While waiting for a clear night, I thought of trying to combine my old substandard data for this target (5-minute subs with distorted stars) and also new better quality data (10-minute subs).
All up about 9 hours of Ha, captured with my trusty and hard to replace 4" doublet from Paddington in Bris Vegas.
There are some lovely super-faint wisps in the far outskirts which are out of field in our shot. There are more of those tiny rice-grain nebulous blobs such as the one to the right of Thor's Other Helmet - glowing Bok globules perhaps - in the far bottom right.
One of the things that first most strongly attracted me as a nipper to astronomy is that what we read in our How and Why Wonder Books was really and truly up there (unlike just about everything else we're taught). It's nice to see that still applies - what's up there is repeatable and true - even if one uses a telescope.
I have a long way to go yet, both with this image and in astrophotography in general, but a real possibility of an improvement, no matter where you are at, is IMO one of the best aspects of this addiction of ours
Looking really good Suavi, pin point stars all over the place.. what more could one ask for
Thank you Colin. Actually, since the new mount guides more consistently, I have noticed a slight tilt in the optical train that was hidden before due to less accurate guiding...
Talk about sharp! Wow. Excellent combination of old and new. Do you plan anything further with the image? RGB or NB?
Peter
Thank you Peter for your encouragement
Collecting more Ha as we speak, and hoping to at least collect OIII data as well before the end of January. RGB is forbidden for me for two reasons: heavy light pollution and my doublet has significant CA at f/5.6.
This Forum needs a "Like" button
Well done Suavi - it will be interesting to see what colour map/mix you create.
I have personally struggled with getting the colour balance right this one - Paul Haese did a very nice rendition last year though, maybe that's a guide?
Thank you Andy, Louie and Simon for encouraging me
Last night, in spite of pesky low clouds and horrible seeing, I decided to try to collect more data. After combining what I have managed to get so far (but not including old data), it can be noticed that in spite of lower noise, the image is now washed out (or maybe I am just seeing things). Seeing is everything!
If there is poor transparency (cloud effected) it'll destroy your low signal areas.
Agree. The thing is most of the data was collected between 30 to 40 degrees altitude and just over a hot roof of a neighbouring house, so not ideal anyway. Will experiment with combining all data I have and see whether the final result is okay. If yes, I could move on to OIII.
... Last night, in spite of pesky low clouds and horrible seeing, I decided to try to collect more data. After combining what I have managed to get so far (but not including old data), it can be noticed that in spite of lower noise, the image is now washed out (or maybe I am just seeing things). Seeing is everything!
G'day, Suavi,
I agree that in principle bad data can make things worse, and I've had to throw out whole nights for that reason, but in this case, there's no doubt in my mind: the 7.8 hrs is far better. Not just the greatly reduced noise, but the stars are sharper, and the faint wispy features are greatly improved in clarity. The slight overall milkiness is fixed in seconds by adjusting the zero point.
Thank you for your very kind feedback and for your advice
In the end I combined all Ha data (765 minutes) with drizzle integration. I think the overall result is not that bad after all, so I will start collecting OIII, probably after Xmas though.
A quick update. The Ha integration is now up to 14.4 hours, but it looks like collecting O3 and S2 will need to wait for another season. Anyway, it was fun trying to reveal as much as possible in this fascinating patch of the sky from my location and with my 4" doublet.
