M16/17 panaorama - colour now added

[RobF]

My first processing effort from 2018 Astrofest. Tried a 3 frame mosaic from M16 through to M17, and would love to say chose to portray this in a "brooding panoramic widefield scene"...... ;)

Ahem......but actually I botched setting the position angle for the camera when started shooting data for this last month - so its actually a fluke I was able to rescue a mosaic at all. :P

This was just the Ha collected to reinforce the LRGB image (colour to follow).

3 frames, each about 9 x 15mins Ha, FSQ106/QHY9.


Larger warts and all image on AB here:
https://www.astrobin.com/full/361455/0/


Thanks for looking.

[Placidus]

The depth is superb. You've nailed our "Cygnet" just above the Swan. You've obviously chosen to sacrifice contrast in order to demonstrate very faint features.

Svlad Cjelli would say you've thereby confirmed the interconnectedness of all things.

:thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup:

[multiweb]

Terrific mosaic Rob. Very deep and detailed. Superb. :thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup:

[RickS]

Great result, Rob! Good to see you haven't got rusty :lol:

[ozstronomer]

Beautiful Wide field and great processing Rob :thumbsup:

[strongmanmike]

Great panorama Rob, look forward to see how you handle the colour blend :thumbsup:

Mike

[RobF]

Thanks Mike and Trish - did try to take the "less is more philosophy" :)



Thanks Marc - pretty happy with it so far



Definitely picked up a few new ideas from your AF talk Rick - helped get back in the saddle :thumbsup:



Many thanks Geoff



Thanks Mike - struggling to beat that into submission currently.....

[gregbradley]

That turned out very nicely. Only problem is now you really need to do another 2 panels to square it off?

Greg.

[RobF]

Yes, I'm still making mistakes to learn from Greg. Will be checking position angle a lot more carefully in future. Seemed like a good idea at the time turning off the PA plate solve check in Sequence Generator :sadeyes:

[RobF]

Here's some colour in an combined HaLRGB blend.

3 frame mosaic, with approx data for each frame:
- Ha 9 x 15mins
- Lum 10 x 5mins
- RGB 10 x 5 mins

Total integration time about 5.5hrs

Larger version here (https://astrob.in/362247/0/)

[peter_4059]

Epic project Rob. Hats off to you.

[gregbradley]

Ha LRGB blends are tricky. Your Ha colour seems fine but the background seems to lack other colours. I think I see a touch of green in the background. I get this a lot. It comes from airglow which is often green and shows up in digital camera images. I didn't know how common it was until I started doing a lot of nightscapes and I see it all the time. Sometimes its ridiculously strong.

Excess green is easily gotten rid of though with SCNR in Pixinsight or its Photoshop brother HLVG free plug in.

Then push the blues a tad more. How did you blend the Ha? I don't think anything beats lighten mode.

Greg.

[RobF]

Thanks Peter - and only possible due to consumption of (moderately) epic volumes fav lager :D :cheers:

[multiweb]

Great job on the blend Rob. :thumbsup:

[troypiggo]

I've got a mosaic from Astrofest sitting there to be processed - too scared to start, knowing it's a big effort :( You've done well mate.

[RobF]

I'm not sure about the green feel Greg - I ran this through SCRN in PI a couple of times with the same feeling. I wonder if its an illusion from all the red in there.

This was my first time using PI's Photometriccolourcal script that does white/colour cal balancing against calalogued stars in the frame based on plate solving. I'm normally inclined to push the blue a bit more, but the overall tone is pretty much what came out of that process.

Ha blends are a bit of a dark art though, and H2 beta is supposed to warrant some blue channel contribution from the Ha.

This was done using the Pixinsight NBRGB combination script by the way. Thanks for thoughts Greg - I'll have to check the histogram again.

[RobF]

Thanks Marc!



Yes Troy, its nice when something pops out, but mosaic's can be a bit daunting. I had more than a few dead-ends had to back out with this one relearning PI along the way. :) :rolleyes:

[RickS]

Nice job, Rob! I would like to see some blues as well. It's pretty tricky to get colour, other than red, happening in a HaRGB image but worth the effort!

Cheers,
Rick.