Eagle 2017: 31 hrs

[Placidus (Mike and Trish)]

Originally Posted by markas

Splendid image! Fantastic detail and I like the colour balance.

This looking so sharp, how does a tight crop of the pillars look?

Mark

Thanks muchly Mark. You can make your own tight crop if you want to download the big one and crop it appropriately.

Originally Posted by Bart

Great depth, has a real deep 3d feel. Top stuff!

Thanks Bart!

Originally Posted by topheart

OMG!!

One the most effective shot's ever taken of this subject!
Dark, terrifying, brooding, majestic, poetic...almost religious. Definitely three dimensional.

Wonderful!
Congratulations!
Tim

Tim, that's really kind. Thrilled that you like it.

Originally Posted by DJT

Love it! Excellent stuff!

Originally Posted by alpal

Hi Mike & Trish,
The pillars look fantastic - so much detail.
The bar keeps getting set higher & higher.

cheers
Allan

Thanks, Allan. The pillars are so special. The detail that the Hubble shot shows is heart-breakingly beautiful. All we can do is to see that the pillars are really there, and imagine.

Very best,
Mike and Trish

[Atmos (Colin)]

Absolutely love it M&T! Not quite as saturated as my preference (brink of over saturation ) but the colour rendition is great. Very sharp for sure!

[multiweb (Marc)]

That's a beauty, such tiny stars and great details.

[PRejto (Peter)]

M & T, that's a beautiful image! As previously noted dark and brooding which I assume was intentional. Was the word "ominous" used?

My curiosity about the darkness led me to open the image in (don't faint) Photoshop. I was really curious to see where you put the black point because I thought it must be clipped. Wrong (though one might slightly argue about the green channel). Anyway, out of curiosity more than anything I hit the "auto" in levels. Since I really know zero about narrowband imaging I can't say anything except that it seems to bring out some beautiful shading between brown and green especially towards the left side of the image. It made me wonder if you could still keep the "brooding" mood and get some of the transitional colours?

Anyway, you have a great setup in great hands!

Peter

[Placidus (Mike and Trish)]

Originally Posted by Atmos

Absolutely love it M&T! Not quite as saturated as my preference (brink of over saturation ) but the colour rendition is great. Very sharp for sure!

Thanks, Colin, that's very encouraging. We like trying to bring out the colours in galaxies and clusters, but narrowband usually comes out pretty alarmingly saturated all by itself. Never thought about making it even more so. Winter is kinder than summer with seeing.

Originally Posted by multiweb

That's a beauty, such tiny stars and great details.

Thanks muchly, Marc. Just using H-alpha for the stars, and dropping the bloated SII and OIII certainly helps. We're getting better at removing them in SII and OIII without leaving horrible artifacts.

Originally Posted by PRejto

M & T, that's a beautiful image! As previously noted dark and brooding which I assume was intentional. Was the word "ominous" used?

My curiosity about the darkness led me to open the image in (don't faint) Photoshop. I was really curious to see where you put the black point because I thought it must be clipped. Wrong (though one might slightly argue about the green channel). Anyway, out of curiosity more than anything I hit the "auto" in levels. Since I really know zero about narrowband imaging I can't say anything except that it seems to bring out some beautiful shading between brown and green especially towards the left side of the image. It made me wonder if you could still keep the "brooding" mood and get some of the transitional colours?

Anyway, you have a great setup in great hands!

Peter

Many thanks for a thoughtful response, Peter. We're still a bit nervous about making the background too green. Doesn't bother us (outside the window, the winter paddocks are very green, especially the neighbours who are better farmers), but there are traditionalists who find it disturbing.

[cometcatcher (Kevin)]

Lovely image as always M&T!

[Geoff45 (Geoff)]

Wow! That's incredibly sharp M &T. Nice balance of colours too.
Geoff

[Slawomir (Suavi)]

Love it! Definitely the sharpest pillars I have seen on IIS

[Andy01 (Andy)]

Dramatic, moody, Cinematic even
Has a cave like 3D appearance - lovely job guys - gotta be happy with that result!

[Placidus (Mike and Trish)]

Originally Posted by cometcatcher

Lovely image as always M&T!

Thanks Kevin. Glad you like it.

Originally Posted by Geoff45

Wow! That's incredibly sharp M &T. Nice balance of colours too.
Geoff

Thanks muchly Geoff. We're starting to suspect that deconvolution and wavelet sharpening work better with long exposures on bright objects.

Originally Posted by Slawomir

Love it! Definitely the sharpest pillars I have seen on IIS

Thank you indeed, Suavi. That is most encouraging.

Originally Posted by Andy01

Dramatic, moody, Cinematic even
Has a cave like 3D appearance - lovely job guys - gotta be happy with that result!

Cheers, Andy. We are a little chuffed!

Very best,
Mike and Trish

[RickS (Rick)]

Late to the party (have been away on a work trip) and there's nothing left to say Great image, M & T

[alan meehan (Alan)]

wow wonderful very special
AL

[Retrograde (Pete)]

Beautiful!

[Octane (Humayun)]

When I grow up, I want to make images as fabulous as this.

I absolutely love, love, love the understated look.

What a work of art.

H

[Placidus (Mike and Trish)]

Originally Posted by RickS

Late to the party (have been away on a work trip) and there's nothing left to say Great image, M & T

Thanks Rick, we're thrilled you like it.

Originally Posted by alan meehan

wow wonderful very special
AL

Cheers, Alan, that's kind.

Originally Posted by Retrograde

Beautiful!

Thanks Pete!

Originally Posted by Octane

When I grow up, I want to make images as fabulous as this.

I absolutely love, love, love the understated look.

What a work of art.

H

Thank you so much for the encouragement, Humayun.

[codemonkey (Lee)]

That's a cracker, guys. Exceptional detail. Great work!

[Raydar (Ray Palmer)]

Stunning capture. Nuff said.

Ray

[Placidus (Mike and Trish)]

Originally Posted by codemonkey

That's a cracker, guys. Exceptional detail. Great work!

Originally Posted by Raydar

Stunning capture. Nuff said.

Ray

Thanks Ray and Lee. Most kind.

[Peter Ward]

Some quibbles first...there are odd dim red "icicles" dangling from many of the field stars...as to how/why they are there, I'll defer to your good judgment.

The palette ...humm. ..kinda muddy?

The image scale and depth...well.... simply impressive!

[Placidus (Mike and Trish)]

Originally Posted by Peter Ward

Some quibbles first...there are odd dim red "icicles" dangling from many of the field stars...as to how/why they are there, I'll defer to your good judgment.

The palette ...humm. ..kinda muddy?

The image scale and depth...well.... simply impressive!

Many thanks, Peter,

The red icicles are due to a hardware (or perhaps design) fault in the Aspen camera. They always show up on medium (but not super bright or super faint) stars when the image is strongly stretched. I've put a lot of effort into writing software to fix them with mixed success. The physics eludes me but I think you yourself once suggested they may be related to the readout electronics. They are red because the SII channel has been stretched the most. They are not due to optics or guiding.

Tell us more about the muddy palette, so we can have a crack at fixing it. Too brown, too grey, not saturated enough?

We've never felt the need to increase saturation on an NB image, firstly because they are usually very saturated already, and secondly because we don't want to imply a strong topographic separation of Ha, OIII, and SII (such as you often get in the Magellanic Clouds) that is not actually there in the object. Perhaps trying to bring out really faint stuff without colour noise has led this one to be undersaturated. Further advice most welcome!



Best,
Mike