Witch Head nebula from country Victoria

[Stefan Buda]

Hi everyone,

This is my first post in this section.

I used a home made astrograph for capturing the image and a QHY8 camera. A total of 3 hours in 5 minute subs. Processed with free software only (mainly IRIS and Gimp).

I wonder whether I went too far with the colour saturation?

Stefan

[nebulosity.]

Thats a cracker Stefen :thumbsup: I'm itching to know some more details on the scope :D

Jo

[John Hothersall]

Beautiful image, dust is so rich and bright.

John.

[cometcatcher]

Absolutely awesome! It's perfect the way it is.

[SkyViking]

That's very nice, I think the saturation is just right. Thanks for the view.

[DJT]

great image,Stefan. Colours and saturation are fine for me. :thumbsup:

[tilbrook@rbe.ne]

Top witch head Stefan!:thumbsup:

Love the rich colours.

Cheers,

Justin

[strongmanmike]

That's a fine image Stefan, lovely and deep with plenty going on and the colours are great. I wouldn't worry about them being too saturated at all, just getting any colour in this region other than blue is no mean feat, so well done :thumbsup:

Funny, I was only just surfing the VIC astro society web site today and was looking at some of your work on there, very nice.

Mike

[Stefan Buda]

Thanks everyone for the replies and comments. Looks like all I need to do is control the noise a bit better and call it done. I only used the free version of Noiseware for that.

Jo, the astrograph is a small Companar: D=132mm F=330mm (f/2.5).
It may be the only one of its type in existence as it is too complex and difficult to make as a commercial proposition.

Stefan

[RickS]

That looks like a very nice Witch Head, Stefan. I like the colours. You did well on a difficult target.

What's the % obstruction on the Companar? It's fairly high IIRC.

Cheers,
Rick.

[marco]

Great shot Stefan, even if the image is a bit too small to full appreciate it. It would be great if you could post a link to a larger resolution image uploaded somewhere (Astrobin? Pbase? Flickr?..).

My compliments also for the use of a homemade telescope, I also would love to see some images of it, always curious to see new gears in particular if they are unusual..

Clear skies
Marco

[gregbradley]

That is a very good Witchhead nebula shot. The colours are spot on. Its quite a colourful area.

Greg.

[Stefan Buda]

Thanks Rick, Marco and Greg.

Rick, you are right about the central obstruction: It is 61%, making the effective f-ratio close to f/3.

Marco, rather than showing you a boring black tube, here's an image with all the structural elements before anodising. As you can see it is all made of aluminium, which is not good for keeping focus, but I had no choice due to the complexity of the design.
I had several goes at uploading a larger version of the Witch Head into my ASV gallery. There seems to be a limit on the vertical size of the images so I ended up rotating it 90 degrees but even so it is not much better than the one here.

http://asv.org.au/gallery.php?dir=Stefan Buda

Stefan

[clive milne]

You successfully made a Companar...?

~respect~

[multiweb]

Great colours and details in that shot. :thumbsup: Kudos for the DIY scope too. Beautiful work.:eyepop:

[Stefan Buda]

Thanks Clive and Mark!

Clive, I just couldn't resist the challenge.

One of my next projects is a small RH. Should be much easier.

[allan gould]

Well done Stephan. A great image.

[marco]

Congrats again Stefan, you deserve all my admiration for being able to both excel in making AND using your imaging gears! It looks an interesting design, I remember long ago (film era) with a friend we tried to make a houghton camera 500/4 but eventually it turned out so complicated that we never managed to get satisfactory images out of it.. kudos to you!

Clear skies
Marco

[Stefan Buda]

Thanks Allan and Marco.

Marco, It's interesting that you started imaging in the film era too. Back then I made a small Schmidt Camera that worked exceptionally well but soon after I finished it, film went out of fashion and I turned to planetary imaging only, until recently. The poor SC has been in retirement inside a cardboard box ever since...

Cheers,

Stefan

[clive milne]

One of my next projects is a small RH. Should be much easier.[/QUOTE]

A concentric flat field Baker Schmidt should be functionally equivalent but easier still I would have thought?

[Stefan Buda]

Perhaps, but I like the extreme compactness of the RH.

I think we better wrap up this thread as it has gone OT.

Cheers,

Stefan

[RobF]

One of the best Witch's Heads I've seen Stefan. Great detail and doesn't seem over-pushed in the processing at all for such a faint and usually tough target. Have you used the scope in anger on any other objects yet? :)

[Stefan Buda]

Thanks Rob,

It's not as good as I would like it. At higher resolution it's a bit noisy, although I might be able do improve on the processing.

I had a go at the Blue Horsehead, the SMC and a couple of fainter comets with it but this was the most serious use so far.

The intended use for this instrument was the recording of brighter comets but there are not too many of those so in between I have to find other uses for it.
For DSO's it will be beaten by the FSQ106/ST1100 combination, which provides the same field of view at somewhat less speed but at higher resolution. However for comets the Companar/QHY8 should have the advantage.

Stefan

[whale]

Hi Stefan, great image!
Would you be able to present this image at the next AP section meeting on the 19th Jan?

Cheers
Nick Jones

[dutch2]

Agree, it is just lovely the way it is.
Well done.:thumbsup: