A 3D View of the Veil Nebula

Posted by Brian Ventrudo

One problem with even the best astrophotos… they give little sense of depth.  Every object appears lovely, but 2-dimensional.  But Finnish photographer J.P. Metsavainio has found a way to add the third dimension.  Metsavainio developed an intriguing experimental technique to convert astrophotos into volumetric models of well-known nebulae, then use the models to create stunning 3D views of these objects.  Here’s a look at the Veil Nebula, one of my all-time favorites.  This, you have to see…

To create these images, Metsavainio looks up or estimates distances to stars in a particular astrophoto and uses the known physical nature of nebulae to estimate its structure.  Then he crunches the numbers to create a virtual 3D image of the object.  His work is part art and part science, but he has achieved some stunning results.  Here’s his animation of a “fly around” of the Veil Nebula complex in the constellation Cygnus…

The Veil Nebula is the shattered remains of two stars that exploded 18,000 and 5,000 years ago. The stars were only 2,500 light-years away for Earth when they exploded, so each likely appeared as bright as the crescent moon in the skies of our prehistoric ancestors (and probably scared the living daylights out of them).  The bright optical filaments in the Veil Nebula are caused by the supernova blast wave colliding with interstellar clouds. As the shock wave slows down, it loses energy by emitting visible light.

The brightest sections of the Veil Nebula are visible in a small telescope in dark sky.  The nebula is huge, about 7 times larger than the full Moon.  But its surface brightness is low, so a good light-pollution filter is needed to improve the contrast of this beautiful object.  The Veil lies off the eastern “wing-tip” of Cygnus the Swan near the star 52 Cygni.  It’s visible in northern skies from July through October.