Astrofest NGC6188+6164

[Garbz]

One of my Astrofest shots. I've seen plenty of people do NGC6164 recently but itching to use my ED80 I opted for a wider target. NGC6188 with NGC6164 visible in the bottom.

I captured 10 hours worth of data but ended up with a high rejection due to focus issues. I think the end result is closer to 8 hours.

Unfortunately I am again battling with a hugely dense star field. I'm really struggling to process these milky way shots. It's much easier from a light polluted sky where you don't need to deal with so many stars in the way of a good shot.

That and I need a narrowband camera. ;)

/EDIT: Ok I redid this last night. Threw away another few hours of data in favour of an even sharper image and dramatically rethought my processing. Localised histograms stretches instead of playing with curves, and generally trying not to clobber the entire bloody nebula. I'm happy now. New image on the right.

Another Edit: I just realised how much this forum clobbers image quality. This one is actually sharp enough to warrant posting a larger version:

Larger version - 1.9MB (http://www.garbz.com/dump/NGC6188.jpg)

[cometcatcher]

Nice image Chris. Which camera for this shot?

[Camelopardalis]

Beautiful all the same Chris, despite the "dark sky problem" :thumbsup:

[Garbz]

Thanks guys, Kevin it's a QHY10 one shot colour camera. Exposures varied between 5 and 10 min.

[Garbz]

Reprocessed. It looks much better now!

Even got a tiny bit of the bubble.

[Rex]

Very nice Chris. The repro has a real 3D look to it, and beautiful colours.

[RickS]

That's a great improvement, Chris.

[Garbz]

Thanks guys, yeah there appears to be much more depth to it. I put it down to more sensible stretching of the image and a local histogram stretch.

Also you can only just make out 2 lobes of the bubble around NGC6164/5 now, so I'm a happy camper :D

[Camelopardalis]

Wow Chris, you had me at repro ;) :lol: