Eagle Nebula (M16)

This large cloud of dust and gas known as Messier 16 is about 7000 light-years away and is the birthplace of new stars. These newborn stars are scorching and bright, illuminating the surrounding hydrogen gas. A particular group of hydrogen gas, the Pillars of Creation, are the weirdly shaped pillars near the core. As time goes on, these pillars slowly evaporate under the intense glare of the nearby massive, newborn stars.

The Pillars of Creation

In 1995, the Hubble Space Telescope captured one of the most iconic images of the "Pillars of Creation." This group of hydrogen gas is one of the night sky's most productive regions of active star formation. Stars are constantly forming inside the massive pillars of gas and dust and are being sculpted by the powerful winds of the young, energetic stars within M16's cluster. When I was a kid, I thought, "Woah, this is where the deities reside, creating the universe we live in!" Of course, I now know none of that is true, but this oddly shaped group of hydrogen gas holds a special place in my heart to this day.

Now in 2022, NASA once again "Wowed" us with their picture of the "Pillars of Creation" through the James Web Telescope's near-infrared-light camera.

“The blue colors in the image represent oxygen, red is sulfur, and green represents both nitrogen and hydrogen. The pillars are bathed in the scorching ultraviolet light from a cluster of young stars located just outside the frame. The winds from these stars are slowly eroding the towers of gas and dust. ” 

NASA – August 25, 2021

Location & Best Time to See it

The Eagle Nebula is one of the brightest emission nebulae in our sky, being located within the constellation Serpens. From northern latitudes, its apparent altitude reaches high enough in the southern sky for visual observation and photography. The photo below from Stellarium is a good representation of where to find the Eagle Nebula in the night sky.

The best time to look for the Eagle Nebula from this latitude is from June – September. By September/October, Messier 16 sits high into the southwest at nightfall and quickly fades into the horizon as the night progresses. 

This means that the Eagle Nebula offers a relatively short window of opportunity for viewing. Luckily, I was able to get a photo of the Eagle Nebula myself in September before it was too late.

Photographing the Eagle Nebula

Since the Eagle Nebula has a sizeable apparent magnitude compared to other celestial bodies, just a short 30-second exposure is enough to capture the intense glow of the core. It's even possible to observe the heart of this nebula with the naked eye, even under moderately light-polluted skies. However, as is the case with all deep-sky astrophotography targets, the key to a successful image of the Eagle Nebula is an adequate amount of integration time for a healthy signal-to-noise ratio. We do this by adjusting our exposure times for each of our light frames, capturing the four main calibration frames (light, dark, flat, and bias), and finally stacking these shots together through DeepSkyStacker. A good tutorial on how to use the software is here.

Here is how to take the four main calibration frames:

Light Frames - These are your signal frames; the instructions above are how to take these.

Dark Frames - These frames' purpose is to increase your photo's signal-noise ratio. Keep the same settings you had for your light frames and cover your lens/telescope with the lid. 

Bias Frames - The purpose of these frames is to reduce the noise in your photo. Keep the same settings on your camera for your light frames, change the exposure time to the fastest it can possibly be, and cover your lens/telescope with the lid. 

Flat Frames - The purpose of these frames are to eliminate vignetting/light falloff and other artifacts in your image due to dust, dirt, or smudges on the sensor or telescope in your photo. These are tricky. In simple terms, cover your lens/telescope with a white shirt and point it at a constant light source, like the morning sky. Then experiment with the exposure times until the histogram looks like the one below. This is shown below for monochrome and color cameras.

From the beginning of my astrophotography journey, the Pillars of Creation were one of my top celestial bodies to capture. Seeing my own photos of it now is just an incredible feeling that will never get old. My photo of Messier 16 below was captured using an unmodified Canon Rebel EOS T3i (600D) DSLR camera and a refractor telescope (100mm Aperture, 900mm focal length).

Eagle Nebula Details:

• Messier: 16

• NGC: 6611 (embedded star cluster)

• IC: 4073

• Object Type: Emission Nebula with Open Cluster

• Constellation: Serpens

• Distance: 7000 light-years

• Apparent Magnitude: +6.2

• Apparent Size: 65 x 50 Arc Minutes

Resources:

Messier 16 - The Eagle Nebula (NASA)

StarCharts - Eagle Nebula

NASA's Webb  - The Eagle Nebula (NASA)

Gallery of Eagle Nebula