The Southern Celestial Serpent – Interstellar Cirrus in the Deep South

Image Title: Southern Celestial Serpent

Copyright: Rodney Watters 202

Date image was taken: July 20, 2025

Location: Glanmire, NSW Australia

Data Acquisition Method: Personal Telescope Setup

Description and Details: There are many different types of objects that astronomers study and that astrophotographers photograph. These include galaxies, nebulae and star clusters. Nebulae that capture our attention can include emission (typically pink to red), reflection (typically blue) and planetary nebulae (which are actually dying stars). The image posted here is an example of another kind of nebula which are generally referred to as Integrated Flux Nebula (IFN). IFN are very very faint and require long exposure times and particular attention in post processing to bring out the details in the object. IFN are actually massive clouds of space dust illuminated by the combined light of the stars in the Milky Way.

This particular area of IFN is called the Southern Celestial Serpent and required over 33 hours of exposures and many hours staring blankly at a computer screen trying to wrest the data signal from the background noise :-) Technical details follow:
Mount: Skywatcher HEQ5 Pro
Camera: ZWO ASI6200
Optics: Canon EF200mm Prime lens
Filters: Astronomik 50mm Luminance, Red, Green, Blue
Exposures:
- Lum/Clear: 6h 24m (64 × 360")
- R: 9h (54 × 600")
- G: 9h (54 × 600")
- B: 8h 40m (52 × 600")
Software:
Data acquisition: Sequence Generator Pro
Calibration/Registration/Integration and post processing: Pixinsight 1.9.x Lockhart

Name: Rodney Watters

Website or Facebook Profile: http://www.astrobin.com/users/Ryderscope/