Antares and Ophiucus - Comparison with (dodgey?) colour adjustment

[midnight (Darrin)]

Greetings All again!

Last two nights being trying to now battle with colours with this lovelly area of the night sky (it reminds me of a giant jellyfish - it should be name tenticulum )

My polar alignment and tracking is pretty good - all images unguided.

I don't have much experience at all in colour balancing so these images could either be close or just plain dodgey. I would love to hear your comments as to whether I am on the right track or not.

Image 1 - minimal processing. So it looks a little bland.
Image 2 - Same as image 1 but more aggressive colour balancing in CS4.
Image 3 - Similar colour scheme applied to image 2.

Image 1 and 2 : 40D + EF50mm F1.4 at F4. Stack of 14 x 5min ISO 800 + 20 Dark Frames. DSS ver 3
Image 3 : 40D + EF50mm F1.4 at F4. Stack of 15 x 10min ISO 400 + 27 Dark Frames. DSS Ver 3.

Had big problems with dew on Sat night so I grabbed the pedestal fan from our bedroom and put it on low all night - that solved the dew

Can you adjust the white balance in say Canon Digital Photo Pro in Raw and then import into DSS and DSS will catch the new white balance setting? I think my problem is white balance.

Thanks for looking,
Darrin...

[multiweb (Marc)]

I like the colors of the last one and the smoothness of the first one. What youi can do is layer the last repro on top of the first rendition and blend it in as color so you get the best of both worlds. Colors are pretty spot on the last rendition.

[jjjnettie (Jeanette)]

Yep, what Marc said.
Less is more when it comes to colour, in my opinion anyway.
Got to keep you're eye on M4 too, make sure you don't burn out the core.

[midnight (Darrin)]

Originally Posted by jjjnettie

Yep, what Marc said.
Less is more when it comes to colour, in my opinion anyway.
Got to keep you're eye on M4 too, make sure you don't burn out the core.

Yes I see what you mean jjj! I didn't even notice this so thanks very much for pointing that out. "Layers" I regularly hear!

Originally Posted by multiweb

I like the colors of the last one and the smoothness of the first one. What youi can do is layer the last repro on top of the first rendition and blend it in as color so you get the best of both worlds. Colors are pretty spot on the last rendition.

I'm glad one of the three had colours that looked alright. The data I have looks good but I really need to work on processing. Ill have a go at posting in the deep space section next time. Thanks for the tips Marc!

Cheers,
Darrin...

[Octane (Humayun)]

Do not worry about white balance, Darrin.

By the time we put our images through the wringer, white balance is the least of our concerns.

Colour balancing in Photoshop is the way to resolve any colour casts.

H

[mswhin63 (Malcolm)]

Personally I think there all great but I have no eye for colour either so I will one day.
I suppose it is an unmodified camera and I love your resolution for dew. This is something that I will look into too.

[midnight (Darrin)]

Originally Posted by mswhin63

I suppose it is an unmodified camera and I love your resolution for dew. This is something that I will look into too.

Yes Malcolm, it is a totally stock/unmodified Canon 40D with over 100,000 clicks racked up on it. I mainly use it for industrial high res application where wide angle and low light are the main features and heavy contamination like ash, coal, steam (ie power station).

As for dew, this is common in high humidity environment that I work in and a cheap but effective resolution we use. I put the fan on it lowest speed and at least 1metre away from the mount. That way you get just a subtle movement of air that prevents moisture build up on everything and stabilises temperature very quickly and uniformly. Apparent power consumption at this speed is 37VA.

Thanks for your comments too!

Darrin...