M42 Orion Nebula under 85% Moon South Coast

[Startrek (Martin)]

Last night only offered a small window of opportunity to image so I grabbed it as it’s been cloudy for many consecutive nights and I was anxious to image M42 down at my dark site with the new 2600MC ( I’ve already imaged M42 in Sydney with this camera )
Clouds cleared enough by 9.00pm so I framed up M42 Orion Nebula and managed to capture only 6 x 180 sec subs ( 18minutes total integration ) before the sky clouded out around 10pm
An 85% lit Moon was located only 20 deg below M42 so the OTA was copping the full brunt of the Moon glare
Processed the limited data this afternoon and was quite pleased with the final result considering imaging conditions and limited data
Scope: 8” f5 Bintel GSO newt
Mount : EQ6-R pro
Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI2600MC Ascom controlled set at Highest Dynamic Range ( Gain 0 ) cooled to -12C
ZWO Duoband filter
6 x 180 sec dithered guided subs
No darks
No flats
Goto and Navigation EQMOD and Ascom Stellarium
Frame Focus and Capture APT
PHD2 guiding, Ra 1.00 arc sec Dec 0.70 arc sec error
Stacked in DSS ( Average )
Processed in Startools V1.6 ( stretched with Autodev to expose Trapezium)
No Layering etc... needed

OSC Synthetic Luminance version
OSC linear LRGB version
Cropped version to show Core area ( obviously reduced resolution )

Comments most welcome

[carlstronomy (Carl)]

Super nice image, some great detail for such a short time....
Colours are spot on, I like M42 to look like this.

[multiweb (Marc)]

That's really good Martin. Good image scale and you've got some really good close up details too. One for the cool wall.

[Startrek (Martin)]

Thanks Carl and Marc
I’m really enjoying this 2600MC
My Canon 600D DSLR was a great entry into the hobby for all those years ( I still use it for lunar and planetary imaging ) but the move up to cooled OSC is certainly a whole new level of performance in regards to SNR. I’ve been using it for 6 months now and still so much more to learn and discover with it
Thanks again
Martin

[Karlz (Karl)]

Great image Martin, could you message me your workflow for startools please, I'm having a little struggle with it.

[Startrek (Martin)]

Originally Posted by Karlz

Great image Martin, could you message me your workflow for startools please, I'm having a little struggle with it.

Karl,
Thanks for your comment
Like most processing software (including Startools) one size doesn’t fit all
Im happy to help but need to know the following -
Startools version you are currently using ( I’m currently using V1.6 and will progress to V1.7 later in the year )
Imaging Camera type DSLR or OSC or CMOS Mono with filters
Sub exposure files RAW or FITS
Stacking software used ( hopefully DSS )
Nominated Celestial Object you want to process

Then I can send you some info

Cheers
Martin

[Karlz (Karl)]

Hi Martin,

I'm using version 1.7, DSLR it RAW form and DSS for stacking.
Objects will be Eta Carina, Orion etc as well as galaxies, I have to get my head around being in a city now and LP instead of the bush with near dark skies.

Cheers
Karl

[Startrek (Martin)]

Originally Posted by Karlz

Hi Martin,

I'm using version 1.7, DSLR it RAW form and DSS for stacking.
Objects will be Eta Carina, Orion etc as well as galaxies, I have to get my head around being in a city now and LP instead of the bush with near dark skies.

Cheers
Karl

Karl
Thanks
I’ll post a generic work flow based on V1.6 which shouldn’t be too different from using V1.7 that should work ok for Carina , that way it may help other folk on the forum struggling with Startools
The most important thing with Startools is that your DSS stacked fits file is clean linear data and not white balanced, is unstretched and not colour adjusted at all !!!
I’ll attached my DSS procedure first , but give me some time ( a day or two ) to tweak an old Startools workflow from 2019 , using V1.6 and then I’ll post it
Cheers
Martin

[Karlz (Karl)]

Much appreciated Martin

[Startrek (Martin)]

Karl,
Please find attached Startools V1.6 basic workflow ( abbreviated version ) I used on M42 Orion Nebula in Sydney a few months ago
This should get you started ( hopefully )
Just remember one size doesn’t fit all , so like everything you need to spend time on Startools to get the best out of its powerful processing performance
It’s really good on noisy data from a DSLR , I know, I used a DSLR for 3 years. Using my DSLR during the summer months, the images were so noisy but Startools really helped so much to clean up the image and expose the detail

Good Luck !!
Martin

[muletopia (Chris)]

Martin,
I am so pleased that a competent, experienced user of Startools has taken the trouble and time to post his workflow for Startools.


I shall try to use it on the next cloudy night, there are plenty of them.


Chris

[Karlz (Karl)]

I thank you for your time Martin in writing your workflow.
I have much to learn again as I've been out of AP for about 18 months.

Cheers
Karl

[Startrek (Martin)]

Originally Posted by muletopia

Martin,
I am so pleased that a competent, experienced user of Startools has taken the trouble and time to post his workflow for Startools.


I shall try to use it on the next cloudy night, there are plenty of them.


Chris

Thanks Chris
I think a few folk are using Startools now , a lot more than years and years ago as it’s developed into a really good , easy to use and very powerful processing software
Hope the example workflow helps folk in some way
Cheers
Martin

[Startrek (Martin)]

Originally Posted by Karlz

I thank you for your time Martin in writing your workflow.
I have much to learn again as I've been out of AP for about 18 months.

Cheers
Karl

Karl,
No problem at all
I hope it helps you get going with Startools
It offers so much
I’ve been using it for over 3 years and still finding things to improve my images
Kudos goes to the developer Ivo Jager
Good luck !!
Martin