M8/M20 Region - The Lagoon and Trifid (DSLR)

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The Lagoon and Trifid Nebula region in Sagittarius, one of five wide-field DSLR shots taken during a summer astrophysics workshop. Also from that session: M31, the M16/M17 region, the North America and Pelican region, and the Rho-Antares region. This image is also covered in a blog post.

Location: Comanche Springs Astronomy Campus

Date: June 2018

Scope/Mount: Takahashi FSQ-85ED ("Baby-Q") apo refractor @ f/5.3 on a Takahashi NJP mount

Camera: Nikon D810a DSLR

Exposure Info: 50 minutes total (2 minute subs, ISO 1600)

Extra Notes: Unattended and unguided -- polar aligned and pointed manually with the finder scope, then left to run on an on-camera intervalometer while the "Astrophysics in a Nutshell" workshop students worked on other things.

About this Image

M8, the Lagoon Nebula, and M20, the Trifid Nebula, framed together in one wide DSLR field. Both are easy visual targets in Sagittarius, and with the "Baby-Q" refractor's short focal length there was plenty of room to fit both in a single unguided exposure.

This was one of several simple, unattended data sets I shot for students at the workshop to practice their processing on -- about as close to "point and shoot" as astrophotography gets, and a good reminder of how much dark skies alone can do for you.

🤖 AI-drafted · unverified

What it is: M8, the Lagoon Nebula, and M20, the Trifid Nebula, are neighboring star-forming emission/reflection nebulae, both easily framed together in a wide field. M20 is distinguished by the dark dust lanes that divide it into three lobes.
Constellation: Sagittarius
Distance: ~4,100 ly (M8); ~5,200 ly (M20)
Apparent magnitude: 6.0 (M8); 6.3 (M20)
Angular size: ~90 × 40′ (M8); ~28′ (M20)
Coordinates: M8: RA 18h 03m 37s, Dec -24° 23′

This summary was generated by an AI assistant from general astronomical references, not from Jay's own notes on this specific image. Treat every detail above as a starting point for research, not settled fact.