Gabriela Mistral Nebula NGC 3324

[alpal]

I wish I could have got more data but the clouds rolled in at 1.30am.


2 hours total integration time.
3 x 10 minute Ha blended as Luminance 50% binned 1x1.
9 x 5 minute Luminance blended 50% binned 1x1.
3 x 5 minutes each of RGB binned 2x2.
Taken 28th Feb 2014.
FWHM of Ha = 2.2 arc seconds -
excellent seeing for Melbourne.

Location - outer suburb of Melbourne.
8" f6 Newt, NEQ6 modified mount, QHY9 mono camera.
Astronomik 2" CLS-CCD filter in front of all 2" filters.
PHD guiding with Lodestar & TS9 OAG, Baader RCC coma corrector,
DSS, FITS Liberator, PS CS5 Ftswork4.

Larger version on flickr - 1,920px × 1,453px, 2.1 MByte.
see here & please wait a few minutes for it to load:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24719437@N03/12867478303/sizes/o/in/photostream/

All comments welcome.

Edit - picture changed to a version with more blue

[strongmanmike]

Some really nice detail there Al which would be come even better without clouds:thumbsup:...colour?..Hmm? :confuse3:...could probably give them a tweek :D

Mike

[alpal]

Thanks Mike,
A tweak which way Mike ?

more red. more green, more blue?

[strongmanmike]

Blue...?

[alpal]

Yes Mike - extra blue does even up the background -
is this better?

[strongmanmike]

Yeah, better but perhaps still a bit orangey..?

[alpal]

I dunno either Mike.
You've got me going blind looking at at. :)

cheers
Allan

[strongmanmike]

Meah..don't worry about it, it looks great as a NB image :thumbsup:...just a bit wacko for an LHaRGB :P.

Mike

[alpal]

Yes Mike,
I think the narrow band images are more appealing -
they certainly seem to have more detail however - I'm
lucky to get a few hours of data some nights & narrow band often
takes 20 hours of data.

If you look at the ESO site their image has an orange colour -
it's just the way it comes out when you balance the RGB humps.
I am actually quite pleased with the result especially after my Seagull Nebula
which was far too noisy.
This has scrubbed up OK for 2 hours & could be added to except I'm greedy
& would like the Running Chicken next.
You've gotta go for the Eta Carinae jewels while they're there.

see here:
http://www.eso.org/public/images/eso1207a/

cheers
Allan

[tilbrook@rbe.ne]

Nice work Allan!:thumbsup:

I do like the nice tight stars you get with narrow ban imaging. Good result for two hours.

Cheers,

Justin.

[Ross G]

A very good photo Allan.

Nice detail.

Ross.

[nandopg]

Alan,
Great image, capture, framing and processing for a beautiful object. You gave it the due justice.

Congratulations for the result,

Fernando

[gregbradley]

Nice work Allan. If you have an O111 filter it would be good to balance out the colour otherwise the Ha red dominates. Did you add a 10% layer of Ha as blue?

Ha also contains H Beta which is bluish so to balance the colour you should add another layer of Ha and set it to the blue channel (delete the red and green channel) and opacity to suit and that is usually around 10-20%.

Greg.

[atalas]

Nice shot Al.

[Shiraz]

nice result Allan - tidy stars and the colour rendition enhances the main region well.

[alpal]

Thanks for the nice comments guys.
Yes - there are nice tight stars - an FWHM of 2.2 arc seconds on Ha really helped.
That is the best I ever measured in Melbourne

Greg has a good idea with adding blue.
I may revisit the processing - I always re-process every image eventually.

The Ha was combined as 50% luminance so it affects all RGB channels.
I find the FWHM of Ha is always better than any of LRGB & adds real punch to any nebula picture.
The 50% of real luminance combined helps to decrease the noise of Ha narrow band -
filling in the gaps between the noise "dots"
I found most of the RGB signal was in the red channel so that is why
the overall result has an orange colour.
The result of increasing the blue was shown in a pic below.
It is perhaps better but I'm still deciding.
I looked around the internet & some people have a lot of blue
yet the ESO link I gave shows their effort has an orange colour as
well as many other pics that I found.
Looks like I need an O3 & an S2 filter too for all narrow band .

cheers
Allan

[alpal]

Ok - I've decided that it does need more blue.
I combined the RGB channels & then stretched them -
not the other way around.
When I added Luminance & Ha it did come out more blue.
In fact the bright part of NGC 3324 did have quite a lot of blue in it.

I attach a revised version.
I have also changed the large size on flickr.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24719437@N03/12867478303/sizes/o/in/photostream/

[RickS]

Nice image, Allan! I'm never quite sure about the colour of mine so I make no comment on that ;)

[strongmanmike]

Well there you go...what would I know anyway :lol: wonder what filters were used for that ESO shot though..?

As I said, it doesn't really matter, I'm just thinking for the RGB look it needs to be more blue/megenta :question: but it's a good image regardless...and yes, too little time too many objects to hammer with a fast Newt and killer camera ;) :thumbsup:

Mike

[alpal]

Thanks Rick.
I am happy with this at only 2 hours of data.

[alpal]

Mike -
it's been changed to more blue - I even deleted the first version from flickr.
You were right.
Will you ever forgive me? :)

I see you've imaged it too:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/strongman/8489331124/

Nice job.
Cheers
Allan

[strongmanmike]

He he...yes I did (http://www.flickr.com/photos/strongman/8533784536/in/photostream/)

See? lots of options :thumbsup:

[alpal]

Hi Mike,
wow - both are high impact images.
You've gone a lot deeper than my puny 2 hours of data.
Do you think the colours are bit strong in your RGB version?
I prefer more pastel colours but it's of course subjective.
I would love to see the full sizes of both images to see
this area that Hubble zoomed in on:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:NGC_3324_Hubble.jpg

cheers
Allan

[marco]

Nice One Allan, have you tried to give it a passage with HLVG to remove the green in some highlighted area?
http://www.deepskycolors.com/archivo/2010/04/26/hasta-La-Vista-Green.html
Of course if you are using PI you can use SCNR..


Regards
Marco

[alpal]

Thanks Marco - I heard about that plug-in.
I tried it & I have attached the result.
It seems very effective.
The problem is the bright star has bloomed on either a filter or the coma corrector.

I also had a play around with just the nebula itself,
rotating & cropping it out -
making Ha 100% luminance & boosting the blue in LAB colour
to see what kind of details would be there - having no respect for colour
& the using HDR toning & selective colour.
The image is too noisy to attempt that but I attached it anyway.

cheers
Allan

[Bassnut]

Tight sharp and detailed Alan, excellent work :thumbsup:

[alpal]

Thanks Fred,
it's something I can always add data to another time for less noise.

cheers
Allan

[strongmanmike]

Here ya go (http://www.pbase.com/strongmanmike2002/image/154789844/original) Allan - from my latest image :D

Mike

[alpal]

That's a great comparison Mike.
Thanks for showing us all.


cheers
Allan