nearly 8 hours on the Eta Carina Nebula

[Robert_T]

Dipping my toe into the deep (sky) end of the forums here after a while paddling in the beginners AP forum, so be kind

I made the most of some relatively cloudfree skies last night (rare indeed!) and combined with a few hours from a couple of nights earlier.

7hr 48 total - 150 x 2min and 42 x 4min exposures with QHY268c in High Gain Mode at 60 gain. L extreme filter and my little Askar 400 F5.6.

I am incresingly impressed with NINA as my capture software. Last night kept my CEM40 mount chugging, meridian flip, auto-refocus and plaetsolving, parking and warming cameraa the end, all while I slept. Nice :-)

Subs stacked in APP and extracted and saved into Ha-OIII mono as Luminance, Ha as Red and OIII as green and Blue and then recombined and processed in Startools. Used Matrix setting in Startools colour module and selected H (H+O) 100R, 50R + 25G + 25B, 50G + 50B setting to give this colour palette

Finished in PS.

Full resolution version on Astrobin as linked below

https://www.astrobin.com/full/90lgrs/0/?nc=user

[xa-coupe (Jeff)]

That is very nice .. I dont have 8 hours on carina yet but I must have 5 or more ...I can only hope the image turns out like that one!

[PKay (Peter)]

Great result Rob

Lots of detail and contrast revealed.

You might have to go NB?

[Robert_T]

thanks Jeff and Peter :-)

Peter on narrowband I suspect that's where I'll end up, but I want to milk what I can from this OSC for now at least until such time I think it's th elimiting factor and not my processing skills ;-)

[multiweb (Marc)]

Superb field. Beautifully processed. One for the cool wall.

[Robert_T]

Originally Posted by multiweb

Superb field. Beautifully processed. One for the cool wall.

Thanks Marc. Appreciate the kind words.

[ChrisV (Chris)]

That's really nice Robert. And looks better as you zoom into it.

[Robert_T]

Originally Posted by ChrisV

That's really nice Robert. And looks better as you zoom into it.

thanks Chris. THat's what I love about this nebula - it has incredible depth even with moderate integration time

[Ryderscope (Rodney)]

A well presented Eta Carina Robert with good colour and detail. Worthy of the effort.

[Andy01 (Andy)]

Lovely ethereal quality to the image there.
Slightly awkward cropping but a darn good first image post in the big pool!

[Placidus (Mike and Trish)]

Welcome

Very deep image. Well done!

The bright nebula top left of dead centre looks like the face of a baby lamb (well, some ruminant or other). Never noticed that before.

[Robert_T]

Thanks all for the kind comments. I was very pleased and surpised to see it chosen as a Top Pick on Astrobin as well. Another first for me.https://www.astrobin.com/90lgrs/?nc=user

[astronobob (Bob)]

Stunning Image & really like the colour rendition , a beauty