M 76
About image
The planetary nebula M76 in Perseus constellations is also called “The little Dumbell” due to its resemblance with the Dumbell Nebula M27 in Cygnus Constellation.
M76 has an apparent diameter of 2.7’x1.8’ and magnitude 10.1, so it is one of the faintest object inside Messier catalogue.
Curiously it is identified with two NGC numbers (NGC 650 and 651), because at that time it was supposed to be a double nebula with the two components in contact.
For this image I used HOO combination for the nebula itself, while the stars come from an old image taken in 2019 with the same telescope and CCD camera.
Technical data
Optic GSO RC12 Truss - Aperture 304mm, focal lenght 2432mm, f/8
Mount 10Micron GM2000 HPSII
Camera Moravian G3-16200 with external filter wheel 7 positions for RGB
ZWO ASI 2600MM Pro with external filter wheel for Ha/OIII
Filters Astrodon Gen2 E-Serie Tru-Balance 50mm unmounted RGB , Astrodon 50mm narrowband filters Ha 5nm and OIII 5nm
Guiding system OAG Moravian M68 with guide camera Moravian G1-0301
OAG-L ZWO with guide camera ASI 174 Mini
Exposure details R 8x300" bin2 -20C
G 8x300" bin2 -20C
B 8x300" bin2 -20C
Ha 50x300" bin3 -15C gain 100
OIII 50x300" bin3 -15C gain 100
Total integration 10h20'
Acquisition Voyager, PHD2
Processing Pixinsight 1.8, Photoshop CS5, BlurXTerminator, NoiseXTerminator, StarXTerminator
SQM-L 20.58
Location Promiod (Aosta Valley, Italy), own remote observatory
Date 25 October 2019, 9/11 November 2025
© Roberto Marinoni 2019 - All rights reserved