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M46, on the left, is located about 3,200 light-years from the solar system and is estimated to be 300 million years old. The greenish magnitude 10.8 planetary nebula visible in the image, NGC 2438, is visible in amateur telescopes; it is not part of the cluster but is located closer to the solar system, about 2,900 light-years distant. M47 is 1,600 light-years from the solar system and is about 78 million years old. The fainter cluster above M47 is NGC 2423.

Equipment: Vixen 102-ED/STL-11000M/Astrodon LRGB filters/Paramount ME
F-ratio: f/6.5
Exposures: LRGB: L 8 x 3 minutes: R 8 x 3 minutes: G 8 x 3 minutes: B 8 x  3 minutes: RGB binned 2x2
Date:  February 16, 2007
Location: Landers, California, USA
Technical Notes: Seeing was poor through the evening, and at times it was difficult to achieve proper focus, especially for the red and blue exposures. Suboptimal focus for red and blue, combined with field curvature of the telescope, caused the stars at the edges of the frame to appear magenta and those near the center of the frame to appear greenish. Individual exposures were obtained using CCDAutoPilot2 and then sigma combined. The RGB image was created in Registar 1.0.