NGC 253, now IOTD in Astrobin

[Geoff45]

It's been a while between drinks, but I finally got some reasonable stuff over the last new moon weekend.

Here is 253, taken over Friday and Saturday.
http://www.astrobin.com/274067/0/?nc=user
with higher res here
http://www.astrobin.com/full/274067/0/

I haven't pushed the saturation very much. This galaxy doesn't need many bells and whistles in its processing. Besides, we need a silvery look to justify its name.

Details:
Telescope: 12.5" Plane Wave CDK
Mount: AP900
Camera: Proline 16803
Exposure: 4h 50m through Astronomik LRGB filter set.
Processing: PixInsight
FOV: 42' x 42' (Slight crop)

I thought it might be interesting to see if progress has been made through the years.
Here is my 2007 version
http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=24978&highlight=253
and here is the 2012 version
http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=97386&highlight=253
I suspect that the 2012 version could be better processed, now that I have become more familiar with PI.
Geoff

[strongmanmike]

...:zzz2:...sorry, sorry....I mean, a very nice 253 Geoff :thumbsup:

Yes the improvements are rather noticeable huh?.. nice to see.

Mike

[RickS]

Showing an excellent trajectory, Geoff! :thumbsup: When do we get the next one? It'll be mindblowing :)

[Slawomir]

Certainly a pleasing result Geoff :thumbsup:

I reckon stars look better too in the recent version :thumbsup:

[gregbradley]

Very nice Geoff. You got the blue outer areas showing very well.

Greg.

[Atmos]

Showing a lot of nice detail Geoff, good to see how you're improving over the years :)

[Geoff45]

Yeah I know. Just another ngc253. Trouble is that I have had rotten luck with the weather at Wiruna, so I decided to do a nice bright object. Good thing I did. I was also imaging 1360 in the second half of the two nights and with the faint object it was pretty apparent that there was a lot to be desired in terms of transparency, particularly in terms of the blue.


Thanks Rick. You probably have more confidence than I do.

Thanks Suavi. Agree about the stars. I used to hate diffraction spikes when I was imaging with a refractor, but I'm starting to like them quite a bit.


Thanks Greg. I always like to see some blue in my galaxy shots--assuming that it is there in the first place.

Thanks Colin. It's often a good idea to look back.

[Shiraz]

Cracking good image Geoff. really like the colour - it should look like a silver dollar and yours does.

[Placidus]

That's excellent Geoff. The details of the galactic fountain are very well shown. Lots and lots of background galaxies showing clear structure. And the blue to warm balance is perfect.

Best,
Mike

[Geoff45]

Thanks Ray and Mike. Yes, I think the colour turned out rather well.
Geoff

[strongmanmike]

He he yeah I was just being my usual comedian self :P, it's a good 253 mate :thumbsup: Always a good fall back if one is desperate to image something...actually...must be about time for me to shoot it again myself, haven't shot it since waaay back in late 2012...maybe a bit late now :question: :)

How's the 1360 lookin? Those Ha jets are a challenge.

Mike

[Geoff45]

Working on it now. I have data from 2013 (5 subs), 2014 (10 subs) and 2016 (26 subs). May have to cull some of the 2016 stuff due to passing clouds.

[Peter Ward]

I like this image ....a lot...and am perplexed as to why it didn't get some more deserving commentary.

Ok there is something weird going on in the dark field around the middle to the right edge of the frame, but the you have nailed the colour IMHO. Plus there is delightful fine structure revealed within the galaxy itself.

This is a hard galaxy to do really well....but I think you've done that here.

Nice one :thumbsup:

[Geoff45]

Thanks Peter. You are the first one to notice this artifact. It was a flare from an out of image star, which I did a less than perfect job of removing. I should have another go at it. That's one problem I have with the Plane Wave. A promising image is often marred by out of field flares.
The interesting thing is that the seeing wasn't all that good--high 2's to low 3's.
Geoff

[Placidus]

Agreed!



We've been having the same problem, but worse, with our NGC 1532, with about 1/3 of the image wrecked by reflections from upsilon 4 eridani. We recall that Marc Aragnou used to tackle this problem in other scopes using special black velvet flocking on the inside of the tube. Might be worth investigating. Velvet is shiny in one direction, and utterly black in the other.

[Geoff45]

I have some of the black velvet I bought from some astro supplier a while back. Sticky on one side. I used it on my refractor with some success. Might give it a go on the PW. I did put in some baffles supplied by PW but they don't seem to have made much difference.

[Stevec35]

I'm no expert on NGC 253 images but it looks good to me Geoff.

Cheers

Steve

[MmmmBalf]

Amazing to see the improvement over the years. Great job.

[Geoff45]

Thanks Michael. It's always encouraging to see progress.
Geoff

[andyc]

Fine shot Geoff! Lovely colours there

[marc4darkskies]

Lovely image Geoff! :thumbsup: Depth, sharpness and colour bases nicely covered!

[Ryderscope]

Congratulations on your IOTD Geoff. Nice work.

[Placidus]

Bravo! Well earned.