Dumbbell Nebula - close up

[VincentMorris]

Dear All,

This one was a marathon attempt; 9 nights of capture. Had to discard more than half of the subs thanks to the weather. And took my time for processing. But I guess there's still a lot to be done. Comments and suggestions welcome please.


Dates taken: 9 nights throughout July and August 2010
Location: Beckenham, Kent, UK.

Scope: Celestron 9.25 SCT
Camera: Starlight Xpress SXV-H16
Filters: 2” Astronomik Ha, OIII, SII
Guiding: Skywatcher ST80 with DFK
Mount: Skywatcher EQ6

Exposure: 7.5 hours Ha, 10.5 hours OIII, 5 hours SII all in 10 minute subs
Calibrated and Stacked in Maxim DL
Stretched and Noise Reduction in Photoshop CS3

Thanks,
Vincent.

[Alchemy]

Some very nice detail there Vincent, this object is obviously much higher in the sky than here. The 9.25 produces some wonderful results, don't know why we see so few of them around.

[CoolhandJo]

Nice detail! Lovely close up. I think your red channel is not aligned correctly? But lovely just the same. Well done.

[gregbradley]

A very striking image. Nice job. As Paul mentioned it seems some red subs are not aligned.

CCDStack has a nice plug in you can buy that precisely aligns subs. Once I starting using that it was the end of misalignments in my images.
So I'd recommend that product if you are using CCDstack.


Greg.

[Lester]

Very nice image Vincent.

[VincentMorris]

Thanks for the encouraging comments guys :-)

Paul, Greg,

I thought, there was some about of star bloat in my red subs. I had not thought about probably misalignment of channel subs. I should give CCDStack a try, if tehre's a trial version.

Thanks,
Vincent.

[Nightskystargaz]

Vincent,

:thanx:, for sharing your nice image :thumbsup:.

CS,KLU,

:thanx:,

Tom

[Hagar]

Nice detail Vincent. It looks a bit strange when I'm used to see it in normal RGB.

[spearo]

great internal bubbly detail there
well done
C9.25 one of the best!
:]
frank