IC 4628 NE part. Alvin meets Jar Jar and ET

[Placidus]

Remember Alvin the Chipmunk. Here is what happens if Alvin gets into the matter transporter at the same time as Jar Jar Binks. Heaps fully bad.

See the original 2MB here (http://www.mikeberthonjones.smugmug.com/Category/Star-Forming-Regions/i-x9hN8H9/0/O/IC%204628%20brighter.jpg)

We notice Alvin's happy, mischievous face, rakishly tilted (with two mammalian eyes) toward top left. Superimposed is Jar Jar's, with an additional green, reptilian eye. Alvin is dressed for dinner, his dusty dark dinner-suit silk ruffle running diagonally down toward bottom right, where we can see he is going to have prawns for dinner - the glow at bottom right is part of the Prawn Nebula. (Less disturbed individuals see neither Alvin nor Jar Jar but the head of a cobra).

A complex region: toward 3 o'clock we can also discern the small and distant figure of ET.

A great puzzle is why this particular region, hugely strong in H-alpha (mapped to green), is also quite strong in SII (mapped to red), implying old, dredged-up material, while being weak in OIII (mapped to blue), perhaps implying not so much ionization energy around.

Green Ha 2hrs, Blue OIII 3hrs, Red SII 3hrs. Aspen CG16M on 20" PlaneWave CDK, on MI 750 fork. Field 36'arc, north up.

[Bassnut]

wow, I havent seen that view before. Monster sharpness and excellent colour, most impressive. a slight purple background cast though .

[LewisM]

Your imagination is running wild :) All I saw was a cobra's head :P

[Placidus]

Thanks Fred. Will eyeball the purple.



Hi, Lewis. Trish saw the cobra's head too. Alvin possibly looks more obvious in monochrome H-alpha.

Mike

[jase]

Ever considered doing a mosaic of this area at your FL. Would look very spectacular. Great image. Hubble palette suits this target. I also like the composition. Pleased someone has punched Jar Jar and given him a green eye.

[Placidus]

Fred was right about the purple cast. It was obvious on the histogram. Dunno why we hadn't noticed. Hopefully fixed. It's also a tiny bit brighter now.




Thanks, Jase. A mosaic would indeed be justified. We were actually thinking of doing the next panel down and to the right (the Prawn proper) tonight, but Skippy Sky says after about 10pm it's a night for wine and movies.

[Geoff45]

Very sharp detail Mike and Trish. Pleasing subtle colours as well.

[Andy01]

I'm with Lewis on this one, kinda menacing, like the lurker hanging around in the dark woods. Well seen. Won't attempt to comment technically, but on the aesthetic, it's a nice colour palatte too. Any chance of RGB stars to follow? Maybe it's just me but I just don't get purple stars!
Nice one :)

[Leonardo70]

Great title for a great image ... :lol:

Congrats and all the best,
Leo

[IanP]

Yeah, definitely a cobra's head :lol:

[Paul Haese]

Great detail M&T. I think I would prefer to see a bit more red in the palette, but its dealers choice on NB. Interesting composition.

[gregbradley]

Nice work M & T. I like the colour palette.

Greg.

[cometcatcher]

That's a great closeup Mike!

[Placidus]

Leo, Ian, Paul, Greg, Kevin,

Thanks for useful comments and positive support :)

Cheers!

[RickS]

Looks like a Cobra to me too, M&T :)

Nice detail as always. Colour palette is attractive too. Minor quibbles are the magenta stars and the small red and blue spots and streaks that look like they should have been sigma rejected.

Overall a big :thumbsup:

Cheers,
Rick.

[Placidus]

Thanks, Rick. I think at this point, it is officially a cobra.

With just 2 or 3 one-hour subs per channel, it's hard to do meaningful within-channel statistical rejection of outliers, but we can perhaps do better at finding spots that are hugely brighter in one channel than the other two. Will look at that.

Best,
Mike

[RickS]

Interesting challenge, Mike. Do you need subs that are that long to get sky noise limited? I know that my NB subs aren't but I only have 12" of aperture.

Cheers,
Rick.

[strongmanmike]

Yep Ja Ja lept out at me straight away too :thumbsup: although I can see the Cobra interpretation too :)

Vibrant bold colours with burnt oranges there, nice and I don't mind magenta stars but perhaps they are a bit saturated in this case as they are drawing the eye a tad strongly?...colours aside, the detail and scale that is such a hallmark of your work is still evident and I like the less than common framing too (or are you guys doing a mozaic?)

Mike

[Placidus]

More laziness, use, and custom than science. We've found a recipe that works. And to some degree, we do 1 hr shots just because we can. (We did do the maths at one point and work out that somewhere between half an hour and an hour was good.)



Thanks muchly, Mike. We really need to watch the magenta. We did reduce it by about 50% on the brightest stars - automatically find the stars, calculate the magenta contribution and halve it - but I was a bit sloppy about the star-finding parameters and didn't really check if it had worked properly. Will try a repro, together with trying to control some of those little blue and red spots that Rick noticed.

[strongmanmike]

Of course you did :question: :eyepop: :lol:

On a second look on a monitor at work...I think the magenta is ok in the stars, maybe just toning it down the few bright stars a tad would work (very minor point).

I was thinking about it and you know, hmmm?..I really would like a scope like yours :question: :P

Mike

[Ross G]

Amazing detail!

A great looking photo Mike & Trish.

Ross.

[multiweb]

Corker of a shot! Inspiring. :thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup: