Tarantula region work in progress

[Lester]

Hi all,

got this one a few nights ago. It is 113 exposures from 10 seconds to 5 minutes taken with Takahashi 160mm F3.3 Astrograph and Astro 40D at ISO 1600.

Large image is full size.
http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...s/aa361e06.jpg

Small image is about half size
http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...s/710f4b71.jpg

[midnight (Darrin)]

There's a fair bit of activity going on in there Lester! It's a nice field.

How are you finding the Astro 40D at 1600 ISO?

Cheers,
Darrin...

[ReaPerMan (Paul)]

Very Nice Pic, I love this Neb.

Merry Xmas

Paul

[Lester]

Thanks Darrin and Paul for your comments.
Darrin the Astro 40D is good at ISO 1600 with not much deteriation from ISO 800 to 1600. It does get a lot grainier at ISO 3200 .

Merry Chistmas. All the best.

[RickS (Rick)]

Great wide-field shots Lester! You should have a go at a mosaic.

[Lester]

Thanks Rick for your comments. There hasn't been enough clear nights in a row for a mosaic. Lucky to get 2 nights per month. Hope it improves soon.

All the best.

[strongmanmike (Michael)]

Hey Lester, what is an Astro 40D exactly...?

Mike

[TrevorW]

Nice one Lester is there a touch of green in the image ?

[Lester]

Thanks Mike and Trevor for your comments.

Mike a Astro 40D has been modified by Central DS in Korea, filter changed within the camera and a peltier fitted to cool to 17 degrees below ambient.
http://www.centralds.net/en/products-x.htm#astro40d

Hi Trevor I will have another go at processing this image and look at the colour balance.

Thanks, all the best.

[Lester]

I have adjusted the colour slightly.

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...s/088ba968.jpg

[TrevorW]

A very busy area for a widefield, the repo looks better IMO but it probably won't be the last

[strongmanmike (Michael)]

Hmmm so the camera is modified and cooled? Then I am surprised that you haven't captured more fainter stuff actually...?

When you aggressively stretch the raw composite, do you see much faint nebulosity?

Mike

[mill (Martin)]

Lester there is much more data hidden in it.
I did a bit of processing on the jpg file and put it on my website if you don't mind (compressing to 200Kb made it bad).

http://martinsastro.net/displayimage..._display_media

See what you think about it.

[Lester]

Thanks for your comments Trevor, Mike and Martin. Thanks for the repro Martin, that will give me something to compare to. As Trevor said there will be more repoing on this data.

[Bassnut (Fred)]

geez, I dunno Lester, I like your pics from the 14" more, your better at NF.

[alan meehan (Alan)]

Hi Lester a lovely shot of the tarantula such a twisted and tortured area,got to love that cooled 40d
AL

[Lester]

Thanks Fred and Alan for your comments. To be honest I think it is my lack of processing skills limiting this image. I find it hard to keep the colour range within the brighter areas as I stretch the image. I use curves and anchor the bright areas so they do not get burnt out. Martins repro on my Jpeg is better than what I have come up with. Comments welcome.

Here is my try from this evening.
http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...s/826e0ad0.jpg

[Lester]

Here is another attempt at processing this area. Comments welcome.

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...s/2f8fa0b0.jpg

[Mighty_oz (Marcus)]

Now if u could just add those last 2 together i think u may have something there

[mill (Martin)]

Lester try to use only levels first, it won't burn out the core and keeps the stars smaller.
Then you can use curves and Shadows/highlights.