Orion 360
This 360 mega pixels image, 24 tiles for 76 hours of exposure covers almost the entire constellation of Orion, one of the richest regions of the night sky and some 1,500 light years away from us. Discover this extraordinary region of the sky, rich in golden stars, dark and colorful nebulae.
Hace a beautiful celestial walk.
Bastien
https://www.bastienfoucher.comThe following images will open in a new tab of your browser.
27 objects have been identified in the image below. Click on it to open a zoomable and annotated version:
Click on the image to access the annotated zoomable version. The image will open in a new tab.
The constellation of Orion is in the arm of the Milky Way of the same name, and in which is our Solar System. It is located on the outskirts of our Milky Way.
The constellation of Orion framed on this integral image of the Milky Way taken in 2016. 12 fields, made in the northern and southern hemispheres, with a objective of 24 mm had been assembled.
Although visible from both hemispheres, the constellation Orion (the "hunter") is difficult to photograph. In Europe, it is low in the sky and is only visible in winter when bad weather does not prevail. The Canary Islands could have been an interesting destination to try the cliché because the constellation is very high in the sky, much more than in Europe. But there too, the weather is too uncertain. So there remained the southern hemisphere. But alas, southern summer is often synonymous with the rainy season in deserts easily accessible from France.
After monitoring the global weather for two winters, southern Atacama was selected: unlike the north of the region and Namibia for example, the chances of having clear nights at this time of the year are high. We left on the New Moon in December 2019: this month of the year, Orion is at its highest from the beginning to the end of the astronomical twilight. It was poossible to photograph the constellation for 6 hours. In comparison, the months of November or January only allows to photograph the constellation for 5 hours per night.
So we celebrated Christmas under the stars…
Under the pure Atacama sky, Orion is at its zenith during the austral summer.
Only 7 nights out of 11 were suitable for acquisitions, the others were spoiled by altitude clouds.
The idea was to take the picture in one trip with good definition and maximum exposure time for a moderate cost:
To cover a maximum of field per tile, a 24x36 mm sensor was necessary. My good old EOS 6D Mark I was therefore perfect ...
Given the few nights available (11 nights and real risk of overcast) and in order to maximize the total exposure time, I bought a second Canon 6d Mark I on the market of the occasion. It was modified Astrodon by the company EOS for Astro . When shooting, one of the two cameras was controlled by computer, while the other was in "slave" mode, controlled with an interval timer.
For the optics, the choice fell on two Canon 300mm F4 L non-stabilized lenses, renowned in astrophotography. They are however now shunned because they are old and not stabilized ... I found mine on Ebay in Japan where I found models in absolutely mint condition dispite their age of 25 years old (!).
To avoid unsightly egrets on bright stars, the two lenses were diaphragmed from the front at F/5 (see my electronic book).
Each EOS 6D was equipped with a 300mm F4 L lens closed from the front to avoid the appearance of "carriage wheels" on bright stars.
Each evening, the parallelism of the two objectives was checked. The orientation of the DSLRs was not changed throughout the stay to avoid any problem with the assembly of the mosaic.
The mosaic was programmed using the Sequence Generator Pro software: during the acquisitions, each tile was framed by computer thanks to an astrometric reduction. The final assembly was then carried out using Astro Pixel Processor software.
The 24 tiles of the mosaic programmed in the Sequence Generator Pro software. To succeed in the project, I had to complete between 2 and 3 tiles per night (11 nights on site).
The "raw" result of assembling the mosaic obtained in Astro Pixel Processor . Each calculation took about 7 hours.
Thanks to the very large size of the image, prints in very large format (several meters with a very good definition) can be purchased. The image can be printed on satin paper (very little sensitive to reflections) or on semi-gloss paper. For any other dimension or service (lamination on alu-dibond, frame in American box ...), contact me.
To proceed with the purchase, click on the button below. You will be redirected to my main site where you can send me a message.
Click on the image to see it larger. 107x60cm print on semi-gloss paper: € 99 without shipping. Purchase, questions, other dimensions, other papers: contact .