Orion Nebula (M42) & Running Man Nebula (S279) 12-7-24

The Orion Nebula (center) is one of the largest and most famous deep space objects in the sky. The Running Man Nebula (top) is a set of several hydrogen nebulae that form a human-like shape. I decided to start with a wide-field of both nebulae using a zoom lens rather than a tighter shot of Orion through my telescope. This was a good opportunity to test my camera lens with deep-space astrophotography for the first time.

Technical details:

• Lens: AF-S Nikkor 200mm
• Camera: Nikon D3200
• Mount: SkyAdventurer 2i
• Filters: N/A
• Exposure: 279x20s at ISO400
• Corrections: 50 darks, 49 flats, 49 dark flats
• Stacking: DeepSkyStacker
• Post-processing: Lightroom
• Bortle: 4

Notes for improvement:

• The stars in this image could be better. I think this was due to focusing issues. Achieving good star focus with this lens is difficult as the focuser is less precise than the one on my telescope. However, I spent quite a while adjusting focus and I am not confident that I could have gotten a better result.
• More total exposure time would have helped to emphasize the Running Man Nebula a bit more, as it is much less bright than M42.