The Pipe nebula, also known as Barnard 59, 65–67, and 78, is a huge dark cloud in the constellation of Ophiuchus, near the center part of the Milky Way. This area contains a lot of dark clouds and you can also see the much smaller Snake Nebula to the right of the Pipe nebula.
You can see the Pipe nebula really ‘popping out’ of the Milky Way when you watch it with the naked eye in real dark skies. It’s really the dark structures and nebula’s like this that make the Milky Way so interesting by contrasting the bright stars and star clusters.
Of course the Pipe nebula is also a nice black contrasting object not alone to the yellow stars in the background, but with the colorful Lagoon and Trifid present in the same image.
Pipe Nebula acquisition details
Date: July 16, 2015
Location: Kiripotib, Namibia
Optics: Nikkor 80-200mm F2.8 used at 80mm F4
Mount: Fornax 51
Camera: Unmodified Nikon D5100
Guiding: Lacerta MGEN
Exposures: 13x5min ISO800 + 17x10min ISO400
