Eagle & Trifid

[thegableguy (Chris)]

These seem to be popular targets right now!

Both shots taken last night with the same settings:
Orion ED80, NEQ6 unguided
Nikon D3300 @ ISO 1600
20 x 75 seconds
Darks, flats, bias
Stacked & edited in DSS, final edits in Lightroom

Suggestions for improvement?

I'm kinda running over the same old ground here. Wondering what comes next. Might start a new thread on that subject.

[Mickoid (Michael)]

Chris, not bad tracking for unguided at 75secs. Was the moon up when you took tbese shots? Always difficult to capture faint nebulosity under a gibbous moon. Even if below the horizon moon glow can wash out your shots so you've done well. I'd back off a little on the background density but that's a personal choice, it can help show more faint nebulosity but the moon was probably reducing the transparency already. I like the colours in the Triffid.

[thegableguy (Chris)]

Thanks!

The Moon wasn't visible from where I was, but I think it was a few degrees above the horizon by the time I finished capturing the Eagle, so yeah it's probably washed out a little detail.

What do you mean by background density? Is that how black the background is? I'm guilty almost always of making it too black and losing detail that way. Contrast is a bit too high, and saturation is probably little much too. Rookie mistakes I know!

[Mickoid (Michael)]

Yeah Chris, the blackness of the background is what I meant. You're right, a little too much contrast perhaps. It's sometimes hard to get the right balance between cutting off faint detail and a black background.