Home > Nebulas > The Belt of Orion
Object The Belt of Orion
Description

The belt of Orion is a large area of intestellar dust, and star forming regions. The Horsehead nebula around the left most star, Alnitak is a glowing red region with clouds of dust obscuring some parts, creating the silouette of a horses head.

The area around the central ‘star’ of Orion’s Sword is the Great Orion Nebula, (M42). This is a stellar nursery, with clouds of dust coalessing into new stars.

As you can see from the image, the entire area contains large clouds of intestellar dust, some glowing due to reflection from nearby stars (bluish) and some emitting their own light in the hydrogen alpha line (red), and some just obscuring.

Image
Scope Canon 200mm f/2.8 lens @f/3.5
Camera Canon 40D
Mount Losmandy G11
Filters none
Guiding C8 and ST-2000XCM
Exposure Info Total exposure time 5 hours (45x4min)
Date November 5, 2008
Copyright Photo copyright Thomas Kerns, Beluga Lake Observatory