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In a recent image of a nebula, astrophotographer Greg Meyer captured the face of a baboon. About 500 light-years away, in Corona Australis, is a structure called the Raging Baboon Nebula. The image reveals a baboon-like face with dusty brown clouds and dazzling blue eyes. With the globular cluster NGC6723 (an region of hundreds of thousands of stars) visible nearby, it even reminds the observer of the vivid characteristics of a mandrill.
Rampaging Baboon Nebula Imaging
Meyer took this picture from a Starfront Observatory in Texas, according to Space.com. Using a 120mm Takahashi Esprit telescope and a QHY 268M camera, he was able to photograph the nebula in 13 nights during the summer of 2025. The total amount of exposure data collected was about 16.5 hours. Meyer then used tools (Photoshop, Lightroom, PixInsight) to stack the shots. His processing highlights the blue reflection nebulae that make up the eyes and the brown molecular dust that makes up the lips, which together make up the baboon's face.
Nebula Shapes and Cosmic Sculptures
The nebulae are clouds of gas and dust that are created by winds and starlight. The mouth of the Baboon Nebula is the black absorption cloud, while the eyes are the blue reflection nebulae (scatter starlight). Strong stellar winds also create structures elsewhere: Images of Orion taken with the Hubble telescope show a space jellyfish proplyd formed by a big star's wind. There are no distinct lines on these clouds. For instance, the Skull Nebula is NGC 246 and the well-known Horsehead Nebula is Barnard 33.
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