Object Description: Just to the east of M8, the Lagoon Nebula, lies this very complex region of hydrogen emission, blue reflection, and dark nebulae. The bright reflection nebula to the left is NGC6559. The main red HII region is IC4685, with the right side of the nebula region is designated IC1274 and IC1275. At the lower left of the image is the globular cluster NGC6544. There are also several named Barnard dark nebulae, most noticeably B303, the small hook shaped nebula in the middle of IC4685. The image is oriented North to the right.

Telescope: Takahashi FSQ106N
Camera: Canon 40D modified w/ Baader UV/IR cut filter
Mount: ParamountME unguided
Filters: no filters

Date Taken: 23JUL2009
Location: Lot4, Arcturus Way, Sacramento Mountains Astronomy Park, Weed, NM
Sky Conditions: transparency 3/5, seeing 3/5, temp 20C
Image Acquisition: 8x300s, iso800, using CCDCommander & CCDSoft

Image Processing: ImagesPlus 3.80 used for data reduction, alignment, MinMaxExc combine, initial DDP. PSCS2 used for levels, curves, and color enhancement. GradX for background equalization.