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The Trifid (NGC6514) and Lagoon (NGC6530) Nebulas: These two beautiful nebulas lie in the constellation Sagittarius and are about 2,300 light years away. The Trifid Nebula is about 18 light years across and is best seen with moderate size scopes, while the Lagoon nebula is 45 light years across and can easily be seen with your naked eyes from a dark site. The Trifid’s three dark lanes divide this nebula into three parts, familiar on photographs, giving it the name TRIFID. The pinkish red clouds shine by excited hydrogen molecules receiving energy from stars inside, while the smaller blue “reflection” nebula is simply reflected starlight off of intergalactic dust. The Lagoon Nebula is a beautiful diffuse red nebula that receives its name from the telescopic view, which appears like a tropical island surrounded by a coral reef. These vast clouds shine by excited hydrogen molecules from stars forming inside, and there are plenty of stellar eggs, or "Globules" in this nebula detected as small lumps of dark cloud. The central stars in the Lagoon nebula are an open star cluster (NGC6530) and are actually located behind the Nebula.

Photographic Details

This is a montage of two single 30-minute exposures with the Meade LXD75 8” Schmidt Newtonian telescope. The images were captured at prime focus with an Olympus OM-1 SLR and Fujichrome Provia 400F slide film. The telescope was manually guided during tracking with an Orion 80mm / 910mm f.l., f/11.3 refractor guidescope. (c)2005 Peter Kennett. See Astrophotography to learn more about this type of photography.