Elephants Trunk Nebula

45 seconds exposures
8.5hrs total integration
The part resembling an elephant’s trunk is actually a huge concentration of interstellar gas and dust known as IC 1396A, sitting inside the much larger IC 1396 nebula in Cepheus.
And “huge” doesn’t really do it justice.
The trunk is roughly 20 light-years long.
That’s about 15 TRILLION Earths lined up side-by-side. 🤯🌍
Inside all that dust and gas, gravity and compression are helping create new stars, making the Elephant’s Trunk a genuine stellar nursery.
The light in this image has spent approximately 2,400 years crossing space before reaching us.
And somehow, I’ve managed to capture a little bit of it from here on Earth.
Never gets old.

DWARFLAB 3
Eq mode
Dual band filter

Stacked and processed in Siril. Touched up in Affinity
45 seconds long exposures
8.5hrs total integration taken in one night.