IC 5070 — Pelican Nebula
Cygnus · Askar FRA400 · ToupTek ATR585M · Sky-Watcher AZ-EQ6 PRO · 2026-03-01
Acquisition
| Filter | Exposures | Sessions |
|---|---|---|
| H-alpha 6.5nm | 37 × 300s | 2 |
| OIII 6.5nm | 61 × 300s | 2 |
| SII 6.5nm | 48 × 300s | 2 |
Total integration: 12h 10m
Main Challenges
OIII signal in the Pelican is notoriously faint relative to Hα — biasing the integration heavily toward OIII was necessary to bring out the fine ionisation front detail without drowning it in hydrogen.
Process Notes
The Pelican Nebula (IC 5070) sits just east of the North America Nebula in Cygnus, separated from it only by a dark molecular cloud. At roughly 1,800 light-years away, it's one of the most active star-forming regions visible from the northern hemisphere — a turbulent frontier where newborn stars are sculpting the surrounding gas with their ultraviolet radiation.
My framing prioritises the ionisation front — the sharp, luminous ridge where the Pelican's "beak" meets the dark lane. That edge is where the physics gets interesting: dense pillars of cold gas being slowly eroded by the radiation pressure from nearby OB stars, some of them barely a few million years old.
The SHO Palette
Pure narrowband, no RGB stars. The sulphur (SII) maps the shock-excited outer shell, the hydrogen (Hα) dominates the broad emission across the body of the nebula, and the oxygen (OIII) traces the hottest, most ionised zones along the ionisation front — giving the beak region its distinct teal edge against the warm hydrogen glow.
The heavy OIII integration (5h 05m vs 3h 05m Hα) was a deliberate choice: the Pelican's OIII signal is faint, and under-integrating it would collapse the colour contrast that makes the SHO palette worthwhile here.
Software
Stacked and processed in PixInsight. Acquisition managed with N.I.N.A., autofocus via ZWO EAF.