Rosette mosaic, panel 1

[DJScotty]

Hi everyone.
Been slowly plugging away at this and hope to have it finished this year!!!! :rofl:

30 minute subs through 10" newt. Ha and OIII, about 5 hours in total...

Any feedback welcome

Full version here
http://www.astrobin.com/221039/

Thanks for looking

DJ Scotty :D

[rustigsmed]

Hi Scotty,

nice start, project should be great when completed.
looks to be some registration issue aligning the channels or something.
how did you combine this in terms of the Ha and Oiii?

Cheers

Russ

[alistairsam]

hi Scott,

looks like you need a coma corrector. Do you use one, if so you might need to check the spacing.
Which camera are you using?
It is a good project and should look good when finished. Keep at it.

Cheers
Alistair

[Placidus]

Going to be a ripper! To my eye, very pleasing colour and contrast.

I'm wondering if it would be worth re-doing the registration step. There seems to have been a change in image scale between different filters (perhaps because of temperature), and perhaps the program you are using doesn't allow for that. The underlying data are much sharper than the finished image.

[DJScotty]

Hi everyone. Thanks for the kind words and encouragement.
I use pscs6 to align and process. It was a very quick and careless process just to see what it would look like. Despite slawomir repeated attempts i have not been converted to the pi cult yet.
Will definitely be taking more care when final processing is being carried out.
Yes I do use the baader mpcc 3. Have tried multiple times to get the spacing right but to no avail. This is about the best i can get. I use the atik11000 camera. Massive sensor makes it a little more tricky.
But these are all excuses.
Once again thanks for your feedback
Djscotty :D

[Slawomir]

Hi Scott,

Colours are wonderful, and I really look forward to seeing the entire mosaic when completed.

Let me know if you would like me to try to do some PI magic on your data- could possibly use drop box?

S.

[DJScotty]

You are most welcome to do that. I would love to see the power of the dark side in the hands of a sith lord... I mean expert practitioner. Once I have the data all assembled I will gladly transfer to you :D

Thanks Slawomir

DJ Scotty :D

[Paul Haese]

I would recommend CCDstack2 for calibration, stacking and assembly of your data Scott. The potential of the image is high. You column defects could also be removed using dedicated stacking programmes too.

I like the colour and contrast too.

[DJScotty]

Thanks Paul for the advice. I will certainly investigate CCD Stack.
In regards to the stacking and calibration, I use Deep Sky Stacker for that, stretch the image in FITS Liberator, save as a TIFF and then rely upon Photoshop to align the layers automatically, which is a bit hit and miss.

What benefits does CCD stack 2 have over DSS? Obviously if it is a suggestion from yourself, it is a decent program, but I do not have funds to purchase additional software, unless I want a divorce, and then I will have no observatory!

Any advice or comments would be welcomed in this regard...

Once again thanks Paul :thumbsup:

[Slawomir]

No worries Scott and whenever you are ready.

P.S. Just to clarify, my lightsaber is blue ;-)

[Paul Haese]

I have never used DSS before so I cannot comment on its abilities. CCDstack though will stack your images properly and allow you to do calibration and combining data. Your mis-registration issue should be resolved. It can scale and align with high precision. It has powerful tools for a variety of alignment processes. It can also undertake pixel math, deconvolution and a variety of other tasks.

[DJScotty]

Hi everyone.

I have figured out what the issue is with the alignment of stars.
In between shooting the OIII and Ha data, I disassembled the imaging train after a little mishap in the observatory (part of the roof falling on the camera and knocking the focuser out of whack!) as a result, after reassembling, the focal plane was different (slightly tilted differently, resulting in slightly different picture "shape").

So, until I can afford the cash to get CCD stack, which by the way I tried and it doesn't look too bad, I will have to reshoot the OIII data (only 1.5 hours) and hope like buggery I don't have to pull the scope apart AGAIN!.

Anyway, off to collect more photons! :D

[RickS]

Looks like a very promising start, Scotty!

[strongmanmike]

Sounds like you are aware and on top of the obvious issues, everything else is looking very promising for a cool mosaic Scott, bring it on :thumbsup:

Mike

[DJScotty]

Thanks Mike and Rick! :thumbsup:

[alpal]

Hi Scotty,
Looking good but not aligned.



rely upon Photoshop to align the layers automatically?

No - you have to make .reg files in DSS to align the LRGB frames
or in your case the Ha and OIII frames.

One method in DSS: ( there is a another method too )
When you have your 2 stacked separate results from Ha and OIII - save them.
Now - you stack those 2 together again in DSS -
not to use as a stack but to align them.

Under stacking - intermediate files -
tick the box for "create a registered/calibrated file for each light frame. "
You'll then get an aligned version of each frame to use in Photoshop
with a .reg extension name.
It will appear in the same folder from where you took the other 2 files.

I really like DSS & I don't see any reason to buy a program unless
I was trying to stack frames using different image scales.

cheers
Allan

[DJScotty]

Thanks Al for the advice. Giving it a crack as I type... Will show you the results soon...

:thumbsup:

[DJScotty]

Al you are a genius!!!! It worked a treat. Perfectly aligned. Just working on the colour now :D