Rho Ophiuchus - PixInsight version...

[rcheshire (Rowland)]

Here is a video of this one - almost 9 minutes - minimal editing of my preferred method (v1.8 - I have not updated to the latest) with DSLR images, to create a preview.

I used ABE but DBE is (I am told), the better alternative, the speed things up.

Noise reduction on the linear image, rather than TGVNoise on the stretched image. Though, with the right settings, not overdone, TGVNoise does a pretty good job.

LRGBCombination tool to saturate, with the modified L* channel in the background. This and the linear noise reduction, picked up from processing examples here and there.

A little sigmoidal contrast, with the CurvesTransformation tool, would spark things up a bit. As in the attached image. But in ImageMagick with Gamma and Normalisation.

EDIT: As per Chris's suggestion a bit more stretch.

[ChrisV (Chris)]

Nice comparison Roland. Looks like you could stretch that a lot more in PI?

[rcheshire (Rowland)]

Thanks Chris. I modified the work flow to stretch to 50% HistogramTransformation in the first instance and apply saturation of 0.1 in LRGBCombination and finished off with CurvesTransformation - otherwise the same. It just needs a bit of tweaking here and there - another day.

[kosborn (Kevin)]

Great image. It's one of my favourite targets.


Kevin

[ChrisV (Chris)]

That's great. Such a nice job of it. You're making me want to have a go.

[Gavin1234]

That is amazing. Does that have a messier number or another catalog number I could plug into my mount?

[rcheshire (Rowland)]

Thanks. It's got a little way to go yet.

IC 4603 4604 4606 NGC 6121 6144.

I generally eyeball it. The clusters stand out well.