M97 "The Owl Nebula" [on hover] with the Original Drawing by Lord Rosse, Who Named It in 1848 (Marc Whitsett)

M97 "The Owl Nebula" [on hover] with the Original Drawing by Lord Rosse, Who Named It in 1848

The Owl Nebula was discovered by French astronomer Pierre Méchain on February 16, 1781. Pierre Méchain was Charles Messier's observing colleague, and the nebula was observed by Messier himself a few weeks following the initial sighting.

When William Parsons, 3rd Earl of Rosse, observed the nebula in Ireland in 1848, his hand-drawn illustration resembled an owl's head [see image*].

It has been known as the Owl Nebula ever since.

What I find fascinating is how close his sketch is to the image photographically.

Wikipedia, accessed 4/29/24:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Owl_Nebula

*Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1484185

Although the Owl Nebula can not be seen with the naked eye, a faint image of it can be observed under remarkably good conditions with a small telescope or 20×80 binoculars. To make out the nebula's more distinctive owl like eye features, a telescope with an aperture 10" or better is required.

My image has been drastically down-sized from 3488 X 2412 pixels to 766 X 530 pixels to match the hand drawing to accomodate the hover.

Final
Original
C

Please note: The following tables are updated every 24 hours.

Distribution of astrophotographers

This table shows the number of distinct astrophotographers who have been assigned and IOTD/TP award compared to the total number of images awarded.
	Distinct awarded users	Total awarded images
Image of the day
Top picks
Top pick nominations

Distribution of subject types

This table shows the distribution of awards per subject type, compared to the popularity of images of that subject type.
	Image of the day	Top pick	Top pick nominations	Total submitted
Deep sky
Solar system
Extremely wide field
Star trails
Northern lights
Noctilucent clouds
Landscape

Distribution of data sources

This table shows the distribution of awards per data source, compared to the popularity of images acquired from that data source.
	Image of the day	Top pick	Top pick nominations	Total submitted
Backyard
Traveller
Own remote observatory
Amateur hosting facility
Public amaeteur data
Professional, scientific grade data
Mix of multiple sources
Other
Unknown

The “AstroBin Image of the Day and Top Picks”, or IOTD/TP, is a long-running system to promote beautiful, interesting, peculiar, or otherwise amazing astrophotographs, with a focus on technical excellence. Learn more.

Submitted The date and time when you submitted this image for IOTD/TP consideration.	...
Views by Submitters (available since September 19th, 2023) Every image is assigned to 50% of available Submitters. In the event that at least 80% of them don't view the image before its time in the IOTD/TP process expires, it's assigned to the other 50% of Submitters and the process begins anew.
Promotions by Submitters When 3 distinct Submitters promote the image, it moves on to the next stage of the process: evaluation for Top Pick status. This requirement, in addition to anonymization of images and distribution to only a subset of them, prevents biases and ensures that the best images are selected.
Promotions by Reviewers When 3 distinct Reviewers promote the image, it moves on to the next stage of the process: evaluation for IOTD status.
Early dismissal Staff members have a lot of images to inspect on a daily basis, and they can dismiss images if they believe they don't meet the requirements for IOTD/TP selection. If an image is dismissed 5 times, it's removed from the process. This streamlines the process and ensures that any bias present in promotions could be overruled by other staff members.

Status	Basic failed
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Astrometry.net job	9755568
PixInsight job	n/a
PixInsight queue size	n/a
PixInsight stage	n/a

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