The photographer is looking for generalized feedback about the aesthetic and technical qualities of their image.
Description
Shot last February, from behind our garage. It was a clear dark night, but we are on the north edge of the light pollution from a town of about 180,000. Looking over the hill toward town (the center is only 7 miles away) the horizon is never even remotely dark.
Specific Feedback
All comments welcome!
Technical Details
About 5 hours of integration – i.e. a bunch of shorter exposures calibrated and stacked with PixInsight, then the integrated file processed with its tools. That is similar to a raw developer and PS in that it is a mix of technology and craft – no auto corrections! There have been some software improvements since then and I should have better tracking now, so I’m hoping for clear dark skies to try it again, although I’m very pleased with what I was able to do.
Great image. I’m really jealous. So, in all, about 5 hours exposure time? What size lens?
The fact that you could get such a clean image inspires me.
Thanks,
Brien
I’m not a night sky photographer, but this shot is truly amazing! I love the colors, and the hidden shapes. It is other worldly, and very impressive. I cannot offer any criticisms, but the fact that you were able to capture this and process it is incredible. And spending 5 hours on it is indeed dedication to your craft of night skies! Brava!
Diane,
I have no idea how you put this all together, but the end result is impressive to say the least. The colors are amazing and the image is other worldly. I can’t image spending five hours on an image, but this was definitely time well spent.
Diane,
That is amazing. Must be so rewarding to get that image after all of the work that you did for it. Also awesome that you can get that from just behind your garage. Something i always think about the night sky, its one of the most amazing natural phenomena and if you have a dark location you can just look up and see it.
Really great image. What type of equipment are you using to capture this type of image. Telescope with attached camera or the type of camera integrated to the telescope? And which tracker would you recommend? Obviously, I’m thinking of getting into this type of photography. Thank you. Robert Engle
The focus of the stars and details in the nebulosity is great! And good control of Altinak not being to bright!
The image seems to have a bit of a blue cast to me, or is it just my eyes?
Did you use separate RGB filters or OAC? Any Ha data? Was it hard to bring out the detail with the light pollution?
This is a target I would like to revisit with my newer camera and upgraded processing skills compared to 2014 when I first captured it.
Robert, I’m about to put a brief description of equipment, capture and processing on my web site. Check it out in a few days. Short list: equatorial tracking mount, Askar FRA400 refractor, astro camera described in response to Kyle’s question.
Kyle, no filters or Ha – I have the ZWO ASI2600MC Pro. For those of you new to astro cameras, it is about the size (and weight) of a larger-sized soup can and captures a color image. It is APS-C sized with 26 MP, has better IR sensitivity than our daylight cameras and is cooled to reduce noise. The telescope is a mid-sized refractor, 400mm equivalent, so this is about a 640mm FOV.
The object is a nebula region around Alnitak, the leftmost star (as we view it) in Orion’s belt. The image is rotated CCW from how we would see it, so would be more logically presented as a vertical. The bright star in the UL is Alnilam, the middle star in the belt.
The red color does seem a bit on the cooler side, and the Flame is rather colorless. I used the color correction process of PixInsight, which uses the actual colors of the stars in the image to give a WB correction. But I don’t know anything about its limitations. I’m still near the base of the learning curve with this stuff.
There is a lot of interest in astrophotography and so much is now accessible to the serious hobbyist photographer. We should start a Discussion on it.
You’re welcome, @robert21 – I have posted a summary of my astro equipment and processes on my web site – the last item in the Tutorials section. I hope it will be of some use.
@Diane_Miller, thank you for more background info on the image. Yes, you are correct on balancing noise and getting detail. I started with a Canon 6D, moved to a ASI1600MM, and now an ASI6200MC. The cooled cameras are far better than a DSLR. The mono ASI1600 was great, but I wanted to move back to a full frame but not spend wicked money rebuying all my filters again. I saw the newer OSC have made great progress from what they used to be, so I switched to the OSC ASI6200MC - it gave me back the full frame view I missed after getting rid of the 6D, and am able to get amazing results with just a dual-band filter.
As for Pixinsight - have you heard of Adam Block Studios? Amazing tutorials! It has taught me so much about Pixinsight over the years.
Good choice of camera, @kyle! Yes, OSC (one shot color, to anyone else reading) is amazing these days. Which filter are you using – or would you recommend? I haven’t gotten into that yet. I’ve thought about the Radian Triad, but don’t know enough about the others.
And yes, Adam Block is the go-to learning source for PI. He is currently improving the organization of his tutorials to keep up with recent developments. PI has gotten so much easier to use in the last couple of years and is still on a roll.
@Diane_Miller, I have the Antlia ALP-T Dualband 5nm. It seems to work well, I have not tried others but have seen a lot of CloudyNights users using Triad filters. The folks at Starizona recommended the Antlia to me when I visited in their store earlier this year.
I am glad Adam is organizing his website. It is getting a bit clunky. It also doesn’t help that I took more than a year off of astrophotography to focus on other stuff since I was in a rut. So much has changed in Pixinsight that I have some learning to do! I plan to get back into it again next spring, as I am starting to miss it but am glad I took some time away from it.
Speaking of Pixinsight, I highly recommend RC Astro’s products, as well! Excellent star removal, noise reduction, and deconvolution. And some of his products also work as plug-ins with Affinity Photo and Photoshop!
Edit: The ASI6200MC & ALP-T Dualband combo is used with my Takahashi FSQ-85. I will likely use it on my 11" Celestron EdgeHD in the future, as well, but love the widefield of the FSQ!
YES to RC Astro! Star removal seemed like such a speed bump before I tried it (as did guiding). His tools are amazing and now incorporated into PI. My workflow has gone from maybe 30 stumbling and uncertain steps several years ago to a smooth flow of a handful of steps now. I run the preprocessing overnight or when I don’t need the computer for a few hours, and can do the final processing in maybe an hour!
You have a wonderful rig! I doubt I’ll ever get into 11" territory. You must have a permanent mount?
@Diane_Miller, I do not have a permanent mount for my 11." I purchased my FSQ-85 last year since I got tired of lugging the 11" around so I no longer use it as my primary scope. I used to use a Celestron CGEM DX for my 11", but now use it on m Nyx-101.
