The California Nebula

20:10 29/10/2009 UTC

After a long cloudy and rainy period we finally got some nice weather (and moon of course). I had tuned my mount for few nights and had to shoot something to test it. California Nebula came in mind first, so it aimed at it. To proof my mount working as expected I did 15min subs and it worked fantastic. Too bad I forgot to switch dithering on. All in all, I got quite a nice set of data. Man, it is a HUGE object! Maybe I have to try to dig out some SII and OIII too for this.

NGC/IC Object List:
NGC1499 gaseous nebula RA:04h03m14.4 Dec:+36°21m'33" BMag: 5.0, LBN 756 California Nebula

Camera: Atik Instruments 4000LE | Telescope: Skywatcher ED80 Pro 80mm f7.5 refractor, William Optics 0.8x focal reducer | Mount: Vixen GP-D2, Boxdoerfer PowerFlex MTS-3SLP drive controller | Filters: Baader H-alpha 7nm 2" | Guiding: The Imaging Source DMK 21AU04.AS CCD camera, Orion ShortTube 80mm f5 refractor, Stark-Labs PHD Guiding | Exposure: Ha 10x900s (2h30m) unbinned, CCD @ -30° f6 | Software: CCDWare CCDStack, Adobe Photoshop CS4, Stark-Labs Nebulosity 2 | Location: 60°31'N 26°52'E (Koivula/Kotka,FI) | Background sky brightness (SQM): 18.85 mag/arcsec² | Image Field: 1.808 x 1.812 degrees | Image Center: Ra 04h01m25s Dec +36°22'22" | Target altitude in the beginning of the exposure 48°