Figure 1.  The constellation Orion is often depicted with these connecting lines.  Imagine a hunter holding a shield to the right, with his other arm uplifted to the left, and a 3-star belt from which is hanging a glittering sword.  The sword is visually seen as 3 stars.  The middle of these stars is seen here to be a reddish nebula, called the Orion Nebula, or Meisser 42 (M42). The cold giant, yellow-colored star Betelgeuse marks the upper-left shoulder, and the hot, bright blue star Rigel marks a foot (lower-right).  North is up, west is to the right.  The sky area is ~25 degrees north/south.  This is a low-resolution version (754x824 pixels) of the central region of the original image (5181x3887 pixels), which was scanned at high resolution commercially by a $16,000 Flextite film scanner, creating a 60 Mbyte TIF image file.   [2001.04.14, 8:53 PM, Mamiya 645 "medium format" camera with 80mm f/1.9 lens, attached to Meade ETX125EC telescope for sidereal tracking, 1.3-minute exposure, Fujichrome Provia 400F slide film, push developed +1 stop; Figueroa Mountain Peak, 4530 feet altitude.]

Figure 2.  This is a 2x zoom of the previous image, showing only the "belt" and "sword" region.  The reddish nebulosity actually consists of large and small regions, with the smaller and fainter to the north.  The faintest stars in this image are magnitude 10.4 (i.e., 60 times fainter than the unaided eye can see on a clear night).  The resolution of the original 60 Mbyte TIF image is much greater than the image shown here (which is a limitation of trying to present images on a web page).  The high resolution file shows star images with a width of 80 "arc (provided they are not overexposed), which corresponds to a dimension of 30 microns on the film.

Figure 3.  Zoom factor of 3, showing only the "sword" region. [480 mm FL, f/6, Nikon F3, Fujifilm Superia X-tra 800, 6-minute exposure, Santa Barbara residence, 200 feet ASL, 2001.10.14, 7:40Z.]

Figure 4.  Detail of previous image, showing different colors of the M42 nebulosity.

Figure 5.  Zoom factor 2.7. Surrounding the red inner nebulosity is a fainter bluish nebulosity.  The star groupings at the top (north) and bottom of this image correspond to the naked eye upper and lower stars in the sword (seen in the previous two images).  [2001.04.07, Meade LX200 10-inch f/6.3 telescope, effective aperture f/6.9, with a Mamiya 645 "medium format" camera at the telescope's prime focus; Fujichrome Provia 400F, 1-minute exposure.]

Figure 6.  This is a longer exposure, at the same scale as the previous image, and shows more of the nebulosity's rayed structure. Notice a "westward pointing dark finger" (pointing to the right) of obscuring gas and dust. The northern component of nebulosity is barely visible in this image.  [2001.04.07, Meade LX200 10-inch, f/6.9 telescope, with a Mamiya 645 camera at prime focus; Fujichrome Provia 400F, 1-minute exposure.]
 

Figure 7.   This same scale image is much brighter and shows the two compnents of the nebulosity clearly. In this color contrast enhanced image there are red and blue regions, with quite distinct boundaries. Stars not visible in this image (but shown in other images, below) are illuminating gas and dust clouds.  [LX-200 10-inch Schmidt-Cassegrain f/6.2, prime focus using Fujifilm's Provia Fujichrome 1600 (pushed to ISO 3200), weighted average of 3 exposures totaling 11 minutes.]

Figure 8.  This is a 2x zoom, and a greatly overexposed black and white image, showing the outer nebulosity, with subtle whispy structures. Clearly, more nebulosity exists outside the area of this image.  [LX-200 10-inch Schmidt-Cassegrain f/6.2, prime focus, Meade Pictor 416XTE CCD camera.]

The sequence of images to this point has shown images with "increasing brightness."  They do not show the stars that create this brightness, however.  The following sequence will explore lowering of brightness, with occasional zoom increases.

Figure 9.  The slightly unzoomed image has a lower contrast, allowing structure with a greater range of brightness to be represented in the same image.  Notice the "dark finger" pointing to the right.

Figure 10.  This black-and-white picture has even lower contrast, which allows a better view of what the "dark finger" pointing to the right is pointing to. [Meade LX-200 10-inch, f/6.2, prime focus with Kodak Tri-X ASA 400 film, 3-minute exposure, 1999.11.09.]

Figure 11.  This color image wiith a zoom factor of 2 shows the different coloration of the inner nebulosity.  has the same scale but greater contrast (to show the color differences).  The brightest nebulosity is dominated by the colors red and green.  The "dark finger" seems to be pointing to a group of stars, which are overexposed in this image. [Meade LX200 10-inch SCT, with Meade Pictor 416XTE CCD imager and 616 color filter wheel; 10-second monochrome images taken with RGB filters; Santa Barbara residence; 2001.10.29, 0813Z].

Figure 12.  This reduced contrast and brightness version of the previous image shows that the nebulos "dark finger" points to four stars. This group of four stars is called The Trapezium, and is a favorite view when observing M42 visually through a telescope.

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Figure 13.  Approximately the same scale, and equivalent exposure compared with the previous image, but using a color digital camera (Nikon Coolpix 990, 3.34 Megapixel CCD). The Trapezium group is more distinct, as are the color gradations. [Meade LX200 10-inch Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope, with a Nikon Coolpix 990 digital camera close to a 1/2-inch focal length eyepiece (i.e., eyepiece projection), average of eleven 8-second exposure images, with "dark" frame subtraction, ISO 400, Coolpix focal length 8.2 mm.]

Dimmer version of previous image, allowing the Trapezium group of stars to be easily seen.

Figure 14.  This underexposed image clearly separates the four members of "The Trapezium" and has "lost" the nebulosity which the Trapezium illuminates. The closest pair of stars in this group of four is separated by 14 "arc. The faintest of the four is about 2 "arc in apparent size, indicating fairly good "atmospheric seeing." The brightest of the four has a visual magnitude of 5.1, which makes it visible to the naked eye (although the entire group, including nearby stars and nebula, are what the eye sees).  Image size is 13.8 x 9.1 'arc, or 17% the area of the sky represented by the full moon.  [Meade LX-200 10-inch Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope, f/6.3, Meade 416 XTE CCD imager.]

___________ The pictures below this line are by other, more accomplished astrophotographers _________________

Figure 15.  For comparison, advanced amateur Jason Ware took this picture of M42 and M43, apparently using film, with a Meade 8-inch telescope [from Meade General Catalog].  By including color we can see distinctions not apparent in black-and-white images, especially in the lower-left nebulosity, and upper-right.  Although the inner region is overexposed, the dark cloud left of the Trapezium is still visible.

Figure 16.   This is another widely reproduced photograph by advanced amateur Jason Ware.  He used a Meade 6-inch refractor Model 152ED telescope, exposing Fuji HG400 film for a total of 60 minutes.

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This site opened:  August 30, 1998.  Last Update:   November 20, 2001