Designating two astronomical objects under one moniker, the Christmas Tree Cluster and the Cone Nebula, NGC 2264 is located approximately 2,700 light years away in the constellation of Monoceros as it appears from the Earth. The nebula itself takes the shape of a Christmas tree with a cone-like structure perched like a tree-topper. Imaging in R, G and B gives more natural hues to this nebula, while hydrogen alpha adds significant details to the nebular structures. Capturing this amount of detail took almost 24 hours worth of data, spread across 8 nights between late October and late November, using the ultra-fast Dreamscope 16” Newtonian Astropgraph at f/3.75 and an FLI PL16803 camera.
I also created a green version which has the RGB data reordered for a holiday themed rendition, which brings out the details better in the dimmer nebular structures!
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