Polaris and his dusty sorroundings

An image of Polaris with his dusty surroundings, which is also known as the Integrated Flux Nebula, or IFN for short. It looks like a faint glow caused by the combined light of the Milky Way’s stars reflected and re-radiated by interstellar dust and gas. These nebulae clouds are composed of dust particles, hydrogen and carbon monoxide and other elements. They are particularly prominent in the direction of both the north and south celestial poles. In the starless version Polaris as well as the star “UMi 2“ remain present for orientation. In this version, the structures and shapes of the Integrated Flux Nebula can be seen best. To make the IFN visible, it takes a lot of exposure time. In this example around 40 hours with a 50mm aperture f/4 apo on a full frame sensor.