NGC 7293 Helix

[Tamtarn]

An image from one of David's all night sessions last week. First frame starting at 2am

Canon 40D unmodded

Celestron C 9.25 at f6.3

Data 1 hr 36 min Full frame

Barb



58335

[peter_4059]

Wow - nice detail. Was this a stack of subframes?

Well done.

Peter

[Tamtarn]

12 x 8min subs Peter

[Alchemy]

youve got that unmodded camera producing the results, i tried it with a standard camera .... failed miserably

clive.

[dugnsuz]

"It truly was the eye of God!!"
Very nice, textured nebular detail.
A work of art there B&D.
Any chance of a high res?
Doug

[Tamtarn]

A larger image is on our google pages Doug but unfortunately their site compresses the images badly.

Loading a res of 600kb it is compressed to 65kb :mad2::mad2::mad2::mad2::mad2:

We need a new website

[dugnsuz]

May not be as aesthetically pleasing as your webpage, but Photobucket allows me to upload images up to 5Mb in size with a "pro" account - $11.85US for 3 months use.
:thumbsup:

[jase]

Nice one Barb and David. Didn't realise it was Helix time again. Will need to think about giving this target another go this season. I like what you've put together, but I feel the data could be stretch a little more to further show the out extension and perhaps ease off the sharpening a little. Overall, well done.

[Tamtarn]

Like the quality of the images from photobucket Doug good high res. Pretty reasonable price too will give it some thought Thanks :thumbsup:



Had to deal with a little vignetting in this image Jase. The night was a bit foggy and smokey as well which could have contributed.

The more I tried to extract the worse the vignetting so it was difficult to get an even blend.

Will try stretching a bit more and see how I go :) Thanks

[jase]

Give the "poor man's flat" a shot. Our good friend Gary described the technique in another thread. I've quoted it here;


reference - http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=26434

[Tamtarn]

I did apply an artificial flat to the image Jase and it definately helped.

I'll just have to get David to take some flats he's been going to get around to it I'll just have to hurry him up :lol:

[Craig_L]

Lovely detail Barb and Dave particularly in the outer regions. A hi-res would be good.

[Bassnut]

Well, thats pretty impressive for an UNmodified 40D, in fact id say the neb extension was very good give the above, your a hard man Jase :D.

[jase]

Possibly hard, but when I looked that the higher res version off the web site, there looks like there is more potential there. Like most images I check out here, I download and open them in PS. I don't trust web browsers understanding colour space info. I know the later versions of IE and Firefox handle them ok, but I'm from the old school of colour space management. My comment could be completely unwarranted and as Barb mentioned, the lack of flats hasn't help. However, when I checked out the histogram, I felt the drop off of the midtone was quite short, hence the conclusion that there is more potential there. :)



No excuses now you've got a permanent set up David. You can leave the camera attached so its at the same PA (position angle) for accurate flats. If you're not keen on doing this, a dot of liquid paper on the coupling t-adapter or similar and camera will allow you to realign before you start imaging. Should allow you to use the same flats for a while, though you'll probably want to cycle the library regularly to accommodate for dust etc.

Cheers

[Tamtarn]

Thanks for the comments Craig. Unfortunately our google webpage gives us very poor compressed data so we're unable to post a high res at the moment. Will transfer to a new site soon.



Thanks Fred we were pleasantly surprised at the amount of neb extentions the 40D captured.

Jase is right there's more there I just have to extract it :P

[Tamtarn]

You're spot on Jase. The more I tried to correct the glow of the vignetting by dropping the background level the more the outer neb was dimmed hence the drop off in the histogram.

I will certainly attempt to extract the neb extensions as I'm sure it has potential for more detail.

Thanks for encouraging me to push the boundaries even further :thumbsup:

David has decided flats have now moved up the priority list :lol: