Friday 9 January 2009

Cosmic Keyhole

This nebula is pretty easy to find - it is just below the Orion Nebula. NGC 1999, or the Keyhole nebula, for obvious reasons. It is quite striking in appearance due to the cloud of cold, dark 'dust' blocking the lit clouds behind. It is a reflection nebula, so I tried to process it to bring out all the faint outer nebulosity. Visually, it didn't look like much: just a smudge around a faint star, even in the 20" scope.

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