Emphasis on Stars

[Crater101]

Folks;


I've shot a series of wide images of the Southern Cross for a local educational group (still a processing work-in-progress) and I was wondering the best way to emphasise the four points of the Southern Cross (Acrux, Gacrux, Mimosa, Imai) a little so that they stand out in the starfield.


Captured using a Canon 60D (modded), stacked with Deep Sky Stacker, and finishing off with Photoshop. I remember hearing about a plugin that will do this, but for the life of me I can't remember what it is. (Getting old...)


Any and all advice appreciated.

[AstroViking]

I'd use a brightness/contrast boost to the stars with a mask layer so that only the 4 stars are affected by the change.

Probably harder to describe than do....

Cheers,
V

[Crater101]

That may be what I end up doing, but I did read somewhere of a plugin that did something similar. Just thought I'd ask, any way. Cheers mate!

[Swagman105]

HI Crater
We must be on the same wave length as had been considering something like that as one of my projects for the coming imaging season.
I have read of programmes that can provide artificial diffraction spiking of stars, but prefer to do it with direct imaging.
I've attached two images I took a little while ago and thought the effects were pretty cool. I was hoping to incorporate some of these effects into some of my normal imaging.
The first image here was one I took through a 6" SCT. I reckon the SCT spikes could be replicated by placing some cross wires in front of the objective of a refractor to imitate the secondary vanes of a reflector.
The second image was one I took while a Bahtinov mask was still in place on my 80mm refractor.
Both images were of Canopus (I think) and are heavily cropped. I'm afraid I cant find any record of the exposure time.
Hope this might offer some ideas.

[The_bluester]

The Star Spikes Photoshop plugin (pretty sure that is the name) could be used to selectively apply the Akira Fuji effect to only the stars you want, to emphasise just those stars in the image. I find that more subtle than faked diffraction spikes (if I want that in my refractor images I will 3D print a cross shaped mask to do it during capture)

[Crater101]

That's it!! I couldn't think of the name for the life of me, but as soon as you said it, I went "D'Oh!". Thank you very much indeed! :party2:


I hunted around and found the link to the plugin. If anyone else might need it, it's here ($36.95USD) ...
https://www.prodigitalsoftware.com/StarSpikesPro4.html


Again, my very sincere thanks! I am not worthy...


Swagman, we do seem to think along similar lines from time to time!