Critique my Eagle please.

[bloodhound31]

11 x 15 minute exposures darks subtracted.

Slight crop to tidy up.

Orion OS Starshoot camera
ED 120 APO Prime focus.

Constructive criticism appreciated.

Baz.

[Buddman]

Wow, nice shot. I'm no expert (actually I'm really struggling with processing) but I'd be very happy with that under my belt.

Adam

[Paul Haese]

Nice image Bazz, guiding and colour looks good, Maybe it needs to be a little brighter but overall it is quite nice.

[peter_4059]

Nice shot Bazz. Well done. Have you applied any processing routine?

Peter

[Kevnool]

Great image Barry no critisizm here .....cheers Kev.

[Inmykombi]

Lovely fine detail there.
Its a great example of this nebula.

I am no expert....but the background of the image on my computer could be a bit darker.
maybe its my screen settings ????

Geoffro.

[bloodhound31]

Thanks Adam, me neither. I'm pretty happy with it so far. But I've been wrong before..;)

That's quite a compliment from you Paul, I love your work and aspire to be at your level.



Peter, I just used MaxIm DL Essentials to stack and colour balance. A little Noels actions in PS elements was about it.



THanks Kev:thumbsup:


Cheers Geoffro. There was a half moon in the sky fairly close by last night so unfortunately I lost a bit of contrast. Darkening the background just caused me to lose nebulosity. I'm no expert in processing either. Getting there though I think.

[troypiggo]

Very nice! Looks like you nailed the focus.

[gregbradley]

Hi Baz,

Great shot, fabulous round stars which is usually the main battle.

There is a blue bias to the image. I played with it in Photoshop and the blue histogram was further to the right than the green and red. I moved it back using an S shaped curve in the blue channel and then pulled back green as well afterwards. Then I boosted red with a more upside down J shaped curve.

It got rid of the overly blue stars and boosted the red in the nebula and made the image slightly darker with more contrast. It is a tad bright in the highlights and it is washing out the dark space areas a bit.

Then a touch of selective colour on red and the top slider made a richer red.

Couldn't get a gain doing anything else.

So try playing around with curves. When you do, make sure you select histogram in the window menu so it displays a histogram for RGB and you'll see the blue bias.

Greg.

[bloodhound31]

Thanks Troy. I reduced my focus exposures in MaxIm to 3 seconds. Previously I was using 10 seconds which was bloating the stars. All good now.


Thanks Greg. I am very happy with the EQ6 in conjunction with the starsshoot AG and PHD. Round stars ar rarely a challenge anymore. I did get a few exposures toward the end though,as the scope approached the meridian, that had egg shaped and double stars. Out of Fifteen subs, the last four were unusable because of this. Not sure what happened there.

Thanks for your tips on the curves. Now I just have to explore PS elements to see how I can try all those things. I think adding star colour with Noels actions may have had something to do with it. Using it once is often enough to give a subtle enhancement, but more can be too much.

Off I go to practice! Might try again new moon when there is no background light.

Baz.

[peeb61]

Nailed it Baz!
Great effort.

The bright stars in the center which bloat out get me every time I attempt this object but you have caught it well.

Paul

[jase]

Great work Baz. In fact, I'd go as far as saying that this image is a turning point for you. Looks like you've nailed all the key data acquisition aspects and you're taking some long subs. Heed Greg's and others advice on the processing. I think the data could certainly be stretch a little harder given it should be of reasonable quality considering how much you've collected. Keep at it.

[Tamtarn]

Well done Baz this has to be one of your best :thumbsup:

[gregbradley]

15 minute subs with such round stars means your polar alignment is very close and your autoguider setup is nicely done and the autoguider scope is sharply in focus, the OTA is fairly well balanced etc etc.

iBut f you are getting eggy stars near the meridian that suggests to me either of 2 things:

1. You are getting some flexure perhaps because of cable drag.
2. Your gear is not balanced at all angles.

1. Check everything is tight and the guide camera/dovetails are all locked down tight/focuser etc.

Make sure cables are not dragging on it when it gets to a sharp angle. A double star means your autoguider freaked out at one point during the exposure; a bad wind gust, a cloud obscuring the guide star briefly, you bumped it or a cable suddenly slipped and made a one off big tracking error.

Although not relevant here as you got nice round stars - not all guide stars get the same guide errors. In fact I find with my setup they vary wildly. If I find I get higher than normal guide errors the first thing I do is select another guide star. I find sharp, closer to the centre of the guide image, by themselves, not a double star, not too bright and haloed but a nice reasonably bright by itself, sharply defined no coma star gives me the lowest guide errors. The software computes the centre of the star and uses that calculation to calculate tracking errors. If you get an overly bright fat star with a touch of coma then that calculation is not going to be very exact. If you chose a double star as a guide star the software could get the 2 confused.
If you pick a star near the edge of the image it may have coma and again distort the calculations.

2. Check your balance at those sharp angles.

If your gear has stuff stacked on top that is a long way from the centre of gravity I have had it happen that the gear is balanced when horizontal but badly out of balance when at an angle. I burnt out some Gemini system motors once because the balance point shifted so badly at different angles.

Perhapsalso you have backlash and this does not show up until near the meridian as then the scope is less weighted on the gears - maybe.

Piggybacked refractors can do this on a large tubed scope. Perhaps side mounting the guide scope is a solution to get the balance point closer to the axle of the mount.

I find my setup autoguides equally well at any angle. But I do check this balance issue at different angles to make sure the mount is not struggling against heavy weight all of a sudden. I also make sure everything is locked down hard and no cable drag.

Greg.

[bloodhound31]

Awesome stuff Greg! You are one of the most helpful blokes out. Your advice is very practical and makes perfect sense. I may be looking at the mill soon and make a new platform to side-by side my scopes.

Apart from that, I an extremely happy with the way things are running. I have been very well looked after.

I tried the things you suggested, and experimented with the curves. Not exactly sure what I am doing, but I think I got a better result, based on your suggestions.

I will put the old and the new side by side for comparison. I didn't crop the second one or clone out the dust motes. I am going to pray for clear skies and get some more subs to add. Do you think more subs will be beneficial?

Many thanks Greg. Bless ya mate.

Barb, Jase and Paul, cheers for your encouragement too!

Baz.

[Hagar]

Nice image Baz, Guiding and focus look really good. The image does look a little dull but that is easy to fix with a very small tweak on the brightness and contrast.
Overall a very nice image with nice clear detail, well done.

[multiweb]

Great picture Baz. :thumbsup:

[bluescope]

Good effort Baz ... lots of detail lurking in there ... I've done a tweak on it ... hard to work on small web sized files ... hope you don't mind :)

Keep it up !

:thumbsup:

[bloodhound31]

Thanks Doug, Marc and Steve,

I have the left the camera and scope untouched so I can get more subs. I really want to work on this one and smooth it right out. I am getting tired of mediocre pics for big effort. The only way I see is to get more subs.

Stay tuned.

Baz.

[bloodhound31]

Nearly one in the morning. Sitting here in the obs. Waiting with camera set for 900 second exposures. Sucker holes in the clouds that only let me in for less than half that, wasting the shot.

Should I persist, or go to bed....that is the question...

[bloodhound31]

I got another hour and a quarter's-worth of 15 minute subs two nights ago.

I have added them and also done the whole bit with flats and darkflats. What a process!

The question is, do the results speak for themselves?

Here is the resulting image, totaling 4 hours.

I am aiming to get a few more hours over this next new moon to add to this again.

Baz.

[multiweb]

Yes mate. More details are definitely coming through. Keep stacking more :thumbsup: