M20

[Peter Ward]

I've been tinkering with some really specialized solar corona image processing routines of late,
which have teased out some remarkably fine coronal structures,
then had the thought...how would this go if applied to deep-sky data. :question:

Hence this M20 image (http://www.atscope.com.au/BRO/gallery493.html) got the solar treatment.

It was fascinating to see how subtle structures popped into view (particularly in the blue reflection nebula)
compared to previous renditions and without the dark doughnuts/ re-bound rings that un-sharp masking typically adds to the data.

I clearly need to get some fresh data to explore this process much further. ;)

[petershah]

Just stunning Peter

[alpal]

That's nice Peter,
you've even picked up the 2 jets very clearly:
https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2017/messier-20-the-trifid-nebula

https://hubblesite.org/contents/media/images/1999/42/915-Image.html

On many images they are invisible.

cheers
Allan

[Ryderscope]

The results here are stunning Peter and provide a good benchmark for targeting the detailed nebulosity in this region.

[Peter Ward]

Ta. My hope is that a re-shoot with much higher sampling i.e. 3.7 micron pixels will deliver data that is better suited to this processing method. We shall see !

[TrevorW]

Nice Peter and a nice set of toys to boot :)

[Peter Ward]

Thanks Trevor. Ah yes, the toys......a bit like Sydney real estate.....the price was
reasonable if you got in over a decade ago.

As for the current price and government's official inflation figures, as they said in The Castle "tell 'em their dreamin" :lol:

[keller60]

:eyepop: Simply beautiful.

[Startrek]

Peter,
Always a pleasure to see your images , especially M20 which I’ve yet to see at this depth.
Thanks to Allan pointing out those 2 jets , quite unique ( I checked my M20 captured with my 10” under dark skies back in May and could “just” make out those jets. If Allan hadn’t pointed them out on your image , I’d be none the wiser !!
Well done !
Cheers
Martin

[Peter Ward]

:thanx: But the raw data has some problems....which with a 16" only become
obvious when the seeing is good, hence the last thing you want to do
is tweak tilt/collimation etc. over gathering data.

The joys of narrow field imaging :lol:

[kinetic]

Absolutely stunning Peter!


regards,


Steve

[RobF]

Sublime detail and beautiful image. Thanks for sharing.

[Peter Ward]

Thanks for the kind comments. I suspect M20 simply presents better with a longer focal length.
:thumbsup:

[Dave882]

Beautiful detail Peter. Would be interesting to see what you can do with a finer image scale, although do you think the seeing/atmospheric conditions you get at your obs would warrant it?

[gregbradley]

Certainly that shows stunning detail, but at a cost. The stars look harshed out and some are misshapen.

Greg.

[Peter Ward]

Indeed...I mentioned the RAW data was not perfect in an earlier post. The de-con routine definitely causes the stars develop processing artifacts. I'm hoping oversampling will mitigate this. All I can say is: watch this space. :)




The best I get here is about 1.8 arc sec seeing. In general terms, deconvolution works best with oversampled data, which hopefully will avoid the artifacts mentioned above. :thumbsup: