The Helix Nebula (Caldwell 63) is a large planetary nebula located in constellation Aquarius. Found by Karl Ludwig Harding, around 1824, this object is one of the closest (est. 700 LY) to the Earth of all the bright planetary nebulae. It is similar in appearance to the Ring Nebula, whose size, age and physical characteristics are similar also to the Dumbbell Nebula.

The Helix Nebula is an example of a planetary nebula formed at the end of a star's life. Gases from the star produce a pattern as if we are looking down a helix structure. The remnant central stellar core is destined to become a white dwarf star. Its observed glow is so energetic that it causes the previously expelled gases to brightly fluoresce.

The Helix Nebula was the first planetary nebula discovered to contain knots, which have now been detected in many nearby planetaries. These knots (an estimated 20,000) are radially symmetric and are described as "cometary", each containing bright cusps and tails. All extend away in a radial direction. Excluding the tails, they are roughly the size of our Solar system. (Source Wikipedia)

The image was captured with a Meade 12"LX200, using the Canon XSi mod (at F7.5), and Atik 383L+ mono (at F6.3).

DSLR: A total of 97 subs at ISO1600 and 5 minutes each (8.08 hr) in 2011, on 8/20 (16), 8/21 (22), 8/23 (21), 8/25 (14), and 8/26 (24).

CCD: A total of 103 subs with binning 1x1 and 0C at 10 minutes each (17.17 hr) in 2012, on 10/03 (10), 10/08 (16), 10/09 (26), 10/11 (25) and 10/12 (26) .

Processing was done with PixInsight. This is a slight to medium crop, due to differences in FOV between the two cameras -- North is up.

This was the third use of the Atik CCD, and again I combined the mono CCD image with the color DSLR. This has shown promise as the CCD time has increased. Not happy with the stars in the nebula - I pushed the color too much when combining the CCD and DSLR images.