Deep Sky Object in Summer
NGC6334, NGC6357 (Diffused Nebulae in Scorpius)


Click on image to enlarge

Date & Time: Jul 5 2011, from 23:06 to 23:21 JST(+0900)
Composed 4 shots with 5 minutes exposed
Optical: TAMRON SP 300mmF2.8, Aperture: F2.8
with IDAS LPS-P2 Light-pollution suppression filter
Auto-guided with TAKAHASHI EM-200 Equatorial
Digital Camera: Nikon D50 (Remodeled)
Location: Furudono town, Fukushima pref.

Camera Settings: Recording Format...12bit CCD-RAW, converted to 8bit TIFF(3008×2000)
CCD Sensitivity...ISO800



NGC6334 / Diffused Nebula, type E
R.A.17h 20m 30.0s (2000.0)
Dec.-35°43' 00" (2000.0)
Apparent Size46.5×22.0'
Real Size74×35 light yrs.
Magnitude -
Distance5500 light yrs.
Other IDsSh2-8, RCW127
Gum 64
NGC6357 / Diffused Nebula, type E
R.A.17h 24m 35.9s (2000.0)
Dec.-34°09' 59" (2000.0)
Apparent Size31.8×30.0'
Real Size57×53 light yrs.
Magnitude -
Distance6200 light yrs.
Other IDsSh2-11, RCW131
Gum 66
This image shows you two vast hydrogen gaseous nebulae spread around the tail of Scorpius. You can gaze at two noticeable open clusters of M6 and M7 being next to the nebulae in east, one of the extraordinary photogenic celestial fields. But the nebulae has a median transit with an altitude of lower than 20 degrees at Tokyo, it's hard to photograph the nebula in good condition at Japan.
NGC6334, the Cat's paw Nebula in lower right, is a reddish diffused nebula with a size of about 20 arc minutes. It consists of several segments of three round red lights and a dimmed vast region, only appears clearly on long-exposed photos. The unique-shape has given a nickname of "Cat's paw nebula", and the nebula has another nickname of "The Telescope Goldfish Nebula" in Japan. It looks like a kind of goldfish with its eyes sticked out.
NGC6357 in upper left has an apparent size of about 50 arc minutes, and is often called "The Cluster Amaryllis Nebula" at Japan (in Japanese "Higan-bana" Nebula), because the shape of it looks like a huge reddish flower.

To close-up of NGC6334
To close-up of NGC6357





NGC6309

Cat's eye Nebula(NGC6543)


Copyright(c) 2011 by Naoyuki Kurita, All rights reserved.
To top page To Deepsky in Summer index Scorpius