[Big Dave (Dave)]

I have only had the 'gear' for a few months now, luckly just before the dollar crashed! Weather has not been kind lately so practice has been at a minimum. I get fustrated playing with the levels sometime when the target object looks ok, the stars around it go crappy. I think I need a little more practice!!!

I have been really working on focus, until now my focusing has needed improvment. I thought these par-focal colour filters (SBIG) should be right if I focus on luminance, but I have been finding a small tweek is sometimes needed on each colour.

Thanks for the comments - I will have to get photoshop I think,
Big Dave.

Originally Posted by jase

Big Dave, off to a good start indeed. You've got the gear, just need to spend more time in processing the data. Its a little hard to critic a small image, but from a distance the data acquisition looks on track. NGC2070 is a little burnt out. You need to get comfortable with PS levels and curves. While these are relatively simple tools of the trade, they play a major role. You can always try to get fancy with DDP, log stretches etc, but you'll probably find you will come back to levels and curves as they provide the most flexibility in what you are trying to convey in your image. Gutsy effort to start out with an RGB image. I stuck with luminance data for some time until I learnt the ropes (and I'm still learning). Look forward to seeing more of your work. Well done.