SUNSET: 
0
Photographer:
Hal Heaton
Location of Photo:
SkyPi Remote Observatory (SkyGems), Pietown, NM
Date/Time of photo:
2022 June 8, 11; September 27; October 22, 25, 26 (moonless)
Equipment:
Telescope: Dream Aerospace Systems astrograph reflector, 0.4-m aperture (f/3.7); Camera: FLI ProLine 16803, plate scale 1.2 arcsec/px unbinned; Filters: Baader L, R, G, B; Exposure Time: 10-min [Luminance (unbinned, stacked for 190-min), Red, Green and Blue (2x2 binning, stacked for 40 mins each)]
Description:
About 1.4-deg east of the famous Iris Nebula (NGC 7023) lies an eerie region designated as number 141 in Sidney van den Bergh’s 1966 catalog of reflection nebulae. Also known as Sh2-136, it lies approximately 1100 lys from the Sun at the edge of the star-forming Cepheus Flare molecular cloud complex. More than two light years in extent, the sculpted cloud is illuminated by the still-forming 12th magnitude star BD+67 1300 embedded within the yellowish nebulosity along its southern (top) boundary. Just to its left (west) on the image, the "Ghosts of Cepheus" wave to those who dare look while a raven seemingly surveils the scene from above. At the far right (east) end the cloud, the northward side of a bipolar outflow emanates downward as a reddish cone from an invisible Bok globule (CB 230, also designated LDN 1177) at its tip. The flow originates from a region hidden from view that is condensing into a new binary star system; the edges of an opposing (southward) outflow can barely be traced as they encase an uninvolved faint yellow star just above the cloud. The image data were processed by CCDStack-v2, Photoshop CC 2018 and GIMP v2.10 into a scene spanning 30 arcmin on a side. It is oriented with north pointing downward, and east to the right.
