M83 The Southern Pinwheel (continued)

[Stefan12]

M83 The Southern Pinwheel (continued)
HaLRGB

Since I first started imaging this galaxy in February, I never thought it would take this long to collect a decent amount of data on this galaxy.
Saying the weather has been crap is an understatement- with nothing but cloud every single night! ...
Finally, the skies cleared and gave me a change to collect what will probably be the final time I image this galaxy this year. We've had a terrible run of weather in recent time with no rain, but a lot of cloud!
Having bad weather was really the start of my problems. Processing the Galaxy proved to be a bloody challenge and i must of processed it at least 5 times before I was some-what happy with the results.
My final tweak was the overall colour that I felt was too red. So so... the whole process was a good test for the Ritchey-Chretien Astrograph telescope and for me and my processing skills.
Its a great feeling finally be putting the RC10 Astrograph to work on some galaxies.

Link: https://www.dropbox.com/s/s4koyk1u6ig1yre/M83%20Cyan%20final.jpg?dl=0

Telescope used: GSO RC 10
Native Focal length: 2000mm w/ Astrophysics 0.67x focal reducer. Focal Length reduced to 1340mm.
Camera: QSI 683 WSG w/ Lodestar for OAG (off axis guiding) Maxim DL used was used for auto-guiding.
Camera Temperature: -20 degrees
Camera filters & exposure time:
1.25" Baader HaLRGB
Mount: Losmandy G-11 w/ Gemini 2, Losmandy G-11 fitted with Ovision worm.

[alpal]

Nice data Stefan,
That's certainly better data than I ever took.
I looked at the full Dropbox size.

Improvements?
I would have processed it a little more carefully as the stars
are a bit over cooked & ragged.
A pass with Fitswork4 to make stars smaller then blended back at 50% in Photoshop
would have made them better + of course a mask on the original stretching -
then you might have got a bit more colour out of them.
Maybe you sharpened the stars?
I also would have done a blurred mask on the galaxy to get a little more contrast using curves.

cheers
Allan

[Atmos]

Galaxy looks good with a few faint fussies in the background :)

[Flugel88]

I think you have done a great job on the colour for M83 well balanced and not over saturated.
how much exposure did you manage to get into this?
Great to see your RC 10 performing well
Well done :)

[willik]

That is a very nice image good colours

[rustigsmed]

very nice work Stefan, the Ha definitely adds some punch to M83 but you have managed to keep it still quite natural looking.

cheers

russ

[strongmanmike]

A nice M83 that Stefan, overall looks good and the HII regions stand out well :thumbsup:

BTW how do you rate your G11/GemII with Ovison worm?

Mike

[Stefan12]

Thank you for the feedback. I find processesing the most difficult part of astrophotography, especially galaxies. I can never find quite the right colour balance that I am happy with, but this would have to be my best effort so far. I'm unhappy with the look of my stars, so they definitely need working on.
The image is 5hrs of Luminance Luminance, I'm not sure on the RGB data, I never actually counted up how many subs I used. There's 40mins of Ha @ 15 minutes exposure time.
I'm pretty happy with the ovision worm. I've never measured the period error of my G-11, but the stars seem to appear pretty good even with 15 to 20 minute exposures @ 1340mm focal length.
I haven't tried the RC10 out at its native focal length of 2000m. Unfortunately New Zealand is not the best location for good atmospheric seeing.

Again thank you all for your feedback.
Constructive criticism always welcome. I'm here to learn :)

Stefan

[RickS]

Colour looks good, as others have mentioned. Stars and galaxy core are a bit overcooked but still a decent start.

Cheers,
Rick.

[Ross G]

Great looking galaxy photo Stefan.

Ross.

[yusbot]

wow great picture!
can you tell me how did you put Ha layer on photoshop to the LRGB image?
Or you just stacked it with one of the RGB layer?

Regards,
Yusfi