Saturday, Dec 7, 2024

The objects captured in this image are two: the Orion Nebula and the Running Man. The first, located on the right in the frame (also known as Messier 42 or M 42, NGC 1976) is one of the brightest diffuse nebulae in the night sky. Recognizable to the naked eye as a non-stellar object, it is located south of the famous asterism of Orion's Belt, at the center of the so-called Orion's Sword, in the constellation of the same name. On the left, the Running Man Nebula (or the Running Man Nebula), officially called NGC 1977 or Sh2-279, is an emission nebula (the reddest areas) and a reflection (the blue areas), dominated by a group of young and hot stars (42 Orionis is the most intense). For the realization I decided to capture the object in a single session in order to also facilitate its processing. All this is made possible thanks to the great dynamic range of the 294 that allowed me not to saturate the nucleus of M42 with 60s shots. In this way, through careful processing I was able to extrapolate even the weak signal of the most diffuse areas, taking care not to saturate the bright ones. The astrophotography session took place under a bortle 6 sky, Campania, Italy.