M8 - details of the Lagoon and Hourglass with processing details

[Greg Bock]

Hi all,
I thought I recall someone asking recently for processing details and raw files to be posted as a means of helping newcomers understand what these look like, but i cant find the post. I thought it may have been in this section, but i'm not sure now.

Yesterday, I posted a close-up image of M8, the Lagoon, which was done to highlight the details around the Hourglass as well as the complex network of nebulosity and associated colour in the Lagoon itself.

Some details of the processing and a raw subframe can be found at this posting here at comments at number 10, if you are interested.
http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=94491

Cheers,

[originaltrilogy]

Thank you so much for posting the raw file before processing, it really helps us beginners!

[Greg Bock]

Hi Petr,
No problem, glad it helps you. As you can see, the raw subframe its not very pretty, but it represents the average subframe that i captured. Some were better, some were worse.

The quality of the final outcome is determined by the quality of the raw subframes of course, so the better the input, the better the output. I usually prefer to take many subframes and combine them in order to avoid saturating the pixels to their full-well limit and therefore losing the colour data (essentially, if a pixel is saturated, it will be seen as white on the final image instead of its actual colour). Also, if any mistracking occurs during a subframe, then i only throw it away and use the rest.

Obtaining high quality data and careful processing the images are the 2 keys to achieving a good image, and of course both take time. In fact, sometimes, processing will take much longer than it took to capture the data in the first place, so be persistent!
Cheers

[originaltrilogy]

Thank you for the description.
I just posted my raw stack of 120 frames of sculptor in this thread.
http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=94271
I still have trouble understanding how to take and apply good flats, but my raw data is at least getting better.
I am trying to get acquisition right first while I learn to process.