Dusty Area Around The Shark Nebula (LDN 1235)

The main focus of this project was LDN 1235 commonly known as the Shark Nebula. It is a dark reflection nebula approximately 15 light-years across and made up of interstellar dust located about 650 LY away in Cepheus. In addition to the LDN 1235, there is a lot of other "stuff" in this image as well. One of my favorite objects was VDB152 which is a blue reflection nebula at the end of a snake-like dark nebula which extends from the middle of the Shark to the upper left corner. I also like the stars in this region as they are quite colorful but overly large.

This was a last minute decision to image this as we had an unexpected clear night last month and I wanted to test my portable mount. I am quite happy with the result, especially considering it is only 3.5 hours. I was concerned about doing a dark nebula as I knew I would have only one night on it. For bright nebulae 3.5 hours is enough for a decent image if your system is fast enough but for dark nebulae in a somewhat light-polluted area it is iffy. I decided to give it a shot and am glad I did. The SkyGuider Pro is not a goto mount so trying to frame it was a little trying especially since nothing shows up in any of the subframes except the stars.

Shark Nebula - LDN 1235
Dates: 6-4
Camera: ZWO ASI2600MC-Pro
Telescope: Canon EF 200mm f/2.8L II USM Lens
Barlow: None
Focal Length: 200mm
f/4 with stepdown rings
Focal Reducer: None
Mount: iOptron SkyGuider Pro
Filter Wheel/Drawer: ZWO EOS Filter Drawer
Filter: Baader UV/IR
Focuser: None
Autoguiding: ASI120 Mini attached to a ZWO Mini 30/120mm Guidescope
Exposure: 104 x 120
Gain: 100
Offset 20
Sensor Temp: 0 C
Processing: NINA, PixInsight, Photoshop, StarXTerminator.

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