Flames of Carina

[Andy01 (Andy)]

Resembling a Burning tree in a raging Australian bushfire, the hydrogen "Flames" of Carina appear to burn brightly in the Southern portion of the Great Carina Nebula.

Located 10.000 ly distant and nearly four times the size of the Orion Nebula, this is one of the largest HII regions of the Milky Way.

First use of the TOA/FS .78 reducer - I like the one stop speed advantage, but pixel peepers will notice a little residual tilt top right.

Taken from my light polluted suburban backyard in Melbourne, Australia.
12 hrs Ha/O3/S2 & an hour's RGB for the stars.

ASTROBIN

My son thinks it resembles a maple leaf, what can you see?

[strongmanmike (Michael)]

Yeah, viewing the full resolution version, the coma is pretty obvious in the whole outer area (least in lower left corner) but at fit to screen resolution view, it looks ok bit of spacing adjustment needed I guess? Lovely colour palette though, and the ROG judges might'a liked the wild fire connection too..but you probably need to remove the stars, colourise it all orange-red and apply some unnatural sharpening filter to the whole scene to make it look more like flames good Melbournian imaging there Andy

[matlud (Mathew)]

Very nice Andy. The big sensors certainly take some taming. Nice tonality and love the detail on the small molecular clouds -did you deconvolve this or just use Topaz for the sharpening on this?

[Andy01 (Andy)]

Originally Posted by strongmanmike

Yeah, viewing the full resolution version, the coma is pretty obvious in the whole outer area (least in lower left corner) but at fit to screen resolution view, it looks ok bit of spacing adjustment needed I guess? Lovely colour palette though, and the ROG judges might'a liked the wild fire connection too..but you probably need to remove the stars, colourise it all orange-red and apply some unnatural sharpening filter to the whole scene to make it look more like flames good Melbournian imaging there Andy

Cheers Mike - just letting pareidolia do it's thing when this familiar target is presented at a different orientation. As to ROG? Well who knows what they like? I missed out altogether this year!

Originally Posted by matlud

Very nice Andy. The big sensors certainly take some taming. Nice tonality and love the detail on the small molecular clouds -did you deconvolve this or just use Topaz for the sharpening on this?

Cheers Matthew, while Topaz NR is a regular part of my workflow, no sharpening or decon settings were used whatsoever. (I'm not generating artificial details, and couldn't be bothered dealing with the continuous grief from the luddite club )

[h0ughy (David)]

Any photon captured is a happy grab given the lack of opportunity lately. I wouldn't be baging Luddites if I were you, not all Luddites are illiterate people, generally quite the opposite. I was dragged kicking and screaming into the world of controlling the mount from the computer, which is a feat in itself as connecting the abacus was interesting. Sometime the art of enjoyment is just accepting the simple things in life.

As for the image, interesting framing , were you going to do some other panels?

[miki63au]

A great a picture Andy, thanks for sharing. I do like the framing, placing the nebula in front of thousands of stars in the background gives a perspective of space. (Not sure if I worded that right )

[Andy01 (Andy)]

Originally Posted by h0ughy

As for the image, interesting framing , were you going to do some other panels?

No, this is it - the intention of the image is to provide an unusual view of an all too familiar object, letting the mind interpret the shapes & forms within ie: Pareidolia. In this case I see the burning tree, and the maple leaf, others say they have seen a human face & body. Not knocking the technically minded, but having something other than technicalities to talk about when critiquing an image can help make it more accessible and interesting for everyone, especially if they are unfamiliar with AP

Originally Posted by miki63au

A great a picture Andy, thanks for sharing. I do like the framing, placing the nebula in front of thousands of stars in the background gives a perspective of space. (Not sure if I worded that right )

Many thanks Mik.
Yes indeed, getting a sense of cosmic scale and depth is important too - good pickup!