After a two-month layoff, I was finally able to try out my new Starizona Apex ED-L 0.65x focal reducer with my Sky-Watcher Esprit 100 refractor. This combination increased my field of view enough that I was able to capture the entire Heart Nebula, and this is the result. The Apex reducer seems to have done a good job at least over the field of view captured by my ZWO ASI533MC Pro camera. The Apex is supposed to handle sensors up to the size of APS-C, but I haven’t been able to test that–yet.

This image was captured with an Optolong L-eXtreme filter and consists of 60 5-minute subs, plus calibration frames. Processed using PixInsight with StarNet++ version 2.0, along with Affinity Photo and Topaz Sharpen AI.