Dates & Location

Catalogue identification

Misleading nomenclature for a single star forming region.
Commonly known as two objects: The North American Nebula and The Pelican Nebula.

In this image, North is down.

Tak FSQ106N at 530 mm focal length, F5.0.
Paramount ME German equatorial Mount.
Camera - Moravian Instruments G3-16200 with 7 position FW and OAG.
TheSkyX Pro telescope control.
SGP used for camera, PHD Guide and Focus control.
Starlight Instruments Boss Focuser with FSQ rear cell replacement.
Lodestar guide camera.

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Where it is in space

About 2°ENE of the magnitude 1.25 star Deneb in the constellation of Cygnus.
It is in the plane of the Milky Way (Galactic Equator), and is located about 1500 light years away and spans about 50 light years.

Remote session using Splashtop control from Ravenshead, UK.
Exposures: L:R:G:B 12 x 10 min each .
Narrowband exposures: Ha, SII and OIII 11,12 and 17x 20 min each.

All sub-exposures -20°C. All images binned 1x1.
Automated sessions using Sequence Generator Pro (SGP).

There are no obvious star clusters which are definitely known to be part of this nebula. Any clustering seen here is probably not a real star cluster but only a random scattering of stars at different distances. However, the strong OIII emissions depicted in blue suggest that there are very luminous, young stars hidden away somewhere in the molecular cloud. The dark cloud partially obscuring the nebula is a part of the main cloud but is sculpted by the high energy emissions in the line of sight from our solar
system, so revealing the hot interior.
In this image the stars have been subdued to allow the eye to focus on the detail in the nebulosity. he two loud.

Processing Methods

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