[troypiggo (Troy)]

Recently I've tried my hand at some narrowband imaging in Ha, OIII, and SII. During the processing of my images, I've come to realise that there is more to it than meets the eye.

Image capture - I used exactly the same sub lengths for each filter. I know that narrowband would typically require longer subs than LRGB imaging. For simplicity I was going 8min subs, but I know I should be going for longer, maybe 15 or 20 min subs. That aside, do you capture all sub lengths the same for each filter? Or should SII be longer, because Ha is more dominant? Or should sub lengths be same but capture more of them for the SII?

Image processing - I had always assumed that for Hubble palette it was as simple as SII goes straight into R, Ha into G, and OIII into B. Then tweak the channels to get the right colour mix. I'm finding that the G/Ha is so overpowering and dominant, it's hard to control. On top of that, I've been doing some reading and finding that some blend some Ha into the other channels etc. So it's not as simple as one filter per channel. Correct?

Or perhaps if I did the longer sub lengths for the weaker filters, eg SII, it should be one filter per channel? ie get it right more at image capture time to make the processing simpler?

I know it's all subjective, and we're not talking about true colour balancing here. What I'm talking about is the true Hubble palette for example, everyone talks about it being SHO.

Any tips, recommended reading, etc?