The California Nebula (NGC 1499) is an emission nebula located in the constellation Perseus. It is so named because it appears to resemble the outline of the US State of California on long exposure photographs. It is almost 2.5° long on the sky and, because of its very low surface brightness, it is extremely difficult to observe visually. It can be observed with a Hβ filter (isolates the Hβ line at 486 nm) in a rich-field telescope under dark skies. It lies at a distance of about 1,000 light years from Earth.

Location / Exposure Date

Mt Parnon 13-14 November 2015

Τelescope

Takahashi FS60 - with TAK FR at f4.2

EQ Mound

Sky Watcher AZ-EQ6 EQ Mount

Camera

QHY9 KAF 8300 mono CCD

Guiding

Lunatico 250mm - QHY LII - PHD Guiding 

Filters / Exposures

Hα 18x900 sec bin 1x, 12x600 OIII, RGB 12x600 sec bin 1x

Total Exposure Time

10,5 hours

Software

Nebulosity, Maxim DL, Pixinshight, Photoshop CS6.