NGC6960 - Witch's Broom

[Dann]

I was planning on 4 hours of exposure time for this as I wanted to try putting together an image taken over a few nights (not something I have tried yet)

I couldn't resist processing what I already have.

My processing has a lot to answer for, I was looking for something that might thin out the star field a little as I think it distracts from the Broom but I couldn't find a way. I'm quite pleased mind for my second guided image.

Feel free to play and as always advise is appreciated

17 x 300sec @ ISO 800

8 darks (all I have at this temp at the moment)

flats/bias

[peter shah]

Its such a rich field Dann this one always looks lost in a mass of stars...a super shot i like the colour

[Pavel]

Shot is brilliant for experiments with tools, filters etc.

[Dann]

I kept looking at this at work and the more I looked the worse it got.

This evening I spent a lot longer trying to process the stars and broom on different layers. Its far from amazing but I'm much happier with it now, its incredible how much difference processing can make.

I think I have to do a dodgy process first so that I can work out what's wrong with it, I seem to have done that with all of my images so far. Anyone else the same?

[Grinde]

The star reduction really made a difference pulling the nebula out from the crowded starfield, beautiful photo you should be very happy with

[RobH]

Definite improvement on the second image....nothing much wrong with it now, although adding more subs would help you to bring out the faint regions a bit more.

Cheers

Rob

[Luke]

I much prefer the second Dann, for me it puts the focus on the stunning broom.

I'm still new to processing (tons of data waiting to be processed - bad idea, I know...) but so far I think in terms of layers - What would I like to have independent control of? That needs to go on its own layer. That's how I think anyway and I would be over the moon to at some point get as sweet a broom as this.

I kept looking at this at work and the more I looked the worse it got.

This evening I spent a lot longer trying to process the stars and broom on different layers. Its far from amazing but I'm much happier with it now, its incredible how much difference processing can make.

I think I have to do a dodgy process first so that I can work out what's wrong with it, I seem to have done that with all of my images so far. Anyone else the same?