Astrophotos: A Wide Angle "Trilogy" of the North America Nebula

By Nancy Atkinson - October 1, 2014 at 5:59 PM UTC | Observing
15401958082_7223063d19_z.jpg

A perfect set of astrophotos for #WideAngleWednesday! Here are not one but

three

views of the North America Nebula taken by

Terry Hancock

. Terry said this is his widest view yet of this region. Also known as NGC 7000 or Caldwell 20, this is an emission nebula in the constellation Cygnus that resembles the shape of North America and The Gulf Of Mexico. It lies at a distance of approximately 1800 light years away from Earth.

Terry presents a "trilogy" of three different color processes (see below). He took imagery in both July and September 2014 with a total exposure time of 13.9 hours from his

Down Under Observatory

in Fremont, Michigan.

For more details about the processing for each image, click on the images. To see more of Terry's great work, see his

website,

Facebook

,

Flickr

, or

G+

.

[caption id="attachment_114972" align="aligncenter" width="580"]

A wide, three-panel mosaic spanning an area approximately 2.5 x 5.5 degrees of the North America Nebula (NGC 7000 or Caldwell 20), in H-Alpha, Hubble Palette and RGB with H-Alpha. Credit and copyright: Terry Hancock.[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_114983" align="aligncenter" width="580"]

Another version of the 3-panel, wide angle view of the North America Nebula. Credit and copyright: Terry Hancock.[/caption]

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Nancy Atkinson

Nancy Atkinson

Nancy Atkinson is a space journalist and author with a passion for telling the stories of people involved in space exploration and astronomy. She is currently retired from daily writing, but worked at Universe Today for 20 years as a writer and editor. She also contributed articles to The Planetary Society, Ad Astra (National Space Society), New Scientist and many other online outlets.

Her 2019 book, "Eight Years to the Moon: The History of the Apollo Missions,” shares the untold stories of engineers and scientists who worked behind the scenes to make the Apollo program so successful, despite the daunting odds against it. Her first book “Incredible Stories From Space: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Missions Changing Our View of the Cosmos” (2016) tells the stories of 37 scientists and engineers that work on several current NASA robotic missions to explore the solar system and beyond.

Nancy is also a NASA/JPL Solar System Ambassador, and through this program, she has the opportunity to share her passion of space and astronomy with children and adults through presentations and programs. Nancy's personal website is nancyatkinson.com