Posted on 08/12/2021 4:02:25 PM PDT by MtnClimber
Explanation: The beautiful Trifid Nebula is a cosmic study in contrasts. Also known as M20, it lies about 5,000 light-years away toward the nebula rich constellation Sagittarius. A star forming region in the plane of our galaxy, the Trifid does illustrate three different types of astronomical nebulae; red emission nebulae dominated by light from hydrogen atoms, blue reflection nebulae produced by dust reflecting starlight, and dark nebulae where dense dust clouds appear in silhouette. But the red emission region roughly separated into three parts by obscuring dust lanes is what lends the Trifid its popular name. Pillars and jets sculpted by newborn stars, below and left of the emission nebula's center, appear in famous Hubble Space Telescope close-up images of the region. The Trifid Nebula is about 40 light-years across. Just too faint to be seen by the unaided eye, it almost covers the area of a full moon in planet Earth's sky.
For more detail go to the link and click on the image for a high definition image. You can then move the magnifying glass cursor then click to zoom in and click again to zoom out. When zoomed in you can scan by moving the side bars on the bottom and right side of the image.
Reminds me of the book DAY OF THE TRIFIDS and the movie.
Ah yes, the famous nebula where Khan met his end and the hands of Captain Kirk. And there to the upper right is the Genesis planet, so named after the Ultimate Weapon that was secretly developed by the Federation and completely forgotten again by the next movie, never to me mentioned again.
I was about to post the very same thing. LOL :-)
Heck, it was a fun movie anyway.
Generally I don’t think Star Trek should have been adapted for the movies, but The Wrath of Khan was a nice improvement over the first one. I like the intro music.
42x35-ISO800
That is a beautiful photo, Dragnet. I always had Sky & Telescope photos taped to my bedroom walls and closet doors as a teen. Trifid, always one of my favorite.
Oddly coincidentally, just watched it again today.( last time about 30 years ago)
Sea water kills triffids like the common cold kills martians. No fear of galactic invaders needed. Earth is just a deadly biosphere.
Reminds me of the Rolling Stones album cover Sticky Fingers.
Thanks! I surprised myself with this image. Looking back I should have gone much longer on it. I’ve been planning on revisiting this nebula and hopefully I’ll capture 20x more data which should improve it dramatically in post processing.
Btw, I did the same thing when I was young and really struggled at the time with the old film formats due to long tracking issues, not to mention not being able to afford film developing, enlargements, at the time. Digital opened a new world for me.
“Rosebud, Rosebud.” Ask Orson Welles about that quote...
“Citizen Kane.”
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Which was the one with the whales?
I recall enjoying that.
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And it’s such an angry shade of pink, one wonders what its been up to.
It is sooo past my bedtime.
Astrophotography is something I never had the patience for.
Now that Iām retired, I have the patience, but canāt get out to a dark sky site.
Really nice shot. I remember seeing the Trifid from my parentās back yard.
I could actually make out the divisions caused by the dust lanes in my new 6ā telescope. It was 1979.
I now have a permanent set up, no need to polar align the scope, just flip some switches, open the dome and everything else can be remotely controlled, the cameras, the scope computer etc, from another computer inside the home. Setting up a scope on a tripod nightly and doing the polar alignment process was time consuming and excruciating and basically forced me to build a small observatory.
Btw, filters are available to help reduce all the artificial light scatter, but dark skies are hard to beat.
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