Tarantula Nebula, NGC 2070

The Tarantula Nebula, NGC 2070  The Tarantula Nebula is more than a thousand light-years in diameter, a giant star forming region within nearby satellite galaxy the Large Magellanic Cloud. It is located at a declination of -69 degrees which is the celestial version of latitude and is only visible from the Southern Hemisphere.   About 180 thousand light-years away, it’s the largest, most violent star forming region known in the whole Local Group of galaxies. This distance is further away than any part of the Milky Way itself which is 110 thousand light years in size. The cosmic arachnid sprawls across this spectacular view, composed with a combination of true color and atomic emission imaging . The blue color is due to Oxygen emission and the red color is due to Hydrogen  emission. The true color imaging allows the color of the stars to be apparent and brightens the center of the nebula while the detail in the nebular clouds is enhanced by the atomic filter imaging. Within the Tarantula, intense radiation, stellar winds and supernova shocks from the central young cluster of massive stars,  energize the nebular glow causing the emission and shape the spidery filaments. Around the Tarantula are other star forming regions with young star clusters, filaments, and blown-out bubble shaped clouds.  The rich field of view spans about 1 degree or 2 full moons, in the southern constellation Dorado. But were the Tarantula Nebula closer, say 1,500 light-years distant like the local star forming Orion Nebula it would take up half the sky. The image data was taken from a remote telescope located in New South Wales Australia and assembled in Jackson Hole into the image here . It consists of 18  true color images and 33 atomic filter images taken over a total of 18.5 hours. The image was done by making a synthetic luminance from both the true color and narrowband images and then blending in the color from each using the color blending mode in Photoshop CC2020.