NGC 3199 - DIFFUSE NEBULA

CARINA

 (ra: 10.17,1/ dec -57:55)

-

Merlo, San Luis Province. Argentina. February 13th  2009

DATA

TYPE: Diffuse Nebula

VISUAL MAGNITUDE: n/a

Apparent Diameter: 22 arc minutes / Picture roughly: 25x20 arc minutes

DISTANCE 12.000 light years

OBJECT DESCRIPTION

Some 4 degrees away well known Key Hole Nebula it is located a faint arc shaped nebula designed by NGC 3199 also in the Constellation of Carina. Fitting quite well in the SCT 8 FOV, the object spreads along a distance of 75 lights years. Near the center of the ring is located a Wolf Rayet star. This type of stars are hot and luminous and are loosing mass in the form of stellar wind at a high rate per year and apparently is what if had formed the shape of this dim object . These stars are nearly at the end of their stellar lives. (*)

It was a difficult object to process since have not seen much color images of it. The intensity and merge of the Ha in R and L was some how following the stars colors.  The dense part of the nebula came a bit posterized probably because the SD mask calibration. No much idea if the color of the nebula is real but most of the data came from the Ha channel.

(*) Source APOD & J.K. Cannizzo

IMAGE INFORMATION

SCOPE: Celestron SCT 8 @ 6.3

CAMERA: SXVF H9

GUIDING: William Optics ZS 66 - SX Guide Camera

IMAGE ACQUISITION: AstroArt 3.0 - Control Interface 3.72 plug in

FILTERS: Astronomik Type II, Ha 6nm - Atik Filter Wheel

SKY CONDITIONS: 3/4 Moon in Virgo (at 56 degrees) - Rural Skies

EXPOSURES: LHaRGB (15,60,15,15,15)

PROCESSING: Calibration SD Mask, CCD Sharp, ImagesPlus 2.75, Photoshop CS2