Orion

[johnnyt123]

HI...

This is my latest attempt at orion...

It is a composite of HaL HaR G B

My processing stills are not good enough to have fix the ugly colour i am ending up with...
Can any one help me with bringing out the proper colours of this magnificent nebula.....

Thanks

John

[raymo]

I can't help you, but looking good.
raymo

[Nikolas]

Many minutes later on photoshop, lots of layers adjustments and colour tweaks this is the best I could do.

[raymo]

How long were the subs John?
raymo

[cometcatcher]

Great shot. That's very deep!

[johnnyt123]

Nik that looks pretty cool. how did you get that result??
How did you do that?
I could sent you the raw tifs if you like of the HA, R, G and B channels and see what you could do with those...

[johnnyt123]

Raymo the subs are as follows:

Ha 5 hrs 1200sec subs + 1 hr or 60sec subs for the core
and 1200sec subs for a total of around 1.5 hrs for each R, G and B

i just always seem to end up with ridiculous colours.....

[PeterEde]

Looks great
Need filters :(

[Rex]

Hi Johnny,
Mate you can adjust the colour balance very easy in any of the commonly used processing programs. I have attached a very quick adjustment with screen shots of what I did. I use Pixinsight but yo can use photoshop or any of the others with the same result. This took literally 2 minutes to do.

The first histogram shows all three channels of your original image. See how the red channel is further to the right hand side compared to the other two? this is what you need to fix to colour balance your image.

The second image shows what the red channel looked like before adjustment.

The third image shows the adjustment i made to the red channel. To bring it to the left compared to the other two channels you simply slide the middle slider to the right which makes the line across the middle dip.

The fourth image shows the RGB histogram after adjustment to the red channel. See how they are closer to peaking at the same point. It doesn't matter that they are different shapes as long as they peak in generally the same position.

Finally I have attached what my adjustment did to your image. I know it's not perfect and there are other thing you could do, but that has improved teh colour balance while still allowing the natural colours to be shown.

After making the histogram adjustment there was a touch of green across the image. It is as simple as running the free HLVG plug in in photoshop to remove the green cast. I have attached the image after HLVG as well.

Hope that helps. I always find it more helpful to post screen shots etc to show you what was done to your image. I believe that way you can then apply the changes to your raw data and learn as you go.

By the way, your image is very good and quite a lot of detail in there. Processing is a huge learning curve that I believe you never reach the top of. Keep the images coming and keep asking questions, generally someone will be able to help you out.

[SimmoW]

Really nice data, and helpful suggestions guys.

[johnnyt123]

Rex

i want to thank you very much for your great input.
That was very very helpful and i realised what my mistake was.
I never used curves to balance colour before while watching the histogram, but thanks to your guide i will keep an eye on it now...

Do you suggest balancing colour after flattening L+RGB layers or before?
does it make a difference?

What other plugins can anyone recommend for photoshop CS6 for astro-image processing?

thanks

John

[raymo]

My feelings on this image will possibly draw howls of protest, but I think
that whilst too overwhelmingly red, John's original version is nearer to the
usually seen images of this beautiful nebula than the later, altered versions. They introduce odd colours, and change the contours of the
nebulosity. To me they look much more like works of art than photographs. For me, this is the one downside of digital imaging.
Imagers often seem to introduce, or intensify, or mute, colours to
get a result that they find aesthetically pleasing. Whether those colours
and contours bear any resemblance to some kind of reality seems to be irrelevant.
I'll probably get charged with digital heresy, and banned from the forum,
but it is just my opinion.
raymo

[MrB]

Nice deep image John, almost has a 3D look to it.


Nice way to sugarcoat an insult directed at those that only answered a call for help from the OP.

[doppler]

I don't think that was meant to be an insult but it does raise the old question of what we are using as the bench mark for the true colours of nebula etc. The sensors of a unmodded camera are set to what the human eye sees as normal colour, so it would be reasonable to asume that an original raw image would represent the true colours and we manipulate these to bring out more detail (for scientific research), but for most of us it is just to make a better looking image.

A really great image though, love the fine nebulous detail.

And great processing tips Rex, thanks

Rick

[graham.hobart]

Hey John, there are 50 thousand ways to process the dreaded M42. I thought both yours and the re -do each had different appeal.
There are ways to try and keep the light natural, but if you think about it the natural light to the retina would be a grey blob with no real impact to share.
We are a community here that thrives and survives on constructive criticism.
Sometimes we can and need to be prodded. But I actually agree with the other poster about criticism here, especially for M42, beauty is in the eye of the beholder and you can do with it what you like.
The interpretation of this one is especially difficult. So bravo for posting and cheers Rex for the post also:lol:

[raymo]

Please, please, MrB, I wasn't trying to insult anyone, not Nik, and certainly not Rex, who has been a great encourager of my efforts over the months. I was commenting on the entire digital scene worldwide. After nearly fifty years of film imaging, I find some of these images almost surreal. If, as Graham says, there are 50 thousand ways of processing
M42, to me it ceases to be traditional photography, and simply becomes
art, and there is nothing wrong with that, just call it astro photoart or
something. I am not including false colour images of course, which have
their scientific purposes. Once again, absolutely no insult was intended,
although in hindsight I suppose it was inevitable that some people
would see it as such.
raymo

[johnnyt123]

There was absolutely no insult taken.

I don't happen to disagree with any comments made here so far. Given the same raw data, no 2 people can ever end up with the same processed image. Some will stretch a little more while others will saturate a little more....
Beauty is indeed in the eye of the beholder. But I can't help find each of the processed versions of Orion in this thread appealing in its own way...

My aim I guess is to try to bring out as much detail as possible while trying to truly bring out the true colours of nebulae....but that is impossible from the get-go as Ha is partially mapped to red.....:P so false colour is already introduced from the very beginning.....

I really appreciate everyone's input on this.....my images are looking better already....

Just want to know if anyone recommends any other plugins for photoshop.....

Thanks

John...

[Rex]

Hey Johm no problems mate, glad you found my info useful. That's why I love this forum, when your stuck and need help someone most times is able to help you out. As for when to colour balance I'm not sure but I don't think it really matters whether it's before or after you combine the channels. To be honest I keep an eye on the histogram and adjust the colour balance several times during my processing. Not sure if that's the right thing to be doing but it seems to work for me.



Hi Raymo, I know what your saying here and to be quite honest I am a little confused. You see, I have always been taught to balance the histogram to get the correct colour, so other than that how do you know what is the correct colour. You can't just go by other images on the internet because there are so many different ways of processing and at the end of the day it is personal choice, so who's personal choice is correct? That's why I just balance the histogram and make sure the background is neutral, (Dark Grey, not have a colour cast), that's what I always thought was the natural colour.



Thanks Simon,it's ok though, I have a thick skin and I didn't take offence to Raymo's comments. In fact I have learnt a lot from his comments, which helps me to improve my processing.



Your welcome Rick, glad you found them useful.



Once again some good points in there Graham, thanks for the
encouragement.



Hi Raymo, as stated above mate, it's all good. I wasn't offended and I do think about what your saying in your comments, and use them constructively to help improve my processing.



Very true John, very true. As for other plug ins there are so many mate I couldn't possibly list them here. As stated in my original comment, I use Pixinsight so have kind of lost touch with what is available for photoshop. If you do a google search for free photoshop astrophotography plug ins you will find heaps of them. Some you have to pay for, but are cheap, some are free. There are heaps of photoshop tutorials online as well. Sorry I couldn't be of more help mate. Someone else may know of some good ones.

[Nikolas]

Wasn't offended either and yes it is a visual interpretation. One thing though that digital does do as opposed to Film is that it can reveal better detail. you can see how imaging has improved over the years and how much better it has gotten.
In the Op's case it was more a megenta cast that needed balancing.
Rex explained it better than I could ever do. (I just do it)

[raymo]

I'm relieved that most people don't feel offended; I hope that includes
MrB. Perhaps if everybody balanced the histogram we would find the benchmark mentioned by Rex.
raymo

[Nikolas]

Here's an interesting look at how far astrophotography has come

[raymo]

Now this stunning pic illustrates my position. Fabulous quality, but retains
the traditional colours that professional images showed over the decades.
raymo