M42

[Raymond]

Dear all,

The M42 and part of Running Man was captured by astro friend Petming using TEC140 F7 APO with his Canon 300D at ISO 800 on 13-09-2005 .

The images (1 image of 6 min and 2 images of 3 min) are stacked and processed by me. As the total exposure time was short, some noises are visible, and I find that the noises in Canon 300D are harder to remove than 350D.

Raymond

[davidpretorius]

great shot, this is simply a fantastic area of the sky. have you got neat image, in say 15 seconds and 6 button clicks i got this from your original.i have a demo copy here: http://www.precons.com/iis/downloads

you may want to upgrade to the ful version

[davidpretorius]

by the way raymond, i am still gazing into that picture of yours. it is beautiful!!

[iceman]

Great shot Raymond, it's been a while since we've seen some Orion pics.. Yours is a beautiful example and a nice wide field too.

David, in my opinion there was very little noise in Raymond's original image, and running it through NeatImage appears to have artifically darkened the background by removing the faint stars, and your version looks more "fake" to me. Just my opinion anyway.

[Itchy]

Great image! :cool2: You two make a good team. You are right about the exposure time though. More exposures would be good. Also, three minutes has still blown out the center of the nebula. It is very bright, so some even shorter exposures may be helpful. There is enough dynamic range in M42 to warrant three different lengths to composite.

Well Done

[Itchy]

David,

I'm afraid I have to agree with Iceman on this. The noise reduction has actually lost a lot of detail in the nebulosity. Perhaps that is due to the fact that you were working with a very compressed image. If it had been applied to Raymond's original, the result may have been more pleasing.

Now don't get me wrong, I use Noiseware myself and it has really helped my images. But you do have to be careful not to overdo it.

Cheers

[Robby]

Very nice work Raymond... Lovely!
I'd say with a bit of processing on the RAW images you could get more detail out of the fainter nebula.. But it is still stunning as it is.
Here we go again. M42 season just starting. That means Summer is nearly here :)
Cheers

[davidpretorius]

So most guys don't reckon there is much noise here???


I have put both side by side and it might be my internet explorer, but i see quite a lot of squares around the edges. Given my noise reduction is by a novice and by no means was any time spent on it, I can't see too much loss of detail.

Taking nothing away from the orginal, it is my favourite at the moment! I can't stop looking at all the detail!

Et's and Striker's great shots have clear smooth edges. I do not want to defend my alteration as it was done to help raymond out as he thought is was noisy, just a bit confused on what is noisy and what is not.

[xelasnave]

Noise or no noise that is a great capture and process. Congratulation on your fine work.Alex

[davidpretorius]

i like it so much that it is my screen saver (hope there is no copyright infringments)

[Striker]

Great shot Raymond...looks very impressive.

I would have to agree with David on this one...it looks 200% percent better even if a small amout of detail may have been lost...the detail lost on the original through all the noise spoils the image....

I would rather be looking at low noise slightly less detail then High noise and little extra detail.

This takes nothing away from your shot Raymond.....I like it a lot....we are just debating on personal preference.

Again I am no pro its just my opinion.

[iceman]

I think you're right on that, in the end it's just personal preference.

My preference, is that the noise-reduced image looks overly smooth and fake, unnatural like a cartoon or texta drawing. But then, who's to tell what's natural looking? :shrug:

[Itchy]

Hi David,

I agree that Ray's image was quite noisy, no argument there. And it's great that you have helped him by demonstrating noise reduction. What we sometimes have to be careful with is how much to use it. And of course, how much is too much is a personal preference thing too. My personal opion was that it was a little overdone and sacrificed detail for smoothness.

I have attached a comparison image at 200%. Ray's original on the left, your Neatimage NR in the centre and my Noiseware NR on the right. I had to tone down the NR considerably. The interesting thing is that the less noisy an image is to begin with, the more NR processing it can take.

Any Thoughts?

Cheers

[ving]

interesting tony, i do like yours better (just my opinion BTW) as you have kept alot of the detail there while reducing most (but not all) noise.
well done to all three.

just one comment tho, I'd probably be asking the creator for permission before playing around with thier image, just out of respect. but then its probably not necesary anyhow :)

[[1ponders]]

:thumbsup:@ ving

[atalas]

Great shot Raymond ! well done dude :thumbsup:


Louie :innocent:

[asimov]

Interesting. Me being a total n00b in the area of noise/stacking/compression/etc.....standing BACK (5 feet) from the monitor & comparing Raymonds original & Daves 'noise reduced' image, I like raymonds pic better. Sitting NORMALLY at the puter, I see a hell of a lot of noise in Raymonds, which I don't like (personal preference) so therefore Daves is better looking to me even though it has lost a slight amount of detail etc.

[Striker]

Yeah I tend to agree with Ving....We should get some permission from Raymond or anyone else before playing around with their images...I know for a fact that I dont mind you boys playing around with my images as I need all the help I can get but this doesn't mean everyone does.

I myself like to see what other members can do with my images as I can use it as a learning tool.

I know everyone is out to help and their reasoning is only to give advise or comparisons but some people may take offence if their images have been tempered with and posted.

Maybe a PM or just a post saying do you mind if I have a go would be the right thing to do.

BTW excellant image again Raymond.

[davidpretorius]

i am happy to pm him as i was the original copyright breaker

[davidpretorius]

quote
"
Hi Mate,

we have been playing with your excellent M42 image. Having a go at it to see if we can clean up the noise you mention with out losing the detail.

I hope you are ok with us doing this.

Kind Regards

David Pretorius

PS this image is my screensaver. I like it that much!"



pm done

[asimov]

Ummm. yeah.:D

[[1ponders]]

Thanks David. :thumbsup:

[Raymond]

Dear all,

Thanks a lot for all your inputs !

I don't mind if anyone on this forum plays with my images (unless and until I put a note to the contrary, not at this stage).

I usually process an image late at night and even though I do not find a satisfactory processing I may still post up the image (and call it a day before I go to sleep). As a result, some of my images are poorly processed. I therefore welcome comments and even criticism as to how to improve. I think this is one of the most valuable attributes in all astro forums.

Some people comment that this M42 is too blue. Some confirm my view that the image is noisy. I browse similar M42s in other forums/webpages and they all show up something that I have missed.

I use Image Plus to darken the background and PS to touch up, leaving Neat Image to reduce the noise near the end. I say the noise here is hard to remove, as my present workhorse is 350D with IDAS LPS filter. The noises usually are more easy to remove even at low settings in Neat Image.

With these images taken by my astro friend (my TEC140 and EM200 mount are now being placed in his roof) with his 300D without any LPS filter, the noises are more grainly and almost stuck. Very hard to remove, unless I use very aggressive settings in Neat Image, which I am not too comfortable. I agree that Tony's re-processing is a midway between David's and mine.

I would certainly re-capture M42 again using my 350D and LPS filter, definitely with more total exposure time, to see if the noises could be removed in a more satisfactory manner.

My short term goal is to improve the autoguiding accuracy with ST402 XME. That would allow me to capture more meaningful images in the range of 5-10 min each.

The medium target to build a permanent setup, thereby dispensing with the trouble of setting up and tearing down equipments each night.

The long term target is to run robotic operation remotely.

Clear skies to all.

Raymond, Hong Kong

[davidpretorius]

Thanks ray, it is a great image.

good luck with the setup!