Probably one of the most famous and iconic nebulae in the nightsky.
The Orion Nebula (also known as Messier 42, M42, or NGC1976) is a diffuse nebula at a distance of approximately 1344 light-years from earth (1 light-year = 9.460.000.000.000 kilometers!). The nebula is the closest region of massive star formation to Earth. It’s estimated to be 24 light-years across.
As I live in the northern hemisphere this nebula is only visible during the winter months. It doesn’t get very high above the horizon either which poses some extra challenges if you want to capture it, not to mention a giant tree and my neighbours’ roof.
The nebula has revealed much about the process of how stars and planetary systems are formed from collapsing clouds of gas and dust. Astronomers have observed protoplanetary disks and brown dwarfs within the nebula, intense and turbulent motions of the gas, and the photo-ionizing affects of massive nearby stars in the nebula.
Because this nebula is the brightest nebula in our nightsky (you can already see it with a pair of binoculars!) it has become a very popular object among amateur astronomers and astrophotographers, like myself. This means there’s a lot of people who have already photographed it, thus setting a very high standard.
From a photography point of view there’s some interesting challenges with capturing the nebula aswell. The Orion Nebula has an incredibly bright core, when trying to capture the very faint surrounding dust with long exposure times it’s very easy (and basically unavoidable) to over-expose the core. To combat this I created a second image, focusing on the core only, and then blending this second image in.