My First M42

[Jongo]

Clear skies tonight so grabbed a couple of shots of M42 the orion nebula got about 10 photo at 2.5 second exposures, all at iso 3200.

I've got about 10 photo's looking similar to the one below and tried stacking them using DeepSkyStacker But the final image looks really dark and generally rubbish.

Just wondering if anyones got any ideas what i can do?

Many Thanks in advance.

*edit should probably add it was taken unguided with a Sony Alpha DSLR.

[nmoushon]

I know you said unguided but do you have auto-tracking or manual tracking? And guessing your using a 300mm lens or are you a OTA? If you are using auto tracking then your polar alignment is a bit out because even at 2.5sec your star shouldn't trail that much on auto-tracking.

Also you will want to take a lot more subs than 10. Especially at only 2.5sec. Try going to 100 and youll see a big improvement. Also make sure you take some darks and add those into the stacking process. Will help with the noise, especially ay iso3200, and will bring down that fuzzy appearance.

[Anweniel]

Theres still a little more detail in there can be pulled out, the stack may well look worse than you were expecting but if the frames are pretty similar in quality it should be an improvement on single frame.

Even just a little strectch and cropping has brougt out a bit more detail that you have caught.

I would really consider better tracking for sure 2.5s is really short to be getting such long trails

heres a slight tweak and crop of your pic

[Jongo]

It was from a rough polar alignment(polar scope hasn't arrived yet) and manually tracking. Just thought i would give it a go and see what results i got.

Hopefully next time its clear my polar scope will have arrived so that will help greatly, although i still need to pick up some motors. I Didn't take any darks so i will try do that next time.

Many Thanks Guys!

[eddy]

I think you should be pleased, if you look at the larger picture.

You are:

a) Photographing something that is over 1000 light years away

24 light years wide

c) has a mass of 2000 times our sun

d) barely visible to the naked eye

So to take a picture of anything at all is quite an achievement!

I personally think that taking an image of anything 'out there' is pretty good going, wether it be a smudge or a hubble-like image. Just remember what it is you are photographing and more importnatly, what you are looking at!

Oh, and above all just enjoy yourself!

[Jongo]

I think you should be pleased, if you look at the larger picture.

You are:

a) Photographing something that is over 1000 light years away

24 light years wide

c) has a mass of 2000 times our sun

d) barely visible to the naked eye

So to take a picture of anything at all is quite an achievement!

I personally think that taking an image of anything 'out there' is pretty good going, wether it be a smudge or a hubble-like image. Just remember what it is you are photographing and more importnatly, what you are looking at!

Oh, and above all just enjoy yourself!

That's pretty much how i see it, just getting something is fantastic! Im quite new it all so as things go on i will improve constantly. Just need my polarscope to arrive then get onto ordering some motors and images should improve.

[eddy]

lol i remember seeing M42 pop up on my laptop after my 1st 8second exposure, i was giggling like a girl i was that excited! My fiance came out and said 'How old are you?' lol (im nearly 29)

Anyways, beneath it all, she shared my excitement, she is in the medical profession and HATES Physics, but is fascinated by astronomy.

Its just such an enigmatic sight to see, especially when your looking at it from your own garden, through your own scope/camera, seeing the images on the internet, it sometimes look 'fake' or CGI but, no, its really there, and makes it even more exciting!

[Quatermass]

M42 is such a wonder of the night sky the first shots of it made me go WOW back in 2010 and you will come back to it again and again I never tire of looking at it. Sad to see it leaving us now and heading west towards the horizon.

[ArmyAirForce]

It's a good effort, and I would be pleased with that for a first go. I've had my scope just over a week, and like you, I'm just starting to explore photographing deep space objects.

This is my first go from last night. Because of the light pollution at home, I had to limit the exposures to a maximum of 6 seconds. I was shooting in RAW on my unmodified Nikon D50, with no filters with an Explorer 200P DS scope. I took 20 images, ISO 800, plus 10 darks, 10 flats, and 10 bias. Each image on its own is poor, but using 90% in Deep Sky Stacker, I think the result is reasonable for a first go.