Thor's Helmet - V3 Backyard

[Anth10]

Hi everyone,

I recently got myself a Hutech V3 filter with the hope it would enable me to take more DSO images from my backyard. Its hard to free up time to get out to darker skies these days. So I tested it with my F5 10" Newt targeting Thor's Helmet. Difficult to resolve visually but eventually found it. I let the 60D smash out 70 subs @ 30" ISO2000 and 30 subs @ 30" ISO3200 for a total of 50minutes unguided(really need to learn & be patient with drift alignment). This by the way was the most time i've spent imaging any object to date. Darks and Flats added.

I am impressed with the performance of the filter at least producing this result.
Anth

[blink138]

nice anthony, can you post a bigger shot?
pat

[Anth10]

read my mind blink i'll try soon.

[Atmos]

For quite short exposures you've gotta be happy with that :)

[Anth10]

Hi Pat,
I've attached a slightly larger jpeg here,
hope the weather stays fine, may try to get some extra shots to add to it (uncharted territory again...)

[Anth10]

Ta Colin,

It's always the case for me when the sky is clear you want to hit as many objects as you can. I'm going to be more selective in future and hone in with more exposure time as suggested. As you say, I'm pretty happy with this.:)

[Mickoid]

Anth, you've produced another gem under difficult conditions and your choice of filter and processing has made it look like it was taken from a dark sky location. Great work.

[Anth10]

Mickoid, it's baby steps for me, I think the V3 will suit my setup for a while. On the other hand Narrow band imaging is a whole new world and will surely one day lead me down the auto guiding/ refractor/ccd path. For now I'll get the most out of the 10 and what I've got.

[cometcatcher]

Looks terrific!

[Anth10]

Thanks Kevin, I was inspired by your effort on 2359 earlier this year, it's an eye catching DSO for sure.

[Anth10]

Good conditions at the moment, collected more data to combine. This image shows a little more detail in the central bubble with the arms or helmet spikes showing more colour. This was a cool object to snap. Other shot reprocessed with less stars and another attempt at using levels and curves. Still getting the hang of it...