The iconic Seven Sisters, also known as Pleiades or Messier 45 has returned to the northern hemisphere during the night sky. You have seen earlier versions of this beauty in the sky before, but this is my first rendition for this Fall/Winter season. I was particularly excited to shoot this target as a test with the one-shot color camera Altair Astro Hypercam 26C. This camera paired with Skywatcher Evostar 72ED provides a fairly wide field version of M45 showing off its myriad of colorful stars. In this rendition, I was able to test relatively short exposures (1-minute) compared to my previous version with 5-minute exposures using the AA Hypercam 183C. A total of 115 one-minute exposures were captured and stacked in Astro Pixel Processor. To me the results were pretty impressive. I will be shooting this target at 5-minute exposures a little after in this season when the target is high in the sky by midnight. Stay tuned!
Gear: AA Hypercam 26C, Skywatcher Evostar 72ED, Optolong CLS, EXOS2GT mount; guided with SVbony 120mm + ASI120MC.
Exif: 115 one-minute exposures, Gain 200, Offset 3, TEC @10 degrees
The image below features an even wider field with the Askar FMA180 lens paired with the Hypercam 26C with just 51 one-minute exposures.
https://earthsky.org/favorite-star-patterns/pleiades-star-cluster-enjoys-worldwide-renown/
Very nice indeed! It’s true you can’t really truly appreciate nebulosity with visual observing. You really need astrophotography to bring out the subtle aspects.
That is very true.