Repro - tried Greg's suggestion re increasing star colour and using the sponge tool to buff up the brighter stars.
There's a wee bit of a difference - gives the image a bit of a lift I think. But you would probably have to do a blink comparison to appreciate it!!!
The sponge tool works well on the brighter stars - think I'll use that technique routinely in my processing workflow...cheers Greg!
Doug
mmm, 2 things, the thumbnail is nothing like the hi res version, an initial dissapointment, just dont bother with that for quality DSLR images IMO. AND, sport, could I take a wild guess and say you applied min filter to the whole image ?, bad call, woefull.
...AND, sport, could I take a wild guess and say you applied min filter to the whole image ?, bad call, woefull.
Do you mean the High Res version Fred?
Applied a "smaller stars" action which uses the min filter heavily I think.
Is that what you mean?
Any criticism from experienced guys is constructive in my book.
Cheers
Doug
Yes, the hi res version. Hey, I use min filter too, but ONLY on the stars after selecting them, its so bleedin obvious on a whole image and kills it with strange stringy artifacts. Mike Sidonio used to hammer me into the dirt for it, he hates it alltogether. Sorry to be savage, but its a heavy filter that should be sneaked in on stars only if you really must.
Yes, the hi res version. Hey, I use min filter too, but ONLY on the stars after selecting them, its so bleedin obvious on a whole image and kills it with strange stringy artifacts. Mike Sidonio used to hammer me into the dirt for it, he hates it alltogether. Sorry to be savage, but its a heavy filter that should be sneaked in on stars only if you really must.
Thanks for the heads up Fred - I've been using that kind of filter a lot lately, and I know what you mean about that stringy "snot" artifact!!!
Small stars look like they begin to join up to form filaments rather than discreet points. Looks passable from a distance but crappy when you zoom in.
Cheers for being a savage
Doug
Geez Fred tell us what you really think - thats OK, bikie gang on the way. Hehehe
You're right though Minium filter is a savage beast. The Noel Carboni action uses it but I think it also selects stars first. I sometimes use it on a single star.
Though you get a better result by using deconvolution. With a one shot colour you may need to make a duplicate copy/desaturate to make it black and white. Then run deconvolution (not a Photoshop tool though) and then use that as a luminance.
When I use deconvolution (on RGB and Luminance masters) I use CCDstack and I pick a star with the lowest FWHM (full width half maximum - a measure of how "tight" the star is) and use only about 40 iterations (number of times it repeats the action).
If you overdo deconvolution you get harshed out stars so its a bit of trial and error.
Then relayer (in Photoshop) in the "luminance" layer you created above into your one shot colour RGB to get tighter stars and set the layer to "luminosity" and adjust the slider to suit.
There's no way around it - you're heading down the several hours of processing time for each image path.
I regularly use the same method as Greg described in his previous post to reduce star sizes, however, rather than copy/pasting the entire RGB image, then desaturating, I often do the R G B channels separately, as they all react differently to the filter, so I process each channel to its own merits, then re-combine them in PS later. Usually taking the R channel, doing a little more work to make sure thats perfect and using that as Lum...
I love this image of yours doug, a few more tweaks here and there and Im going to want an A3 print...
What's wrong with the minimum filter? Sure it butchers stars, but you don't use it to 100% opacity. Immediately after applying it, go to the edit menu and select Fade. Drop it down between 40 to 60 percent. It will just tighten them up a little. Subtlety is the key with processing.
Really grand image Doug. 280mm frames the target exceptionally well. You got any of your ED80 data there of Eta? Make a hybrid image by registering some of the data to incorporate into the key features. Just blend it in as another layer. It will pack the image with some resolution punch and beats trying to sharpen details that aint really there to begin with. Don't worry about incorporating the stars, just use a mask to tweak the nebulosity details.
Thanks for sharing this visual treat. Keep up the good work...and yes...3 hour total integration time images from now on please.
What's wrong with the minimum filter? Sure it butchers stars, but you don't use it to 100% opacity. Immediately after applying it, go to the edit menu and select Fade. Drop it down between 40 to 60 percent. It will just tighten them up a little. Subtlety is the key with processing.
Really grand image Doug. 280mm frames the target exceptionally well.
Thanks jase - must admit I get a little bit carried away with the processing side of things and don't always stick to a rigid processing workflow! In this case I think I used the min filter and faded it as you suggested early in the piece - all the subsequent tweaking has only served to accent and highlight the artefacts caused by this filter.
For me it's a balance between the dodgy stars and the lovely wispy nebular detail! Going to try a repro now with all this in mind!
Doug
