Autumn's Veil....

[rocketandroll]

Ok, so it is a bit late for anything in Cygnus now but... with it still high enough at my site to get a few hours on it at the moment, I just had to have a first try at the veil nebula... something I've been wanting to shoot all year but only now, with working guiding, can I really manage.

So... the processing on this was a bit of a pfaf and I'm still not 100% happy... but adding in layers to boost the nebula and reduce the stars helped a lot but there's still a bit of a gradient towards the top right and the stars are still a little overpowering... still learning so much with every image!

This was my main target last night, I also did the Perseus double cluster (which I posted earlier) and more data on my M45, which I'll re-process later.

Anyway... the techie bit:

Mount: HEQ5-Pro

Scope: WO Meg72 + FFII flattener/reducer at f4.8

Camera: modded Eos 500D + LP clip filter

Guiding: SX Lodestar + ST80 + PHD/EQmod pulse guiding

Target: Western + central veil inc 'Witches broom'

Subs: 21 X 360 seconds

Darks + Flats applied

Stacked in DSS and edited in PS7

As always, constructive criticism always appreciated.

Ben

PS: Full res versions will be up on my Flickr page in my sig later today.

[Fenriz]

Lovely looking Veil Ben, great job.

[Sparrow]

I love the Veils. Never bothered doing them widefiled myself but this image makes me think I should.

Nicely done:)

Regards

John

[rocketandroll]

Yeah, with the reducer in there the Meg72 comes in at about 345mm focal length I think.

It's not wide enough to get the whole thing in, but frames this part of it all quite nicely. Much wider and the stars just start to look like background noise :-)

Ben

[rocketandroll]

Ok.... had a bit of an extra play with it... it was only after uploading it here and seeing it against the grey background that I realised I had a nasty red tinge to the background sky from boosting the red chanel to pull the nebula detail out.

Hope this version is a little better... I've cropped it a bit more too, noticed I was getting a bit of field rotation at the edges, must sort my polar alignment out :-)

Ben