Ngc6744

[gregbradley]

At my last trip at my dark site I took some additional data of NGC6744.

I've added it to the data I had from about a year earlier. Keep in mind this is quite a dim galaxy really and it never gets that high in the sky.

http://www.pbase.com/gregbradley/image/166428319/large

Greg.

[Atmos]

It is a pretty faint sucker but you’re showing it nicely. Perhaps a little too much noise reduction but when you’re going faint and without heavy integration, cannot always be helped.

[Tony_]

Nice one Greg!
This galaxy (like a lot of others) has a very low surface brightness - you've capture a lot of details and nice Ha regions.

Tony.

[Stevec35]

I agree with the comment about noise reduction Greg but other than that I think you've captured it very nicely. The colour is excellent.

Cheers

Steve

[Placidus]

That's wonderful Greg. You've definitely gone deeper in the outermost tendrils of the spiral arms. Bravo!

[RickS]

Greg,

Great detail and colour and you pulled out some very faint stuff, Greg.

Cheers,
Rick.

[alpal]

Hi Greg,
that's an excellent image and
I wonder if the stars could have been processed to be a little softer?
The stars look a little bit over white and hardened.
It would have been very difficult to process give the high dynamic range.
I like the red Ha regions.

cheers
Allan

[gregbradley]

Thanks Allan. I have softened the stars a bit. Thanks for the suggestion.



Thanks Rick.



Cheers Mike. I have done a bit of a rework this morning with fresh eyes and from the astute comments so far.



Thanks Colin.

I've done a rework this morning with fresh eyes and in line with these comment in mind. The new version has way more subtle noise reduction. Other ways to skin the cat.


Thanks Tony. Its a beautiful galaxy but a bit faint. Also imaging so close to the SCP seems to have extra challenges.



Thanks Steve. I accidentally ran a noise reduction routine a few times and it seemed like it failed at the time but apparently it worked each time! Fixed now.

[DJT]

Hi Greg
The rework is excellent. There’s some good detail in in there.

[alpal]

Nice work Greg,
it looks better now - it's perfect.

cheers
Allan

[gregbradley]

Thanks David. Its amazing how much control we can gain using Photoshop. Is such a deep and powerful tool (PI is good too Rick!:rofl:).



Thanks Allan and thanks fro your suggestion.

Greg.

[Atmos]

The rework is a nice improvement. Less large wavelet blotchiness and the stars are better :)

[gregbradley]

Thanks Colin for your suggestions.

Greg.

[Retrograde]

Very nice Greg - such delicate spirals.

[gregbradley]

Thanks Pete. They seem to extend very very faintly into the area above the galaxy as well. I think most galaxies have a faint outer section which doesn't often come up in photos being too far away. At least I think so.

Greg.

[Octane]

Looks fabulous to me. Excellent effort on a faint sucker, Greg.

H

[multiweb]

Excellent Greg. Love the high res details. :thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup:

[gregbradley]

Thanks very much H.



Cheers Marc.

Greg.

[Joshua Bunn]

I like this version Greg, nice warm colours, not to harsh... with detail out to the extended regions of the galaxy.

Josh.

[strongmanmike]

Nice result Greg, some good details can be seen in the inner areas :thumbsup:

Mike

[gregbradley]

Thanks Josh.



Thanks Mike. It wasn't my primary imaging target but the downloads looked good so I did a bit more. I am having trouble with the main target though as it looks like the data is in 2 types the 1mhz and the 8mhz digitisation. I started using 1mhz for the lower noise and apparently if you mix them they won't calibrate properly. I think a setting was set wrong for some of the data.

Greg.

[strongmanmike]

Yeah I would imagine frames at 8mhz wouldn't match those taken at 1Mhz...? I was just checking this yesterday while setting my new rig up. I would think you would need completely separate sets of darks, flats and flat darks for each download speed...?

Mike

[gregbradley]

Yes it seems that way. I was using the sky X and it allows you to set which speed for each filter. I think a few must have been set at the faster but noisier setting and they don't calibrate well and when I got not too bad it wouldn't colour combine. Another thing to double check!

Greg

[E_ri_k]

Thats really nice Greg. I remember imaging this one last year, and it was very faint. Great result.
Erik

[gregbradley]

Thanks Erik.

I like to image this one from time to time.

Greg.

[Peter Ward]

Not too shabby Greg. Only observation I’d make is it lacks “snap” and the dynamic range looks a little compressed to my eye. ( Yes, I’m being really picky :) )

A nice rendition just the same :thumbsup:

[willik]

That is one nice image well done Greg
Martin

[gregbradley]

Thanks for that. Its a bit short on exposure time so I would put it down to that. But next year I'll add some more time. Perhaps even this year if its still up next new moon.



Cheers Martin.

Greg.

[Paul Haese]

Nice going Greg, I like the colour and the detail is pretty nice too. The outer dust lanes look good and showing well.

I started imaging this galaxy quite a few months back but never got it finished with the RC. I found it to be a tough customer and required a fair bit of time to get the inner detail out near the bar. I'll hit it again next year once I have the RC up and running again. Until then nice to see it imaged well.

[gregbradley]

Thanks Paul. It is a bit of tough one. The stars around it also seem to be kind of largish too.

Greg.

[MLParkinson]

That is an awesome image. The galaxy looks like three galaxies in one: a red elliptical in the core surrounded by a blue spiral, and then another blue elliptical at top left. Perhaps the last galaxy is in the background?

Who needs the Hubble telescope when 'amateurs' can produce images of this quality? I guess if you are imaging with a CDK17 then you are a 'pro'.

[gregbradley]

Thanks very much for the kind words.

Greg.