Wednesday night was a good night at the River Ridge Observatory, at least until the Moon rose. I got there right at 5pm and set up my scope. It was dark enough by 6 to have finished the alignment and focus stuff. One target was the bright Comet Leonard but that was too low in the trees to try to image so I had to settle for viewing it in 100mm binoculars. It was very distinct and well formed. It looked like, well, a comet with a distinct green aspect that they often do.Once that was done, I switched to the main event – trying out my new IDAS NBZ dual narrowband filter. This filter is designed to allow only two narrow bands (hence the classification) of light through, the bands of light that emission nebulae tend to emit. This line of filters is designed specifically with fast systems like my f/1.9 11″ Hyperstar system. I picked the Western Veil Nebula in Cygnus which is getting low in the western sky at sunset and will soon go behind the Sun and return in the morning sky.The Veil Nebula is a large but dim supernova remnant that extends about three degrees (6 times the size of the Moon) in the sky. This is one section of it. To do it all with this setup, I would need to do a mosaic of probably six tiles. The bottom part of the nebula is also called The Witch’s Broom Nebula. The red tones you see come from the Hydrogen Alpha emission line and the blue-green from the Oxygen III emission lines (two of them).
