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NGC 6946 and NGC 6939 and Surrounding Area

NGC 6946, NGC 6939, B 150, B 354, B 357

Move your mouse over the image above (on smartphones or tablets: touch it) to get an annotated version.

This image shows the boundary area between the constellations Cepheus, Cygnus and Draco. There is a lot of interstellar dust blocking our view towards the plane of the Milky Way. Notice the many dark and not-so-dark lanes crisscrossing this image. Prominent dark nebulae are Barnard 150 (the Seahorse Nebula), Barnard 354 and Barnard 357, all located in Cepheus.

NGC 6946, the Fireworks Galaxy, which is located at the center of the image above, is a face-on spiral galaxy with a small bright nucleus, whose location in the sky straddles the boundary between the constellations of Cepheus and Cygnus. Visually, if forms a pair with the open star cluster NGC 6939, as they are separated only by ⅔ of a degree in the sky. NGC 6939 is actually located 400 parsec above the galactic plane and 8.400 parsec away from the galactic centre.

Milky Way Vista - Cygnus to Cassiopeia, zoom lens photograph.
Barnard 150 - Seahorse Nebula, CCD image.
Sh2-129, HαRGB image.


Exposure Data


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© 2022 Walter Koprolin