Astronomy Picture of the Day -- M42: Inside the Orion Nebula

NASA ^ | April 08, 2014 | (see photo credit)

[SunkenCiv]

Explanation: The Great Nebula in Orion, an immense, nearby starbirth region, is probably the most famous of all astronomical nebulas. Here, glowing gas surrounds hot young stars at the edge of an immense interstellar molecular cloud only 1500 light-years away. In the above deep image composite in assigned colors taken by the Hubble Space Telescope wisps and sheets of dust and gas are particularly evident. The Great Nebula in Orion can be found with the unaided eye near the easily identifiable belt of three stars in the popular constellation Orion. In addition to housing a bright open cluster of stars known as the Trapezium, the Orion Nebula contains many stellar nurseries. These nurseries contain much hydrogen gas, hot young stars, proplyds, and stellar jets spewing material at high speeds. Also known as M42, the Orion Nebula spans about 40 light years and is located in the same spiral arm of our Galaxy as the Sun.

[SunkenCiv]

Ths one is an eyeful, eh? :’)

[SunkenCiv]

Ear, ear!

[SunkenCiv]

:’)

[SunkenCiv]

I wonder if it would work better as a wallpaper turned 90°, I'll have to try that.

[left that other site]

I still have the horsehead as mine.

[cripplecreek]

Don’t wait up.

BTW a new orbital simulator game I discovered this afternoon.

http://www.stefanom.org/spc/

[SunkenCiv]

Great, now I’ve got “Speak Softly, Love” going through my head.

[left that other site]

Ha ha Ha!

Did i make an offer you couldn’t refuse?

[TheOldLady]

Should have called it O’Ryan.

[SunkenCiv]

:’)

[SunkenCiv]

Well, this is fun! Thanks!

[dragnet2]

That's a bit over manipulated and over processed image..but very pretty.

Here's my Orion M-42

Canon 40D, 10" SCT, 6.3 reducer at 19X65seconds- No filters

[SunkenCiv]

On my second attempt, I’m over 400 points at 82 years.

[SunkenCiv]

Nice!

[cripplecreek]

I got to just about 2,000,000 points with a full 500 years.

High mass bodies are where the points are but they disrupt orbits badly.

[TigersEye]

Well played! :)

[SunkenCiv]

Oooooh, nice! I tried submitting my scores, it ran all night, didn’t work, and now the website is down.

[MarineBrat]

I have always been a star-hopper, but I admit that I do enjoy observing next to a guy with a GoTo scope. Because they can always find something without fuss, or tell me if it’s high enough for a decent observation. Makes it easier for me to find it then. :)

My only complaint is if the GoTo scope is a noisy one. The early GoTo mounts from a manufacturer that will remain nameless sounded so bad that we called them coffee grinders. When at a large gathering like Pinos or RTMC I would always avoid setting up next to them.

[dragnet2]

Thanks

[messierhunter]

Yeah, I have one of those coffee grinders myself. It's loud enough to wake the dead, but it gets the job done nicely. Here's my best shot of M42 so far with it:



I'm going to have to redo that this coming winter though with the new camera I just used to shoot the Lagoon.



Who needs a fancy newfangled quiet coffee grinder when the loud one still has some life left in her?