My deepest ever astrophoto. Helix Nebula 1.75 hours
Howdy
Ive just finsished quickly processing a 1 hour 45 minute image of the Helix Nebula I took earlier this morning. Its 7 x 15 minute ISO 400 images, using UHCS and UV/IR filter, MPCC and modified 350D camera on my 10 inch F5.6 scope, started imaging about 3 am, off axis hand guided. The Northeast Arc is clearly visible, as is an object called the Northeast Object, a little further to the left. Those objects are mapped out here http://exploration.vanderbilt.edu/im...ix_nebula2.jpg
I may have a hint of the Northwest and Southeast Outer features. Theres a number of faint background galaxies scattered throughout. Darks flats and offsets processed in Iris then finished in Photoshop. Ive never gone so long on one object before, amazing how far it moves across the sky in that time too. I was lucky to get it as when I got up the scope that Id left out after getting about 2 hours sleep was covered in dew, but using a dewshield kept it from getting on the secondary. It was foggy too but it miraciously cleared as I prepared to take some short test images to verify I was on the Helix and ready to go.
I might see about reprocessing it again later on to see if I can coax more detail out of it.
Scott
what a winner, I will bring the lappy and IP over sometime to reprosess the image to see what else can be coaxed out of the originals. Beautiful Scott!
After that guiding effort you could get a job watching grass grow .. The effort certainly has produced an excellent result ... with winter coming on you will be able to expose and guide for up to 12 hours
alex
After calling in from being up at the hospital with my son I am glad I picked up those raw files, have done a little bit of processing with IP2.75, and one passed through noiseworks community edition.
man that thing is faint, you are simply amazing Mr Alder, that was the best I could do with those images, digital development is a wonderful tool in IP
Interesting comparison Scott and h0ughy. Scott how did you get rid of the amp glow that shows up quite clearly in the H0ugh processed ones? There doesn't seem to be a trace of it in your original processing (which for me comes out on top from the four processing runs).
Houghy just 1 thing with IP you must select Edit and copy a portion of image and crop some all around the image...you can see where the images have been stacked and you get that difference in frames...this will affect your histogram and should be done before you apply the digital development....just a tip mate....get rid of it before processing....but otherwise a great job on the images guys.
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I'm pretty speechless Scott. And that takes some doing. 
.. The effort certainly has produced an excellent result
... with winter coming on you will be able to expose and guide for up to 12 hours
