NGC-6559 and friends with TV genesis

[Garyh]

Hi all again...
Getting a bit bored with all this bad weather/jetstream etc over the last month, I decided to dig into some old raws that I might not have processed. There are plenty of them but mostly with bad focus, framing and bad seeing. Came across this lot of ngc6559, IC4685,IC1275, IC1274 plus a globular cluster which I don`t know the NGC number too..
Focus was a bit soft and the framing not the best but I decided to give it a go...Didn`t come out too bad...... Not sure if my color balance as there seems alot of blue reflection neb in there, more than I have noticed in others images of this.
Ok details are: 10 x 5 min at iso 800 with Df subtracted, stacked in deepskystacker and processed in PS..
Taken with my 100mm f/5 Tv genesis and modded 300D..
Any comments on my processing/etc of this very appreciated.
Image about 600k in size.....
Cheers Gary

http://www.iceinspace.com.au/uploads...275-IC1274.jpg

[leon]

Cant complain about that one Gary, Its amazing what you find in that computer when there is not much else to do, well done.

Leon

[jase (Jason)]

Great image Gary.

The image is well composed and flows well. I enjoy the dark lane that spreads diagonally from center to lower right. It’s a nice feature and provides an interesting perspective. I tried rotating the image a few ways. I actually prefer the image flipped horizontally – this puts the tight star cluster up in the right top corner and serves as a reference point. This may upset the composition purist, but when your goal is taking pretty pictures there are no boundaries.

You’re right on the money regarding the blue nebulosity. While its there, it is typically not as strongly pronounced as it is in your image. I attribute this to background sky neutralisation or lack of. You could perhaps slightly boost yellow in colour balance - shadows, but be careful as you’ll then introduce hints of green (easily seen when equalized). You may also lose some nebulosity as a result. So you could try an alternative method of duplicating the original layer, then only dropping the blue curves and blending the original. You could also select the area you want to drop, but you need to fine-tune your feathering to ensure you don’t affect other details in the image.

Stars look round and tight. I would have thought the small star cluster would resolve better – this could simply be seeing related or your image sampling (arcsec/pix). Do you use any form of deconvolution in your processing routine (either LR or MaxEntropy)? This may bring out subtle details after you’ve made an initial data stretch, but before you’re final stretch. Don’t stretch to your final level immediately as this may result in clipping with other processing events. I think your star colour balance is looking good.

Good work and look forward to seeing more.

[Ric]

What a lovely image Gary, very enjoyable to view. Everything is so crisp and clear.

Cheers

[skeltz (Rob)]

ONYA gary nice pic
yeah the weather sucks and when it hasn,t been bad.
i have pulled of the cover of my stl11000 and put it back on only to have the connector plug on the pcb dislodge itself twice and its not something you can fix

[iceman (Mike)]

That's a beautiful area of sky captured nicely, Gary. I love the dark lanes.

[Garyh]

Originally Posted by leon

Cant complain about that one Gary, Its amazing what you find in that computer when there is not much else to do, well done.

Leon

Thanks Leon... yeah found lots of pics to play with during bad weather, but nothing to write home about..but good to practice processing!!
cheers.

Originally Posted by jase

Great image Gary.

The image is well composed and flows well. I enjoy the dark lane that spreads diagonally from center to lower right. It’s a nice feature and provides an interesting perspective. I tried rotating the image a few ways. I actually prefer the image flipped horizontally – this puts the tight star cluster up in the right top corner and serves as a reference point. This may upset the composition purist, but when your goal is taking pretty pictures there are no boundaries.

You’re right on the money regarding the blue nebulosity. While its there, it is typically not as strongly pronounced as it is in your image. I attribute this to background sky neutralisation or lack of. You could perhaps slightly boost yellow in colour balance - shadows, but be careful as you’ll then introduce hints of green (easily seen when equalized). You may also lose some nebulosity as a result. So you could try an alternative method of duplicating the original layer, then only dropping the blue curves and blending the original. You could also select the area you want to drop, but you need to fine-tune your feathering to ensure you don’t affect other details in the image.

Stars look round and tight. I would have thought the small star cluster would resolve better – this could simply be seeing related or your image sampling (arcsec/pix). Do you use any form of deconvolution in your processing routine (either LR or MaxEntropy)? This may bring out subtle details after you’ve made an initial data stretch, but before you’re final stretch. Don’t stretch to your final level immediately as this may result in clipping with other processing events. I think your star colour balance is looking good.

Good work and look forward to seeing more.

Thanks Jase for the detailed reply, I shall give some of your suggestions a go..might try the color select tool and select the darker areas to color balance. I thought it looked a bit blue!! Didn`t do any deconvolution on this one, though I did give it a go on a copy of it. Wasn`t too happy with it as ended up with those dark circles around the brighter stars and I couldn`t be bothered redoing it again so stuck to the original image.
Rez would be around 3.5-4 arc secs per pixel I think and I don`t think the seeing was the best either!!!
Thanks again Jase for your comments, it all helps in the never ending learning curve!!

Originally Posted by Ric

What a lovely image Gary, very enjoyable to view. Everything is so crisp and clear.

Cheers

Thanks ric for the nice comments..., I think it is often overlooked being so close to M8...cheers

Originally Posted by rpsastronomy

ONYA gary nice pic
yeah the weather sucks and when it hasn,t been bad.
i have pulled of the cover of my stl11000 and put it back on only to have the connector plug on the pcb dislodge itself twice and its not something you can fix

Thanks Skelty!!! I agree with what you say about the weather!!! so much poor seeing up here lately and you can only take so many wideangle shots!! though I do enjoy wideangle stuff!!!
Hope you get that connector fixed up before the seeing is good!!
cheers

Originally Posted by iceman

That's a beautiful area of sky captured nicely, Gary. I love the dark lanes.

Thanks Mike for the comment... I might have framed the original target badly but those dark lanes of dust do add nicely to the image!!
Thanks again everyone...:thu mbsup:
cheers Gary

[Dr Nick (Nick)]

Nice pic!