I captured these on the 30th December 2007 and only just got around to processing them.
For something different (for Tycho and Wilhelm), I tried a HDR approach - capturing 2 avi's; one which had the highlights overexposed, and one which was slightly underexposed. I processed them both identically, and combined them using layer masks in photoshop - similar to how we do it to reveal the core of M42 with shorter exposures.
It allowed me to get the histogram just right and have a better dynamic range without blowing out the highlights. It seemed to work fairly well and is something i'll do again in future when the subject needs it.
On Wilhelm, I like the banded contrast across the crater floor, due to the rays from Tycho splashing out.
MAP processing, about 200 frames stacked on each alignment point (between 4-8 alignment points).
3 more nice images im going to pick tycho as my favorite, the mountain looks superb with the angle of lighting. the hdr seems to work. lots of craters on plato there too, always an indication of a good image
Thanks guys. The HDR adds quite a bit of time to the final image (duplicating the capture, and the processing, and then combining), but it's worth it on those targets where the illumination creates a very bright side and a very dark side.
Tycho and Wilhelm probably could've been captured with just one avi at a lower exposure and brightened afterwards, but I used the HDR technique more for practise and the end result of the combined avi's did have more breadth to the histogram than the single capture.
nice images there mike. i'm loving the craters on the floor of plato.
what you could try is a third exposure for somewhere in the middle of the other two. then bring the other two exposures 'further away' from correct. that way you could get an even higher dynamic range. kind of like doing a three bracket exposure on the DSLR's. that could yield some interesting results.
