Eta Carina in NB colour 38hrs

[Bassnut]

Hi Guys

Eta Carina nebula NGC3372 in colour mapped Narrowband (http://fredsastro.smugmug.com/Photography/Astrophotography-1/i-H7q7GPB/A) (click for big)
Taken on an RCOS 10" RC Scope at f9, SBIG STXL6303E Camera and PME mount at itelescopes Siding Spring Observatory.
Processed with CCDstack, Star Tools and Photoshop. 38 hrs total.
71 off 3nm Ha subs 20min each bin1. 28 off OIII 3nm subs 20min each bin2. 19 subs SII 3nm subs each bin 2.

Ive added a few hrs to the Ha previously posted and curved the middle bit for more , less blown detail.

The colour is a bit boosted. Its interesting to see how OII and SII is distributed.

Cheers
Fred

[DavidU]

Very sharp Fred, beautiful work.

[gregbradley]

You know you've done an exceptional image when it looks 3D as that requires depth and high SNR to do that. Great solidity and density of colour Fred. Its becoming your trademark.

A rarely seen 3D effect on Eta Carina. There is obviously layers of material that are different distances from us.

Greg.

[SkyViking]

Wonderful colours and very nice resolution. The scene looks like a painting, amazing processing. The Mystic Mountain (http://hubblesite.org/gallery/wallpaper/pr2010013a/) is very prominent, that's not often seen so clearly. Great work!

Out of interest, given this nebula is very bright did you need a full 38 hours to get this level of detail? Just asking as I'm not a narrowband expert :)

[alpal]

Fantastic image - beautifully processed.

[h0ughy]

wow now thats something you done see very day! wonderful

[multiweb]

Love the colours but it looks a little plastic(ish) to me. Maybe a little heavy on sharpening or other. You've got the aperture and the seeing. I reckon there's a lot more fine details in that data.

[cosmophoton]

Wonderful image!

[Bassnut]

Thanks for looking Guys.

Rolf. No, those hrs are not always required, I do it because I can, and my tube is only 10" f9. Also, the hrs allow more stretching/sharpening etc without noise being a bother at all, thats a nice luxury !. With a 12" and say f3.5 , 5-7 nm Ha filter and more noise processing, you would get the same effect with a quarter of the exposure time (or less).

Marc. OK, sharpening is borderline, but OK I recon, perhaps I should have isolated the stars, they look a bit hard (and plastic perhaps). That plastic effect creeps in too with colour boosted and sharpness, not sure what to do about that.

[strongmanmike]

He he good on ya Fred, luxury :thumbsup:

Seriously though I'm not sure the value of the mega data is as noticeable on this one but it is a typical colourful (slightly garish :question:) artistic Vanderhaven effort that we all expect when we see a post of yours :)

Another mega well done job :thumbsup:

Mike

[Shiraz]

that is a really impressive image - very detailed and smooth

[Camelopardalis]

Speechless...just beautiful.

[RickS]

Love it, Fred! Definitely worth all those hours even if you weren't sitting at the scope :)

[Regulus]

Wow. That has some depth and detail in it!
Very Nice.
Trevor

[atalas]

Fred,I love the sense of depth you have achieved here!strong color but the data can handle It no probs....quite excellent.

[Bassnut]

Thanks Guys. I think I have taken more hours than required on this bright object, thats true. The blue is a bit saturated. I use Ha only as lum as a point of difference to other examples (artistic license, nothing scientific), so Im guessing some areas of OIII have little Ha, so the OIII brightness is subdued by the Ha lum layer.

[WingnutR32]

That 3D view is just phenomenal! I will never look at Eta Carina the same way again. Thank you.