A hard won Orion's Sword....

[rocketandroll]

Hi all

So, many of you will have seen my thread about my little accident last night where my new Newt almost knocked me unconscious and got smashed up in the process... well, after that I decided to give up on the Newt for this year (it was massivly out of collimation and I don't have a collimator anyway) and salvage what I could of the night by shooting some long subs on M42 and Orion's sword throuygh the trusty Megrez72. I lost an hour and a half with the pfaf and after arriving on site at 7:30 didn't get imaging until 9:30... packed up about ten to 11 as it was getting too cold for me (wimpy southerner) and I really neened some paracetamol for my dented head.

Anyway... I began shooting 6 min subs on the target, got nine in, then went for a couple of ten minute subs, which came out pretty nicely. Anyone who says you can't shoot subs beyond 5 mins with a DSLR is clearly not using a new enough DSLR :-) Though the freezing temperatures can't have done any harm.

Anyway, I got an hour and a bit, and have then added in a layer of 15 second subs and a core layer taken from my data from March this year taken with my original Meade 5" scope. I was very impressed to see that the detail in the nebula from the Meg at 345mm fl was pretty much comparable to the detail from the Meade at 950mm fl. Dunno if that means the Meade was lame or the Meg is amazing... maybe a little of both :-)

So... enough with the waffle... this is my first (of many no doubt) stab at processing this... the background dust is just starting to show, albeit a bit reddish tinged. It's not a patch on the stunning narrowband/RGB images Olly and the like have put up... but it's mine :-)

I recon I can get a couple of hours on this in 10 minute subs it'll start REALLY looking good.... but that's a project for the new year :-)

Anyway, this is (if you include the core data from March) about 90 minutes total, imaged as always with the trusty Megrez72 with FF2 flattener/reducer at f4.8 and 345mm fl, Canon Eos 500D (modded + LP filter), HEQ5-Pro, guided with SX Lodestar through an ST80 with PHD/EQmod.

Thanks for looking all and, as this is almost certainly my last image of the year... merry Christmas all! Here's to a dark and cloudless 2012!

Ben

[rocketandroll]

Ooops...

Seem to have saved that version with the core layer and another layer turned off... here it is again... sorry!

Ben

[Matthew]

Hi Ben i hopes your scopes ok lol,but they are cracking images mate well done !

[carastro]

Well done Ben, you are coming on leaps and bounds. I was interested to see these are 6min subs with DSLR, as I have always been told the SNR goes up after 5mins with a DSLR.

It looks a little brown, maybe the colour needs some adjustment, but an excellent M42.

Sorry to hear about your accident, I assume you did what I have done on occasions, stood up and cracked my head on the scope.

Carole

[rocketandroll]

Well done Ben, you are coming on leaps and bounds. I was interested to see these are 6min subs with DSLR, as I have always been told the SNR goes up after 5mins with a DSLR.

It looks a little brown, maybe the colour needs some adjustment, but an excellent M42.

Sorry to hear about your accident, I assume you did what I have done on occasions, stood up and cracked my head on the scope.

Carole

Nope, the scope came down to me :-)

As mentioned in the 'little accident' thread... it was tightened up (very hard mind you) on the edge of the dovtail, not with it seated flat.

I was kneeling down polar aligning when the whole rig fell a few feet and hit the back of my head. Nasty with a 2kg Frac... far worset with 12kg of Newt + guidescope! :-(

And yes, it's a little brownish... but it was previously looking garrishly red... the running man is the right colour and they are all processed together so... I'm fairly happy with the colour so I'm gonna leave it there for now :-)

Cheers

Ben

[ollypenrice]

It's going very well. I think the blue maybe needs a lift but who's to say? Strong signal in the fainter stuff.

Really sorry about the accident. It does happen. I have a 'no moving scopes in the dark ' rule but I've had the odd near miss, believe me. Thank goodness it was only my head that got smashed!

Olly

[Quatermass]

great image to see christmas in with and who says we dont suffer for our art hope your heads feeling better now.

Sent from my GT-S5670 using Tapatalk

[Gonzo]

Great pictures, it gives me hope as I too have a Megrez 72

[Anweniel]

Nice job if painfully got! Personally I'm quite fond of the colour you have in there the kind of pastel brown makes it feel realer to me than when you see the heavy reds/pinks.

[carastro]

Hi Ben,

You seem to have captured some of the background dust, what sort of site was it imaged at from the point of view of Light pollution. Just trying to gauge whether it's the longer subs that got it, or the choice of site.

Thanks

Carole

[rocketandroll]

Hi Ben,

You seem to have captured some of the background dust, what sort of site was it imaged at from the point of view of Light pollution. Just trying to gauge whether it's the longer subs that got it, or the choice of site.

Thanks

Carole

Cheers all... and yeah, I quite like the colour... looks a bit like an old oil painting to me.

Carole... to be honest there's probably more noise than dust in there... but I'm pretty surprised it started to show already...

My site isn't very good... its on an industrial park with 24hr floodlighting but despite that I get naked-eye Milkyway most nights I'm there.

The Megrez with the reducer is running at f4.8 so that probably helps with the feint stuff... the ten minute subs can't have hurt either.

There's a lot of noise but I reckon if I can get another hour of 6min subs and an hour of 10min subs it'll really start to look special.

Ben

Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk

[steppenwolf]

I was horrified to hear about the accident but your WO 72 has more than saved the day. You've captured plenty of background dusty material in your image as well which is great. Colour is such a personal thing but I had a quick play in PS balancing up the RGB centred on the blue channel and felt that it was worth doing but in any event, you've got a nice detailed image for your pains so well captured!

[rocketandroll]

Thanks Steve!

Yeah, at some stage I'm going to re-edit the image, but I'll probably wait until i can get more data on it in the new year now... it does need a bit more blue and a teensy bit more red.... but we'll get there :-)

Ben