I have already imaged the IC1848 nebula in the past using a 130mm aperture apochromatic refractor and an Atik383 camera. I was quite happy with that results, however, having a larger telescope I also expected a better outcome. But the truth is, that the resolution difference between diffraction-limited 130mm and 254mm optics are not so obvious, at least not for long exposure imaging. The actual resolution bottleneck at my home location is usually the seeing, that blurs any detail to at least 2-2.5 arc seconds. One way to fight seeing is to perform so-called “lucky imaging” – that is making a large number of short exposures, and then selecting only the best of them for the final stack. But lucky imaging is not really suitable for large diffuse nebulae due to its low surface brightness. So I approached again IC1848 Soul nebula in an old fashion mode 🙂
The image above contains only a fragment of the IC1848 Soul nebula. These hydrogen, oxygen, and dust features in the frame center do not have their own names or designations – they are just a part of the IC1848. At the left frame edge, the IC1871 emission nebula starts. At the lower right part, there is a small globule IRAS 02497+6018.
Other than that we have only unnamed stars and clouds in the image.
Soul nebula is cataloged in several places. IC1848 is only one of its designations, there are also Sh 2-199, LBN667, Westerhout 5. This molecular cloud is located in Cassiopeia about 7,500 light-years away. This area is also known as a star-forming region and contains huge evacuated bubbles formed by the winds of young massive stars, that are better defined at the wider field of view than the image above.
Full resolution here https://astrojolo.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/2021-11-30-IC1848HORGB.jpg
Image technical data: Date: November 2021 Location: Nieborowice, Poland Telescope: Meade ACF 10" f/10 Corrector: AP CCDT67 Camera: QHY163M Mount: SW EQ6 Guiding: GPCAM 224C + SW ED72 Exposure: RGB 40:30:40 minutes, Ha 4h, Oiii 4h Conditions: Bortle 6, transparency good, seeing medium-good
