The Constellation of Scorpius

[Octane]

Hi all,

This is the first image I have taken since November, 2007, and, also probably the worst. But, it's good to be posting something new for the first time in over 1.5 years.

It was taken up at the Pony Club on Saturday night. First light for both the G-11 and my modified 40D (thanks, Eric).

I experienced all the woes, trials and tribulations on Saturday night, that comes with playing with new equipment for the first time. Levelling, balance, polar alignment, et. al., were a major pain in the you-know-what, but, towards the later part of the evening, things started to come good. Thanks go to Geoff (gmb_filter), Deeno and Andrew (Rocket Boy) for assisting me with my equipment.

I only managed 1 hour and 40 minutes as the bottom of the frame started to sink below the trees (thank you, sigma-kappa stacking for removing the trees). I am not impressed with my framing; the constellation should have sat higher up in the composition, however, I did manage to capture M8 and M20, so, that was a bit of a bonus.

The skyglow gradient was pretty bad, but, IRIS handled it well, with some minor work having to be carried out in Photoshop.

Anyway, enough rambling.

Read and view here (http://users.tpg.com.au/octane2/Mangrove_Mountain_20090718_Scorpius .html).

Please be gentle.

Regards,
Humayun

[glenc]

It shows all the nebulae well Humayun. :thumbsup:

[Alchemy]

crikeys, i see you around all the time and didnt realize you hadnt been imaging......

lots of detail, i can clearly see the cats paw , all of the ophiuchus nebula, plus banding throughout the milky way.

nicely done Humayun, i hope its not another year before we see some more

gentle regards

clive

[sheeny]

That's a wonderful image, H!:thumbsup: Superb exposure and dynamic range.

Al.

[dugnsuz]

Beautiful image - I love this one.
Images as wide as this can be difficult beasts to tame - you've done a great job with it.
Doug

[jjjnettie]

It's a lovely BIG wide field.
And thanks for providing so much info on the capture and processing.

[telecasterguru]

Fantastic work and wonderful processing.

Frank

[leon]

Wow H, that is spectacular, :eyepop: nice shooting mate, ;) and all those stars, super shot.

Leon :thumbsup:

[toryglen-boy]

Thats a great image fella, maybe you could put that, with some others to music, and show it at the next meeting ...


:thumbsup:

[Jeffkop]

Take it straight to the poolroom !!!!!

Great photo ... Fantastic !!!

[Tamtarn]

What a great comeback Humayan.

Having lost your years of data recently you must be "over the moon " to get back to deep sky imaging.

This is a stunning image and the composition as always is great.

More please :)

[h0ughy]

Humayun, please dont take this the wrong way, BUT I feel as though there is a large proportion of gradient within the image from the lower right to the upper left. What you have captured is a ripper of an image with the colours of Scorpio and other nebulae’s, the dark lanes are there but I fear they are washed out a little by the gradient. I might be wrong, probably I am (must be medication time). Keener eyes than mine might interject here. I think it’s all there – just needs to be tweaked a little more.

[TrevorW]

I can see a darker background region at top left as compared to bottom right however I don't think IMO this really detracts from the overall image quality.

Well done

[Benno85]

Cracking image that, puts all of my efforts to shame:shrug:

Well done!!!!!!

[multiweb]

Yeah very nice. Colours are great. Good pic to swim around. :thumbsup: even see Jase's APOD on the lower right ;)

[Tom Davis]

What a vista! Beautiful!

Tom

[mexhunter]

That's a very nice picture.
Congratulations!!!
Many grettings
Cesar

[renormalised]

Damn nice widefield that!!!:D:D

Imperfections or not, I'd be happy with that:D

Nebs are a treat:D:D

[sjastro]

Very fine wide field Humayun.

Regards

Steven

[Octane]

Cheers, Glen! Took a little bit of coaxing with some slight saturation adjustment to make the red pop a little bit more.



Thanks, Clive. Appreciate the gentle regards. :P



Al, thanks, mate. Glad you like it. :)



I've been really lucky with my widefield's Doug, they have been rather fun to process. Thanks!



Jeanette, glad you like it, too! 24mm is a pretty wide field. I'd love to give this a go on the 5D Mark II, it'd be even bigger, albeit without the pretty red stuff.



Thanks, Frank!



Thanks so much, Leon. :) It was so good to be back out under the stars, and, am so happy that despite the problems encountered on the night, I managed to capture one or two photons. :)



Cheers, Duncan. Did you like my slideshow? :P I would need a lot of images to put together another slideshow. I've lost the originals of all my prior work in a hard drive crash, and, only have the web resolution JPGs scattered about the place.



Jeff, thanks! I will prepare an 18x12" print at some stage. :)



Thanks, Barb and David. I am literally jumping for joy that I've made a new image! Looking forward to getting out and doing some more as time permits.



David, I think you're right about there still being residual gradient even after letting IRIS have its way with the data, as well as my own masking in Photoshop. Admittedly, I did pass some very mild arguments to IRIS' gradient removal command. Perhaps it's something I can go back to and massage a bit further in pre-processing. I found that if I pushed the gradient removal layer in Photoshop any more, then it kind of made the bottom right of the image a bit darker and really screwed around with the already sort-of-OK composition. It might also have something to do with the fact that Scorpius was pretty low in the sky. It also needs a lot more exposure, too. :)

I appreciate the constructive criticism, and, so can not take your comments in a negative light. :)



Trevor, you're right about the top left being darker -- it was also higher in the sky. I did darken it a little bit in Photoshop, but, I may have gone a teeny weeny bit overboard. Not to worry, as I'll be redoing this area again at some stage, no doubt. Thanks for the compliment!



Ben, cheers, mate. Don't be discouraged by what you see. I am a newbie, too. I will always, however, push what I have (camera, lenses, telescope, mount, and data) to the limit. Keep imaging and keep learning. There's no stopping in this obsessive hobby. :)



Cheers, Marc. lol, I should take Jase's image and overlay it on my own Rho Ophiuchus region and then tell people to zoom in. :P



Coming from you, Tom, that means a lot. :)



Cesar, thank you, mate! Glad you like it.



Thank you everyone!

Regards,
Humayun

[Hagar]

Very nice widefield Humayun. Looks a little bright on my laptop but the detail is magnificent. Lots to look at and peruse.
Thanks for posting.
Well done.

[Octane]

Doug,

Cheers, mate!

Interesting you mention the brightness of the field. I at first was going to post a slightly darker version (about 20% darker) but I just kept being drawn to the brighter version.

I will redo this field, either this year, or next year. I also want to have another crack at Rho Ophiuchus with a 200mm lens (f/2.8L II USM) on the 40D.

Thanks for looking and commenting. :)

Regards,
Humayun

[batema]

That is a great image. After that long away from taking photos I'd be happy just to remember how to set up my tripod let alone take a shot like that. The lens must also be a real beauty too. Well done.

Mark

[bones]

H
For a while there I couldn't see the constellation for the stars.
Overall I think it looks great. Don't put yourself down by any means. I'm sure that that is the kind of image many of us on the IIS forum can only aspire to do one day. After seeing the vanity of your labour in setting up earlier on in the night, I've got to say it looks like it was all well worth it.
Well done. :thumbsup:See you next time we're both at the PC.
Tony

[AlexN]

Bravo! talk about coming back with a vengeance!

[Lester]

Hi Humayun, that is a rippa image. Well done.

[RB]

That's turned out nicely H despite the initial woes.
The mod 40D performs beautifully and it was fun watching it being controlled via the laptop.
It was a lovely night too with great company.

You'll have to get yourself a good ballhead so that you can orientate and frame the camera the way you want when piggybacking.

:thumbsup:

[Deeno]

Wow. Intense!

Must be pleased with a 'first' effort for a few years.

[RobF]

Just stunning Humayan, and I also appreciate the detailed info on how you went about capturing it. Its images like this that really inspire others to get out and have a go (affects me that way anyway!) :thumbsup:

[lesbehrens]

wow wow wow. very nice image.:thumbsup::eyepop:

[Octane]

Mark,

Thank you! You can ask the guys that were there -- I was a complete gumby trying to set everything. It had just been far too long. :lol:



Tony,

Cheers, mate. I appreciated your company! We'll catch up soon.



Alex,

Onwards and upwards from here on in. Thanks!



Lester,

Cheers, mate!



Andrew,

I'm glad that all the electronics side of things seemed to work out well in the end. Thanks for your assistance!



Deeno,

Thanking you! I am quite happy, but, I know I can do better. Next time! Thanks to you, also, for your assistance.



Rob,

Much obliged. Thanks!

It's really interesting -- when you look at the RAW 5-minute exposure, you think it looks absolutely horrible. The whole thing was one big shade of pink with some orange from the Milky Way. Stacking and processing is a wonderful thing. :)



Les,

Thanks, glad you liked it!



Thank you, everyone!

Regards,
Humayun

[Omaroo]

How did I miss this one Humayun? A splendid shot - a humdinger widey!

When are you going to take the plunge and modify a 5D? :whistle:

Ripper mate :thumbsup: