Some (more) Orion eye candy

[Andy Elliott]

The constellation of Orion is home to one of the most active regions of nearby stellar formation visible in the night sky and is known collectively as The Orion Molecular Cloud Complex.

The complex contains many large bright nebulae, with the most famous being M42 (The Orion nebula), which must be of the most photographed objects in the night sky; I certainly never grow tired of imaging it.

This image is made up from a 6-panel mosaic of 2 regions within the complex known as The Orion A and Orion B molecular clouds. These clouds encompass the area around Orion’s belt and sword. The image incorporates amongst other things, The Horsehead Nebula, The Flame Nebulae, The Orion Nebula, De Mairan’s Nebula, and Running Man Nebula.

Towards the bottom of M42 is an open star cluster NGC1980, also known as, the ‘Lost Jewel of Orion’, which can easily go un-noticed when looking at images of M42. The Lost Jewel is a cluster centred around the bright star Hatysa (also called Nair al Saif or Iota Orionis), which is the brightest star in Orion’s sword.

The full res image can be viewed here: https://astrob.in/v8ixjl/0/

 

[JimFox]

Great job Andy on taming this one! That's a lot of dynamic range. One thing I really like as well is how you got all of that dark nebula so well. That's something that got lost in my recent effort.

Awesome work! I might have to go back to the drawing board on mine!

 

[Mike Lewis]

Excellent widefield of this classic area of the sky. Lots of great detail and a deep view with lots of dim dust to go along with the nebulae. Lovely work.

ML