That link is very nice hi res Bill, does the image justice, and even with max zoom it looks clean and excellent guiding. Right at the limit with DSLR super wide field imaging, sooo many stars ;-). And that those diffraction spikes, love em.
This is an amazing piece of work Bill. Thoroughly enjoyed it. From M20 and M8 at the left of field, right of center NGC6357 and NGC6334, then what looks like IC4628 far right with the “table of scorpius” cluster. The FOV is incredible. It is pleasing to see dslr’s going deeper, collecting more than 1-hour worth of data. We all know the more data you capture the smoother the result. In my opinion you can never have enough data, but at some point you’ve got to draw the line. My only negative comment on this image is I don’t believe your flats are working well for you. The reason I say this as there appears to be a discolouration band across the bottom of the frame. This results in the appearance field not being equal or balanced. I believe Bert did some investigation around this and discovered the issue is related to the flip mirror or lockup process (really can’t remember), but it appeared to slightly block the light path. You could create an artificial flat in PS to remedy the colour band as an alternative. Overall, the processing looks in tune. You’ve done a great job of bringing out dark nebulae details without clipping data. Well done!
Everyone: Thankyou all, very much for your kind comments.
Rocketboy: No problem. Go right ahead.
Eric: Good idea. No promise, but if I get the time I'll create a marked up copy for you.
Jase: Great to get feedback from you. Thanks for the tip.
Ingo: With focus - I'll try better next time.
...I've adjusted to colour balance and have uploaded the large image (original size) on the IIS server.
In your version the stars are more golden/bronze which I like. Mine is pallid by comparison. In my workflow I balance red/green/blue evenly -i.e. I get the RGB histograms to line up - to have approx. overlapping peaks. Is this workflow a problem?
Many thanks Ken, I just knew this was a job for you. Now I can find my way around the image. I just get lost when all these extra (billions in this case!?) of stars appear that I don't see through the eyepiece!
Originally Posted by Rocket Boy
...I've adjusted to colour balance and have uploaded the large image (original size) on the IIS server.
In your version the stars are more golden/bronze which I like. Mine is pallid by comparison. In my workflow I balance red/green/blue evenly -i.e. I get the RGB histograms to line up - to have approx. overlapping peaks. Is this workflow a problem?
Your workflow sounds similar to mine Bill but when I opened your original into Photoshop it showed me the histogram below (1st image).
The green and blue channels are shifted in relation to the red.
Do you adjust so that the peaks line up or the start of the histograms to line up?
I basically adjusted the channels so that the beginning of the histograms virtually line up (2nd image).
Your histograms though are nice and smooth compared to mine since I used your web version to work from.
Your data is great and has lots of detail, once again it's a great image and thank you for the opportunity to work with your image.
Top stuff Bill,
I love these super wide fields showing us 'drain pipe' imagers the 'real' time view of where every thing's located in this busy constellation that is the heart of our wonderful galaxy.
