Derby and District Astronomical Society
NGC 2174
The Monkey Head Nebula
Emission Nebula in Orion
RA 06h 09m 42s Dec +20° 30' 00"
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John Hill captured this image of the Monkey Head Nebula (NGC 2174) and the embedded star cluster NGC 2175 using data obtained on the on the 17th and 18th March 2026. The image was taken with a Skywatcher Esprit 100 ED telescope with a field flattener, ZWO 294 Pro camera (at -10°C) mounted on a Skywatcher HEQ5 Pro, all controlled from a ZWO ASIAir Plus. One set of images, 107 x 60s subs were taken through an Optolong L-eXtreme filter and the Ha and Oiii (7nm) images extracted. The second set of images, 93 x 60s, was taken through an Optolong Sii filter (6.5nm). The images were processed and combined using PixInsight. Image Credit: John Hill.
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This image of the Monkey Head Nebula was created by Chris Callaway using data obtained in January and February 2025. The nebula SH2-247 is also visible to the lower left. The image comprises a total of 84 x 300 second subs of Ha, Sii and Oiii data. The Ha was assigned to the red channel, the Oiii to the green channel and the Sii to the blue channel. It was taken using a Takahashi 106 telescope and Atik 16200 camera on a Paramount MyT mount. The image was processed using Astro Pixel Processor, PixInsight and PhotoShop. Image Credit: Chris Callaway.
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This image of the Monkey Head Nebula was created by Chris Callaway using data obtained in January and February 2025. It comprises a total of 84 x 300 sec subs of Ha, Sii and Oiii data and processed in the Hubble Palette. It was taken using a Takahashi 106 telescope and Atik 16200 camera on a Paramount MyT mount. The image was processed using Astro Pixel Processor, PixInsight and PhotoShop. Image Credit: Chris Callaway.
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This image of the Monkey Head Nebula (NGC 2174) and associated star cluster NGC 2175 was taken by Mike Lancaster on the 25th January 2023. It is comprised of 20 x 4 minute subs taken using a Mallincam Universe colour camera at 22 dB gain through an Orion Optics UK AG12 astrograph, 0.95x Wynne Corrector and Astronomik CLS-CCD filter. This setup was guided on an EQ8 mount with PHD2 using an SXV Lodestar camera through a piggybacked ST-80. The images were stacked in Deep Sky Stacker and processed in Nebulosity. Image Credit: Mike Lancaster.
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Adrian Brown captured this false colour image of emission nebula NGC 2174 in Orion on the 29th October 2008 using narrowband filters. This object is nicknamed the Monkey Head Nebula because depending on how you orientate the image you can see the face of a monkey. Adrian chose a 'north' down orientation because the face seemed more prominent to him. Can you see the monkey face? The technical details for this image are: 7 x 20 minutes through a 6nm Astronomik Hydrogen-Alpha filter. 6 x 20 minutes through a 13nm Astronomik OIII filter. Skywatcher 80ED Pro refractor @ f/6 using a William Optics 0.8x focal reducer. ATIK ATK16HR CCD camera. Maxim DL 4.53 was used to calibrate and stack the raw exposures. Registar 1.0 was used to align the hydrogen-alpha and oxygen III data. Photoshop CS2 was used to process the stacked data and a false colour image was created by assigning the hydrogen-alpha data to the red channel, and the oxygen III data to the blue channel. Noel Carboni's Photoshop Actions were used to create a synthetic green channel. Image Credit: Adrian Brown.
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