AMcD

No problem, glad it helped. This method has improved guiding on my mount significantly.

Final piece of remote equipment installed. The all sky camera let’s me confirm that, when the CloudWatcher says it is clear, it is ‘AP clear’ rather than ‘high wispy cirrus clear’. The images are also strangely relaxing to watch come in.

The final version of my image of the Cygnus Wall in NGC7000 comprising 24.6hrs of 300 sec subframes taken using a QHY8 OSC with an Optolong L-Extreme filter on a TS152 achromatic refractor mounted on a Losmandy G11. Integrations acquired using SGPro guided with PHD2 from Bortle 5 skies. Stacked with flat frames in DSS (the QHY8 does not ordinarily need darks). Processing in PS. The 32 bit DSS tiff file was cropped, rotated, a medium/medium Gradient Exterminator applied, adjusted in levels and converted to a 16 bit tiff file in 'Gamma and Exposure'. Three 'Curves' stretches were then applied to the 16 bit tiff file, followed each time by adjustment of the black point in 'Levels'. Noel Carboni's Astronomy Actions for PS was then used ('Enhance DSO and Reduce Stars' / 'Local Contrast Enhancement' / 'Reduce Stars / 'Fade Sharpen to Mostly Lighten'). 'Select and Mask' was used to sharpen selected edges. Final tweaks in PS with 'Colour Balance'. 'Hue and Saturation' and 'Brightness and Contrast'. Tiff and PNG versions below: NGC7000_DSS_LFStack_24.6hrs.tif

Trying, and failing, to emulate the Hubble 😂

Unexpected clear skies after heavy rain. Hoping to get to twenty four hours of integrations on the Cygnus Wall. Have a good night if you are looking up 🤩 c

Been there, done that 😄

No, not me @LondonNeil! I am an amateur with a particular interest in astrophotography. If your children get the astronomy bug it can be an interest for life. My parents bought me a 3" Tasco refractor when I was 8 years old or so and I am still fascinated by the hobby at the age of 51. I remember that the instruction booklet for the Tasco said that passion for the hobby of astronomy may wax and wain over the course of your life but it will never leave you completely. That has certainly been true for me. I put aside the hobby in my twenties and early thirties as life, career etc. took over, but found my way back to it in my late thirties. A change of job six years ago gave me more time to dedicate to it and I have just set up a remotely controlled observatory so that I can take the hobby of AP with me, as it were. The other great virtue of the hobby of astronomy is that it gives one a wonderfully sobering perspective on our place in the universe, as the great Carl Sagan articulated so beautifully in the Pale Blue Dot: Good luck with your search for a scope.

I get a lot of assistance from Trevor Jones on his Astro Backyard YouTube channel from Canada (AstroBackyard - YouTube), both with respect to acquisition and processing. I get a lot of amusement and some valuable tips, again on both acquisition and processing, from Dylan O'Donnell on his Star Stuff channel from Australia (Dylan O'Donnell - YouTube).

I think this is as far as I can push it. Now that I am at nearly 20 hours of integrations, it would seem a shame not to have another go once I get to twenty-four. I think then I really need to look to another target for the oncoming winter. Many thanks again to @Padraic M, @steppenwolf and @carastro for all the exceptionally valuable advice. NGC7000_DSS_LStack_19.9hrs_Final.tif

Many thanks, @Padraic M for the detailed response. Interestingly, in PS there does not appear to be as much unused dynamic range available when Levels is selected but I will seek to extract some more contrast. Many thanks again for the valuable advice.,

Many thanks @steppenwolf. I have this morning added in the 2.5hrs of integrations I acquired last night and I have restacked the totality of the integrations to retain 95% of the data, resulting in a total time for the image of 19.9hrs. On the advice of @carastro and yourself, I have stayed away from aggressive noise reduction and voila. Hopefully this is travelling in the right direction... NGC7000_DSS_LStack_19.9hrs_Final.tif

Many thanks Bryan. I think it is the noise reduction. The autofocus on SGPro appears to be working pretty well, and far better than the Bhatinov mask that I used up until recently. Managed a further 2.5 hrs on this target in the wee small hours so will have another crack at it this weekend.

Many thanks @Ouroboros. I am still in awe of the fact that it is possible to capture these views of the Universe from the back garden!

Many thanks Carole. I am trying to absorb the mantra "less is more"! The skies are not bad here tonight so am acquiring some more data and will have another crack at it over the weekend. Many thanks again.

A further attempt to process my 13.3 hours worth of data on the Cygnus Wall acquired with a QHY8 with Optolong L-Extreme filter on a TS152 achromat mounted on a G11 Any criticism much appreciated as keen to get better...

After a number of weeks operating my RRO observatory remotely whilst working away, the utility of an All Sky Camera has become increasingly apparent as what the weather apps say and what the weather is actually doing are not always the same. The Lunatico CloudWatcher provides the 'macroscopic' picture for safety purposes but not the detail. For some reason, regular calls home to ask my wife to "just check the sky" are not met with enthusiasm. Whilst I greatly admire those who have built their own, I have decided to buy an off the shelf solution in the form of a Starlight Xpress Oculus (apparently, FLO has over 10,000 in stock 😂). Before I press 'buy', is anyone able to assist with the respective advantages / disadvantages of the 180 degree and the 150 degree lens? I know the latter is f 1.2, which seems advantageous from a light gathering perspective. Apart from a very big tree next to the observatory I have a relatively open horizon above city centre roof tops and plan to mount the camera on a pole such that it will be approximately 3 metres off the ground.

Very nice indeed. Glad to see the G11 is working out so well...

I have added a further ten hours of data to this image, making a total of 17.5hrs of 5 minute integrations taken with a QHY8 OSC on a TS152 achromatic refractor with an Optolong L-Extreme filter. Guided with PHD2 on a Losmandy G11 mount. The ten hours of additional data were captured during the first attempt at fully emote operation of my ROR observatory in Worcester whilst away at work in London. Acquired using SGPro and stacked with darks, flats and bias frames in DSS. Best 75% of the integrations stacked, resulting in an image comprising a total integration time of 13.3hrs. Processed in Photoshop. Tif File: NGC7000_DSS_LDFB_Stack_13.5hrs_Final.tif

The observatory upgrade project appears to have passed the final test. Over the course of the past two nights I have managed to obtain a further ten hours of data on the Cygnus Wall whilst working away from home. I was able to access the observatory over the Internet on my iPad, set the sequence running and go to bed. Whilst I was asleep the scope gathered 5 hours of integrations, re-focused every hour and performed a Meridian flip before the telescope parked itself at the end of the session and the observatory closed the roof. I appreciate this post risks sounding rather too boastful, but I am just amazed it worked. There was something very surreal about looking at Deneb from our balcony in London whilst the scope was pointed at from the Midlands.😃

Many thanks Lee. I have cropped it in. I have been experimenting with putting a black border around the image in PS so I wonder whether the think pink line is an artefact associated with the borders between layers. The line is not apparent in the Tif file when I open it in PS so it might also be a function of converting the Tif to a JPEG for posting on SGL. I too noticed the brighter edges to the image. The strange thing is that they were at the edges of the original and appeared to move in when I cropped off the stacking artefacts 🤔. The weather tonight is looking half promising for more data - although presumably there is a law of diminishing returns that operates?

I managed to get five more hours of data on the Cygnus Wall last night from Worcester city centre, which I have spent the day combining with the three hours of data I gathered during the course of last week. This second version of the image now comprises 8 hours of 5 min subs taken using a QHY8 OSC camera with an Optolong L-Extreme filter on a TS152 achromatic refractor mounted on a Losmandy G11. Acquisition was undertaken using SGPro guided in PHD2. Stacking was done in DSS and processing was undertaken in Photoshop - details below image. As always, constructive criticism most welcome. Many thanks for looking. Cygnus Wall 26-29.8.21 Final Version.tif ACQUISITION: Luminance Frames: 5 minute subframes with an Optolong L-Extreme filter. QHY8 Gain 0 / Offset 120 Flat Frames: 3.65s exposures on flats panel set to high (resulting in an ADU of 16000 against FWC for QHY8 of 25,000). Bias Frames: Taken at 0.000032 seconds. STACKING IN DSS Stack settings: "Average" for all sub-frames. PROCESSING IN ADOBE PHOTOSHOP Cropped the image to remove stacking artefacts so as not to affect the histogram during processing. Removed gradient using medium/medium in Gradient Exterminator, feathered at 55px. Applied levels to set black point for each channel. Converted to a 16 bit TIFF file using "Local Adaption" in HFR. Set the black point using 'Levels' in each channel. Stretched the image using curves. Further adjusted black point levels and repeated stretches using curves as necessary. Moved to Carboni's Astronomy Actions to reduce stars and enhance contrast. Applied a fine / low Gradient removal using Gradient Exterminator. Re-checked levels and colour balance.

Deeply impressive, epic work.

Great image. It is also incredibly helpful to those of us still getting to grips with PixInsight that you set out your processing workflow in such detail.👌

Many thanks for the feedback Lee, which is much appreciated. I am planning further integrations tonight if the forecast clear skies arrive after midnight to combine with my current data. With respect to the colour, I find the question objective "truth" versus subjective preference one of the hardest to answer when processing. This version represents my subjective preference. I will play around with the colour again once I have more data. Finally, it has just occurred to me that the picture rather resembles a Labrador looking up, lovingly, at its owner...😃 Thanks again for the comments.

An image of the Cygnus Wall in NGC7000 taken from Worcester city centre with a QHY8 and an Optolong L-Extreme filter using a TS 152 achromatic refractor mounted on a Losmandy G11. Three and a half hours of 5 min subframes. Acquired using SGPro, guided using PHD2, stacked in DSS and processed in Photoshop. Constructive criticism very welcome...