Cederblad 116

From time to time, I obtain data sets from remote observatories to complement my own imaging projects. One of my favorite providers is Telescope Live, which operates a network of high-quality telescopes in Chile, Australia, and Spain. These locations offer beautifully dark skies and excellent seeing conditions, making them ideal for deep-sky imaging projects that aren’t easily accessible from my own latitude.

Among the data sets I received was an intriguing one featuring the nebula Cederblad 116, located in the constellation Centaurus. This region of the southern sky is a treasure trove of complex interstellar structures — glowing clouds of gas and reflection nebulae illuminated by nearby stars, woven together against a rich background of the Milky Way’s star fields.

Cederblad 116 is a faint and subtle reflection nebula, where starlight scatters off interstellar dust grains, producing a soft bluish glow. Unlike emission nebulae that radiate due to excited hydrogen atoms, reflection nebulae shine only by reflected light, making their delicate forms and tones more challenging to capture. The interplay of light and dust in this object gives it a quiet, almost ethereal beauty, revealing the intricate textures of the interstellar medium.

Data calibration, registration, and final image processing were all carried out in PixInsight. The main challenge in processing this data was maintaining the fine balance between contrast and subtlety — preserving the faint reflection component without losing the surrounding star field. Through careful nonlinear stretching and background extraction, the faint, dusty tendrils of the nebula could be brought out with natural color and structure.

The resulting image captures Cederblad 116 as a soft, luminous patch drifting among countless stars — a small but elegant example of how light can reveal the quiet beauty of interstellar dust.

The images were taken with the following equipment (Telescope Live CHI-1):

• Date: 2023
• Location: El Sauce Observatory, Chile
• Telescope: Planwave CDK24
• Focal length [mm]: 3900
• Focal ratio: 6.5
• Mount: Mathis MI-1000/1250
• Camera: Moravian QHY 600M Pro
• Filter: Hα:[OIII][SII]
• Exposure time [min]: 120:110:110
• Resolution: 0.39″/px bin2