M42 is special for me. It's the reason I started my astronomy journey and it's my favorite object in the winter night sky. I keep coming back to it again and again and it became a nice benchmark of my skills in astrophotography.
I captured this image about a week ago and, while processing, had to find out that there‘s a huge white flare overlaying the whole image. Capturing deep sky at full moon is a bad idea already, but this time, I was too close to it and got a massive moon light leaking into my scope. The data went straight to trash. But I just had to try recovering it. So after a LOT of Photoshop trickery, I ended up with an acceptable image :)
Scope: Askar 103APO
Lens: Askar 0.6x Reducer
Camera: Canon EOS 6Da
Filter: Altair Tri-Band
Mount: Skywatcher AZ-EQ5-GT
Guiding: Svbony SV165 with ZWO ASI224MC
Controller: ZWO ASIAir Pro
Die Milchstrasse über der Hauptsinsel Helgoland. Rechts daneben der Hafen, in dem nicht selten auch spät abends noch Schiffe beladen werden, welche dann am nächsten Tag früh raus zu dem nahegelegenen Offshorpark fahren, um Reparaturen durchzuführen.
The Milky Way over the main island of Helgoland. To the right is the harbor, where ships are often loaded late in the evening before heading out early the next day to the nearby offshore park for repairs.
Mitte August, endlich kein Mond am Himmel. Mit dem Stativ in der Hand nachts über die Insel gelaufen. Noch jemand anderen mit der gleichen Idee geroffen. Bischen verquatscht, aber die Zeit drängt. Auf einer großen Düne kann man genau auf die Milchstraße und den Leuchtturm schauen. Also hin da. Oben angekommen überall bunte Blinklichter, uffff ja hübsch aber, na wird schon. Egal, 16 Bilder aufgenommen und weiter. So dunkel hier, ins Leere getreten und mit Stativ und Kamera darauf die ganze Düne runtergerollt. Nix passiert, fotografieren macht so Spaß. Wieder aufgestanden und gleich ein neues Motiv gesehen. So viele Sterne hier. Ferne. Weite. Alleine? Kaum!
Mid-August, finally no moon in the sky. Walked across the island at night with tripod in hand. I ran into someone else with the same idea. A little bit of chattering, but time is short. On a large dune one can look exactly on the Milky Way and the lighthouse. So there we go. Arrived at the top everywhere colorful flashing lights, uffff yes pretty but, well will. Anyway, 16 pictures taken and on. So dark here, stepped into the void and rolled down the whole dune with tripod and camera on it. Nothing happens, taking pictures is so much fun. Got up again and immediately saw a new motif. So many stars here. Distance. Vastness. Alone? Never!
If my last day on this planet could be staring up at the stars and wondering, it would bring me incredible peace. #camping#nightsky#nightskyphotography
The enormous rock formation that stands out to sea is named Stag Rock. The Island has been put forward as a candidate as a Dark Skies Park. We are so lucky to have little light pollution here.