Helix Nebula NGC7293 in Aquarius

This is one of the largest of the planetary nebulae. It consists of a spherical shell of very tenuous gas illuminated by its central star. This planetary is likely about 450 light years away with a diameterof about 1.75 light years.

Images taken with TEC-140 Telescope mounted on Losmandy G11 mount. Camera used was a Canon EOS20D used at prime focus.

Twenty-five 3 minutes exposures dark, flat, and bias compensated, aligned and stacked, background removed and Digitaly Developed in ImagesPlus 2.75 beta 2d. Noise filtered in NeatImage.