The Bat, the Squid, and the Seahorse
Image Details:
This region of sky is located in the constellation Cepheus, an area known to Astrophotographers in the Northern hemisphere for hosting a variety of expansive regions of both dark nebula and emission regions dotting the fainter upper Milky Way. This area is dominated by the twin crimson wings of Sharpless 129 (distance: approximately 1,300 lightyears), also called the Flying Bat, which is an emission region of Hydrogen ionized by O-type star HD 202214.
Within this nebula is another, much fainter construct called Ou4 (after its discoverer, Nicolas [Ou]tters, who found it in 2011, also calling it the Giant Squid Nebula). This is 50 lightyear-long region of ionized Oxygen (Oiii) caused by polar flows from star HD 8119. Ou4 has been historically very difficult to capture due to its low luminosity, requiring significant time investment for capture, especially for budget photographers using color cameras. Even from the dark skies of Central Texas I used over 10 nights of capture to achieve an acceptable signal-to-noise ratio (see below).
Below the ionized regions, and really throughout the entire field of view, is brown/orange interstellar dust which is ubiquitous throughout the Cepheus Molecular Cloud Complex, with a thicker area of dark nebula present in the lower left blocking out visible starlight completely (Barnard 150, or the Seahorse Nebula).
Equipment:
TS Optics 86mm Petzval (486mm Focal Length F/5.6)
ZWO ASI6200MM-P, Antlia Filters
AstroPhysics Mach2GTO Mount
Autoguiding: Orion 50mm Guidescope + ZWO ASI174MM
Exposures:
Luminance: 256 x 300” (Total: 21h 20m)
Red, Green, Blue: 122, 121, 120 x 300” (Total: 30h 15m)
Oxygen-III 3nm: 288 x 300” (Total: 24h)
Misc Details:
Capture Software: N.I.N.A. (capture), PHD2 (guiding)
Processing Software: PixInsight
Taken from: Starfront Observatories, TX, Bortle 1
Capture Dates: 26-27 June, 7-11, 13-21, 23-24, 26-28 July, 2025
