Saturday, November 28, 2020

IC 5146 - Cocoon Nebula


 

IC 5146 (also Caldwell 19Sh 2-125, and the Cocoon Nebula) is a reflection/emission nebula and Caldwell object in the constellation Cygnus. The NGC description refers to IC 5146 as a cluster of 9.5 mag stars involved in a bright and dark nebula. The cluster is also known as Collinder 470.  It shines at magnitude +10.0/+9.3/+7.2.  Its celestial coordinates are RA 21h 53.5m , dec +47° 16′. It is located near the naked-eye star Pi Cygni, the open cluster NGC 7209 in Lacerta, and the bright open cluster M39. The cluster is about 4,000 ly away, and the central star that lights it formed about 100,000 years ago; the nebula is about 12 arcmins across, which is equivalent to a span of 15 light years.

When viewing IC 5146, dark nebula Barnard 168 (B168) is an inseparable part of the experience, forming a dark lane that surrounds the cluster and projects westward forming the appearance of a trail behind the Cocoon.


The above images is made up of 24 subframes 5 minutes each (2 hours) stacked and processed in AstroArt 7 and tweaked using Photoshop 5.  The subframes were captured using a AT6RC scope mounted on an AP900 mount with a Starlight Express SXVR-M25C.  The AP900 was autoguided using a Meade DSI Pro camera and an 80mm f7 refractor scope.  The image data was captured while at Rusty's RV Ranch near Rodeo, AZ in October of 2020.


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