Stunning Photo of the Eye of God Took Over 100 Hours to Capture

Eye of God

Planetary scientist and astrophotographer Connor Matherne invested two a long time and about 100 hours of exposure time to produce a beautiful picture of the Helix Nebula. Also recognised as the Eye of God, it is a single of the closest planetary nebulae to Earth. Sitting down at about 650 gentle-years absent from Earth in the Aquarius constellation, this cloud of fuel and dust is a sight to behold.

Matherne had been fascinated with the nebula for a lot of a long time, starting up when he noticed an e mail chain with a photo of the Helix Nebula. The title of the e mail was “The Eye of God.” Intrigued and seeking to realize regardless of whether or not the pics he was looking at were being really or only artistic renderings, he was pushed toward astrophotography and has been developing his craft at any time considering that.

Thanks to his work at the Deep Sky West observatory, Matherne has quick accessibility to the telescope that assisted deliver his graphic to daily life. “A personal computer is programmed with a list of targets and decides on its own primarily based on factors such as sky clarity, the position of the concentrate on in the sky, and the length from—as well as stage of—the Moon when it will shoot just about every goal,” Matherne shares with My Fashionable Satisfied. “In this scenario, this nebula is a single revisited several periods as we slowly but surely gathered additional and far more publicity time on it night time right after night time.”

All informed, Matherne spent about two a long time collecting exposures of the nebula. Then, it was time to place every thing jointly in article-creation. This is where by the actual obstacle commenced. “Seamlessly integrating in excess of 100 hrs of images into a solitary image taken in excess of the years is not uncomplicated,” Matherne confesses.

“Additionally, when the picture has these types of a extended exposure time, I required to guarantee that the processing I did on the knowledge was as fantastic as I could. I had to have a stunning impression to go hand in hand with the absurd exposure time, I could not have a photograph that looked like the numerous other photos of the identical concentrate on captured by many others.”

In the conclusion, this difficult function compensated off with an impression that is rich in element. For Matherne, it is significant that persons realize that the spectacular photos of nebulae they see usually are not only real but that they can be taken by everyone.

Connor Matherne is a planetary scientist and astrophotographer who enjoys taking pictures the stars.

The Orion Nebula

Horsehead and Flame Nebula

NGC 253

His visuals of outer space demonstrate that, with a very little practice, anyone can make extraordinary astrophotography.

The Pillars of Creation

The Cat’s Paw

The Tarantula Nebula

His most up-to-date graphic of the Eye of God, or Helix Nebula, essential around 100 hrs of publicity time.

Eye of God

Connor Matherne: Web site | Instagram 

My Present day Fulfilled granted authorization to feature pics by Connor Matherne.

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