[marco (Marco Lorenzi)]

Originally Posted by allan gould

Marco a beautiful image of a difficult object. Its actually so faint that the amount of time you used to capure really brought it out in all its beauty. Love the image scale too - another gem.

Thanks Allan! In fact long exposures always make the difference, in particular when the aperture of the scope is not very large Less pictures but deeper is the way to go

Originally Posted by strongmanmike

Excellent result Marco, sure it isn't as high res as you probably wanted but as a picture overall it looks great. The thing you do well is manage to stretch the faint cirrus out of the data and still get it to blend reasonably naturally into the final colour image, that's a real talent mate . I too revealed the Cirrus when I imaged it with the Starfire (1/2 the exposure time of yours) but though it was clear in the stretched Lum it just didn't look any good when I tried to combine it into the final colour image...so I tip my hat to you sir

Mike

Thanks Mike, actually there is not a real secret behind it, just lots of exposure helps to bring out the faint details without overstretching. I found also pixinsight better than photoshop in stretching the data, it is easier with this package to reveal the faint parts and than operate on the stars reducing their impact on the image without getting an innatural result..

Originally Posted by peter_4059

Thats a lovely image Marco. The detail and star colours are amazing.

Thanks Peter!

Originally Posted by dvj

Wonderful color balance. A bit of glow around the bright stars, but I guess that might be from high moisture in the air recently at Coona.

Thanks John, I believe however the main culprit of the larger halo is due to my optical setup, the way I process (lots of stretch) and, perhaps, my telescope lenses needs a cleaning

Originally Posted by marc4darkskies

A stunning image Marco!! Lovely composition and beautifully processed!

Cheers, Marcus

Thanks Marcus

Originally Posted by RobF

Amazing work as always Marco. If I crop that right down to the galaxy it still blows my best ever 6744 right out of the water
(which isn't surprising I guess)

Thanks Rob, glad you like it

Originally Posted by Ross G

Another amazing photo Marco.

Beautiful detail and colour.

Great composition.


Ross.

Thanks Ross!

Originally Posted by Octane

That is so utterly beautiful.

Just look at that thing -- what a stunning object.

H

Thanks H, I agree, this is a very pretty galaxy to image!

Originally Posted by gregbradley

Fabulous Marco. I love the glowing stars and you got nice density on the galaxy which is rather faint.

Only complaint it its upside down!!

Greg.

Hi Greg, thanks for the appreciation and for pointing out the wrong orientation, now fixed As for the glowing stars, well, it is not completely a wanted effect but overall it is quite ok (on most images..)

Originally Posted by RB

Lovely image indeed Marco !
The large version looks terrific.

Well done.

Thanks Andrew

Originally Posted by alpal

Wow - what a beautiful picture Marco &
I like the wrietup as well - fancy that galaxy
being twice the size of our own Milky Way.
Thanks for sharing.

Thanks Alpal, actually Astronomy.com deserves the kudos for the writeup, I just adaped it to my image *^_^*

Originally Posted by Poita

I really enjoyed that framing and colour, it is very dynamic.

Thanks Peter

Originally Posted by Paul Haese

Would love to have your setup though Marco.

Very nice image overall. Great colour, detail and even some misty dust.

Thanks Paul, my setup is fine but the Coona skies make the real difference in my imaging

Originally Posted by John Hothersall

Refractors do give such glorious star colours, nice to hear this galaxy is apparently most like the Milkyway.

John.

Thanks John!

Originally Posted by RickS

A lovely, deep image, Marco!

Thanks Rick, appreciate

Clear skies
Marco