First go at Eta Carina

RobF (Rob) · #1 13-01-2009, 01:03 AM

Shot this late last year, but have been struggling to understand and come to grips with a few new processing tricks. Unmodded 450D, so lots of green coming through (O III ?). I think I like the mix of different colours though.

Gives me a real kick to be able to "see" so much more than I've ever been able to through the scope in this amazing part of the sky.

5 x 4 min subs, flats, ICNR, autoguided

Screwdriverone (Chris) · #2 13-01-2009, 07:23 AM

Nice one Rob,

A little green, but it looks good, stars are sharp and plenty of detail there.

Well done, I like it!

Cheers

Chris

multiweb (Marc) · #3 13-01-2009, 07:41 AM

Nice shot Rob

I like the colours. Sharp and focused.

rastis95 (Scott) · #4 13-01-2009, 08:13 AM

Nice shot, looks sharp, wondering if anymore data would help ?. Still learning myself but great shot.

Cheers
Scott

CoolhandJo (Paul) · #5 13-01-2009, 09:33 AM

Nice wide shot. Stars are pretty sharp also. The big difference between your DSLR and a DSI can be seen by the image I took (attached) of the same nebula in April this year. FOV difference is amazing!

TrevorW · #6 13-01-2009, 10:22 AM

Nice image maybe go a bit deeper on the colour IMO

jjjnettie (Jeanette) · #7 13-01-2009, 10:48 AM

Fantastic work!
How did you achieve focus?

Octane (Humayun) · #8 13-01-2009, 10:55 PM

Rob,

That's a magnificent effort for a first go at a challenging object.

With the data that you currently have, take it back to Photoshop and try and play around with the levels and curves -- the image could do with a bit of contrast.

Other than that, you've done great!

Regards,
Humayun

gregbradley · #9 13-01-2009, 11:06 PM

An amazing image for a first go at it. I wish my first goes at it looked anything like that!

Try 20 x 4 minutes or even 5 minute subexposures, perhaps even longer depending on how much light pollution you face. The darker the skies
the longer the subexposures with a DSLR. You are limited by light pollution (called sky fog in DSLR talk) to how long an exposure you can take
in suburban skies.

Longer total exposure is almost always better.

Greg.

mill (Martin) · #10 13-01-2009, 11:09 PM

Very nice image and plenty of detail.
Been stuffing around and came up with this if you dont mind.
Levels,highlights,saturation and contrast in CS4

RobF (Rob) · #11 14-01-2009, 12:15 AM

Many thanks for all the encouragement guys.

Chris - green from the unmodded camera and blue from the IDAS filter something I'm still learning to handle successfully I guess

Mark - thanks for looking

Scott - More data is always good of course - have to confess I botched 4 additional subs on this one with bad focus and forgetting to recalibrate PHD for move to a new part of the sky...

Paul - FOV difference interesting - I look upon the ED80 widefield shots of Eta posted here with interest/envy sometimes! We can always go crazy with mosaics I s'pose....

Trevor - thanks - definitely still a beginner at processing, but slowly learning

Jeanette - have been framing and rough focusing on object, saving position, then fine focusing on a bright star like Archenar with Liveview trying to get nice fine diffraction spikes, then moving back to saved position and shooting subs. Must have a go at a Bhatinov mask sometime, but happy doing this for now

Humayun - thanks for the kind words - Photoshop still a beast for me - I'm sure better is possible, but some early efforts I made on this one were pretty scarey looking!

Greg - I'm starting to get more confidence in what's possible, but still "hedge my bets" most sessions by shooting half as much data on 2 objects. I can usually salvage something from a night that way.....

Martin - many thanks - I've never had an image that warranted a "remix" before - I certainly couldn't get that depth of colour when I was at it! Loved your recent Eta widefields!

Cheers,
Rob