The Heart Nebula (IC 1805) and the Soul Nebula (IC 1848) are two giant molecular clouds located in the constellation of Cassiopeia. The two clouds are physically connected by a bridge of gas and reside in the Perseus arm of our Milky Way Galaxy. In the center of the Heart Nebula is the open cluster Melotte 15, which is one of many clusters formed from the molecular cloud. These clusters within the clouds are known as the Cas OB6 association, and the energy from their hot stars illuminate the surrounding nebulae.

In this image, North is up.

Exposure Details
Lens	Canon EF 200mm f/2.8L II USM
Focal Length	200mm
Focal Ratio	f/3.5
Mount	Schaefer GEM - 7 1/2 inch Byers gear
Guiding	Piggybacked on C8, guided with an ONAG On-Axis Guider, Lodestar autoguider, PHD Guiding
Camera	Canon 450D - Gary Honis modified (Baader Mod)
Exposure	57 subexposures of 300 sec @ ISO 400 (4 3/4 hours)
Calibration	30 darks, 30 flats, 30 flat darks, 30 bias
Date	September 11, 2013
Temperature	57F
SQM Reading	21.45 (Bortle 4)
Seeing	5/5
Location	Pine Mountain Club, California
Software Used	Images Plus 5.5 for camera control, calibration, stacking, digital development, smoothing and noise reduction, multiresolution sharpening, and star size and halo reduction. Photoshop CS5 used for levels and curves, high pass filter, star shrinking, screen mask invert, lab color, match color, vibrance, selective color, hue adjustments, and unsharp mask. Gradient Xterminator for gradient removal. Registar for registration and stack alignment. Carboni Tools for additional noise reduction and smoothing.
Notes	I'm very happy with this image - the stars have nice color, as do the nebulae. This pair make for a very pretty field of view.