Tarantula Nebula NGC 2070 _TRY MY DATA

[alpal]

I got about 4 hours of data last night on the Tarantula Nebula.
That's the first time I've been able to take a picture since March.

I mixed Ha in with Red at 50% & also as 33% Luminance.
Ordinary Luminance was also 33%.
It came out with some wild colours.
The colours were binned 2x2 & the Ha & Luminance were binned 1x1.

A larger version is on flickr at size 1920 x 1486 pixels here:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/24719437@N03/15822606270/in/photostream/

Any comments welcome.
I may re-process this.

cheers
Allan

Edit - links to data supplied on this thread.

[alpal]

The Ha picture is interesting in itself.
It was 6 x 10 minute frames binned 1x1.
There is more detail in the Ha than in the other channels.

[Geoff45]

Very nice Allan. I think the colours are about right--not wild at all. There is quite a lot of OIII in 2070, hence the green and, of course, Ha, giving the reds.
Geoff

[atalas]

Very attractive work Al with good detail.

[strongmanmike]

Yay Al! :2thumbs:

Good to be back at the helm I bet? :thumbsup:

Super field to image that and I'm liking the colours on this one :)

Mike

[Harel_Boren]

Hi Allan,

A lovely image, as I noted in CN just a few min. ago. It was worth waiting since March for a wonderful result like this!

As you can see in the image I just posted, color turned out somewhat different upon a pure LRGB combo. We are blessed: not only we have an infinite number of objects out there, but also there's an infinite number of ways to process them and enjoy :)

Cheers,
Harel

[tilbrook@rbe.ne]

Wow!:eyepop:

Wild indeed, nice work Allan!:thumbsup:

Cheers,

Justin.

[alpal]

Thanks Geoff,
I actually knocked the Green back a little bit but to me it still looks wild.:)
If you want colors see Mikes pic in narrow band:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/strongman/14284907446/




Thanks Louie,
It came out not too bad considering most of the sub frames gave about 4 arc seconds FWHM.
Some of the color frames were giving closer to 3 arc seconds.
I wish that I'd put the time spent on 1x1 Luminance into RGB as that
hour of 5 minute subs did little for the final picture.
There were 40 x 3 minute subs of RGB binned 2x2:
16 x Red
12 x Green
12 x Blue
The detail was in the 1 hour of Ha - 6 x 10 minute subs binned 1x1.
I should have done 3 x 20 minutes of Ha but I didn't want to risk it with the wind.
Actually - that all adds up to 4 hours not 5 as I said!




Thanks Mike,
Yes it was good to finally take a pic.
I am on my holidays now & at last got a clear Friday night.
I still don't know about those colours.
I bet a re-process would give me different ones again. :)
As for the field - I could go in any direction there to add a frame to a mosaic - it's rich with targets.




Thanks Harel,
It was well worth the wait although I would have preferred your dark skies & low FWHM seeing.
It would be interesting to see if you later added some Ha to your pic.
It seems to drastically alter the colours.


cheers
Allan

[alpal]

Thanks Justin.
It is wild - The Tarantula has the wildest colors of any target that I know of.

cheers
Allan

[gregbradley]

Very nice Allan. I like the colours also. Very sharp.

Greg.

[Stevec35]

Very nice Allan. I like everything about it including the colour.

Cheers

Steve

[alpal]

Thanks Greg,
I did a bit of a crop of the best part & a slight re-process.
A larger version is on flickr.



Thanks Steve.
I think it's a bit of an original.
I pushed the colours really hard in LAB mode.
A noise reduction mask stopped it getting too much colour noise.
In this new re-processed cropped version I didn't reduce the Green.
As Geoff was saying there is Green there because of O3.
I hope you like it?


cheers
Allan

[RickS]

It's an interesting interpretation, Allan, but I think the colours are quite pleasing.

Cheers,
Rick.

[rustigsmed]

nice work allan, I have been waiting for you to post a new pic, got to love this Melbourne weather ...

I like the original, you've managed to keep the dynamic range in check. wouldn't mind seeing the 'greener' version for a comparo. there is so much OIII in there, many dslrs struggle to show any red.

cheers

rusty

[alpal]

Thanks Rick,
I like the repro for all those colors of the rainbow.
Maybe pushed a bit hard on the colour but that's what I wanted.

cheers
Allan





Thanks Rusty,
I might re-do it again one day.
I'd prefer better data at the occasional 2 arc second seeing that we get in Melbourne
rather than the 3.3 to 4.5 arc second that I got.
It was windy on the night & I had to restart many sub-frames when
wind gusts hit the scope & the guide graph went off the scale.
I probably lost an hour of data from the wind.

As for DSLRs - you're right -
I have some old pics with a DSLR on my flickr photos
& they are no where near as good because the DSLR just can't get the Ha wavelength for reds.
Putting 50% of Ha into the Red channel boosted the red detail & power.

The QHY9 camera is great - I had it at -30 degrees Celsius
& I applied all darks, flats & bias frames that I made fresh the next day.
I also used an Astronomic CLS CCD filter in front of all filters.

cheers
Allan

[SimmoW]

I love the reprocess as well as the original, quite evil looking now

[alpal]

Thanks Simmo,
I re-processed it from scratch with more pastel colours.
A larger version is on flickr 1920 x 1359 is here:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/24719437@N03/15416464033/in/photostream

I wonder if that is better?
It's more conventional.

cheers
Allan

[strongmanmike]

Naah prefer the original Al, the punchier colours worked well :thumbsup:

Mike

[alpal]

I dunno Mike,
I thought I'd over done the original.
It was done quickly - but there are infinite variations.
The latest one can stand more magnification.

cheers
Allan

[Slawomir]

Very nice photo Allan, overall I think I prefer bold colours of the original version :-)

[alpal]

OK - it looks like another re-process will be necessary. :)

Maybe I should post the data & let others have a go?


cheers
Allan

[Slawomir]

Although comments and criticism allow to see own images from different angles, the final revision will be the one you like the most :-)

[alpal]

Sure - but I don't mind letting others have a go -
these Xmas holidays could be boring for amateur astronomers due to clouds
& they may like to have a go at some processing.

Notice Harel's post below - there is no way I ended up with those colours
even when I didn't mix the Ha with Red or Luminance.

I could post .reg pre-aligned stacks in tiff format ready to go.

What would be a good place to post them?
I don't like drop box as you end up with a program permanently running in your task bar.

cheers
Allan

[alpal]

Hi Everyone,
For those who are bored over Xmas -
I found Google Drive.
These stacks were saved as FITS then stretched in NASA FITS Liberator using x^(1/5).
They were then saved as TIFFS & registered & aligned in Deep Sky Stacker so they are ready to process.
Copyright - you can process them & post the result anywhere e.g
on Astrobin or flickr but give a link to my flickr photos saying that it's my data.
Have fun & I would love to see what the experts can do?

Here you are:


RED
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2VJKGAcwQ0ZQVZiMi1NTVcyRUk/view?usp=sharing


GREEN
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2VJKGAcwQ0ZVm5hSTdHY3JtNVk/view?usp=sharing

BLUE
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2VJKGAcwQ0ZMGRSMFY4UDU0bzQ/view?usp=sharing


LUMINANCE
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2VJKGAcwQ0ZcW8tYkhwQzIzY3c/view?usp=sharing

Ha
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2VJKGAcwQ0ZcEN4RzBOWnpHMjA/view?usp=sharing


cheers
Allan

[rustigsmed]

will have a crack when I get a chance Al, who knows it may sway me to go mono. I prefer the original by the way simply as it shows more colour contrast [more colours].

[alpal]

So that anyone with Photoshop can download my 5 files & have a go

I'll describe the whole procedure to at least get people in the starting line:

This method is quite good because it will almost automatically assign the grayscale images to RGB.


Open the 3 files :stack of red , stack of green , stack of blue.
Click on the red file.
Click on channels in the layers window.
Click on the right hand side down arrow button.
Click merge channels.
Change mode to RGB inside the little box that pops up.
Click OK
For Red select: stack of red
For Green select: stack of green
For Blue select: stack of blue
Click OK

Go back to layers inside the layers box.

Open the luminance file.

Go Ctrl A, Ctrl C to copy it.
Click on layers of the RGB file above & go Ctrl V to paste it as a new layer
on top of the RGB. ( Rename it Luminosity if you want to )
Set the blend mode to luminosity.


Now - open the Ha file called stack of Ha.
Go Ctrl A Ctrl C &
click on the now RGB L image & go Ctrl V to paste it as a new layer.
( Rename the layer Ha if you want to )
Set the blend mode to luminosity.


You should now have 3 layers in your layers window:
Ha, luminosity & RGB (if you have called them that )
now change the opacity of the Ha & Luminosity layers to taste.

( Note: If you want you can combine 50% of the Red & Ha together before starting the process.)

I hope that helps people to get started?
It's quite easy really & good practice for those wishing to upgrade to a mono camera.


cheers
Allan

[alpal]

Hi Slawomir,
OK - I'll try to re-create my original - but better.

I hope you do have a go & just in case you or others may
not have processed mono before I have included some easy instructions below.

cheers
Allan

[alpal]

I had a go at re-processing the L Ha RGB but
didn't really come up with a better one than the first.
Anyway I decided to see what a version would turn out like using only Ha as Luminance.
A larger version is on flickr 1920 x 1481 here:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/24719437@N03/15860762828/in/photostream

[Leonardo70]

Very Nice.

All the best,
Leo

[rustigsmed]

hi Al,

haven't had a go at mono data before (except b&w only).
here's my attempt https://www.flickr.com/photos/80336656@N07/15862738579/in/photostream/lightbox/
i didn't spend a lot of time on it but it wasn't as time consuming as i thought it would have been (for the steps i haven't done before). All done in PS.

Still liking your original version. :thumbsup:

Cheers

Rusty

ps i edit at home on my tv screen then usually check the brightness / balance at work as the tv usually makes it appear brighter than it is - so it may be a tad dark.

[alpal]

Hi Rusty,
That's amazing for your first go at mono.
It's not too dark.
I got rid of the bleed line from the top left hand corner star with
the spot healing brush.
Can you do noise reduction masks?
see here:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJ5b6pFHBGe66vsuSaXb-0A


cheers
Allan

[alpal]

Thanks Leo.

[rustigsmed]

cheers Al :thumbsup:
it was made easier seeing what you had done with the same data. it would have been much less vibrant if i hadn't referred to yours.

thanks for the link, i had seen that before but i was probably in my photoshop infancy and it was forgotton, i would usually do colour select or something but the inverted background looks waay quicker. so actually - that channel has a few things I should start doing!

cheers,

Rusty

[alpal]

Hi Rusty,
You did well.
I think I have finally come up with something I can live with.
I took my re-processed Ha LRGB pic & combined it with 50% of my last Ha RGB pic to get this:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/24719437@N03/15429377843/

It adds a little touch of blue & takes some of the noise out of the background.

A smaller version here: