recently processed the Caldwell 10 dataset and managed to pull out the faint red open cluster (IC116) towards the top left of the image.  Note also the dark nebulosity running diagonally across the field of view.  There are a total of 7 (yes-seven) catalogued open clusters in this image – Cassiopeia is a very rich star field region.  Another beautiful Star Vista – courtesy of Cassiopeia – for Star Vistas II.

Back to some deep-sky imaging and two more brand new objects for Star Vistas II.  Recently captured from the New Forest Observatory we have a nice little open cluster (in fact there are three open clusters in the field of view) in Cassiopeia – Caldwell 10.  Next to this we have a globular cluster and Messier object – M15 – in the constellation Pegasus.  The C11/Hyperstar III/SXVF-M25C is a great combination for star clusters and star fields as you can grab a great dataset in just one evening’s (4-hour) imaging.