M8 Lagoon

[rogerg (Roger)]

Very nice image. The pink is a little unusual but looks great still. Such smooth nebulosity and sharp round stars.

[Paul Haese]

Ok taken a few things on board and did tried them out and here is the image as version number 8. Not sure about it myself. It remains smooth but looks over cooked to me. Opinions would be welcome. There is more detail now but is that at a price?

[TrevorW]

prefer the first this has a greenish tinge in the stars IMO and not as smooth as the first

[Paul Haese]

You are right Trevor, that is disasterous. I think this image is better. I am thinking it is my final process with this data at present. It is contrasty, has better yellow stars and less pink and salmon. What do you all think?

[CoolhandJo (Paul)]

Like the first one

[Peter Ward]

Paul....I really like this rendition.

I tend to think the outer extremes of M8 are more red, and the inner, more magenta (due H-Beta) but this is neither here nor there.

With M8 it's often a case of dealer's choice, but the fact of the matter is, you have nailed the focus, guiding and colour extremely well. A top shelf result for sure! The world doesn't need more fuzzy M8's

Well done

[gregbradley]

Yep that is pretty close to spot on. There is a transition of magenta at the edges of the neb. On a really long exposure of the Lagoon you'll see a blue haze around its perimeter. Its a band of reflection nebula and it is blue like the Trifid only very hazy and very dim. The magenta is showing there is some blue there but is skewed to the red.

Perhaps selective colour and blues/magentas can be played with to shift that shade there.

Greg.

[Paul Haese]

Thanks Peter, much appreciated.

Greg, I don't know if you can see it on my image but the blue is sort of present. I might try doing a lot more subs in the blue channel and maybe some more in the Ha. Just to really bring out the blue and smooth out the tiny bit of noise in this image. I looked at Wolfgang Promper's image of this target and the reflection blue is really quite evident.

[strongmanmike (Michael)]

Nice job Paul, a striking image, again, with a bit of that solid plastic look (not really a critisism)

If I may give you a bit of feedback though... your processing here is juuuust verging on having an obvious processed look to it. This isn't always a issue and many fine images are not of "natural" look or colour but the colour hues here look just a bit out to me so as not to render it as eye pleasing as it could be... with the reds looking a little burnt orangy purpleish..y , the colours kind of clash and don't go...in a fashion sense . It looks just a bit clipped in the outer regions too? As has been mentioned M8 has a lovely soft blue hazzy nebulousity surrounding and in front of it too and this looks beautiful when captured.

Hope I don't sound picky or waffly...The lagoon is a striking object and you have certainly done this aspect plenty of justice...I am sure Marc just loves it ..but hopefully these observations are of some use

Mike

[Lester]

Looks very nice to me Paul.

[Paul Haese]

Mike I can see where you are coming from. When I view the image on the screen I have I can see the blue and yes there is an orangy thing going on that I just cannot seem to shake. This might work out better when I get the final lot of data in the coming month. During the reprocess I will keep an eye out for the native things about this image that attract everyones eye.

Thanks Lester.

[Dean]

nice work

[TheDecepticon]

Good job, Paul! I like them all!!