After a week of clouds, the skies are clear enough for imaging

August 28, 2022

Right now, I'm in the middle of a 70 x 240 second Ha imaging run of sh2-157, the Lobster Claw Nebula in Cassiopeia and crossing the border into Cepheus. (I shot this with a Sony A7s, Zeiss Batis 40mm f/2 CF, 15 sec exposure, ISO 1600). That bright star in the center (out of focus—bokeh) is actually Jupiter.

Another one of the astro setup, this time with an Air Force tanker cruising in for a landing at Pease, just outside Portsmouth, in the background. (I think it was a tanker, going by the sound because I couldn't actually see anything but the lights. Pease is home to the 157th Air Refueling Wing).

I finished up the Lobster Claw Sunday night with some 3 nanometer Oxygen3 data. The Lobster Claw (Sh2-157), the Bubble Nebula, and so much more, extending over the border from Cassiopeia into Cepheus. The squarish bright region, Sh2-157a, at the joint of the top bluish arc of the Claw is a denser emission structure surrounding the Wolf Rayet star WR-157. The Bubble Nebula is middle top (NGC 7635, Sharpless 162, Caldwell 11), and the bright emission region below and to the right is NGC 7538. That cluster of stars above the Bubble Nebula is Messier 52 (M52). The Lobster Claw Sh2-157 is about 8000 lightyears away.