M42 from Olly's skies

[perfrej]

Currently at Olly's in Provence and loving it. So far I have unpacked the GM2000HPS and run some basic tests. After that a faulty cable temporarily halted further use, but that will be fixed eventually. In the meantime, the Edge with Hyperstar is on Olly's Takahashi mount and enjoying it. Further up the hill is my hyper trimmed NEQ6 with the FLT-98 on. Both are running in parallel, sometimes on the same target.

Having M42 more or less at the horizon at home, I decided to go for it in spite of the moon being just a bit away from it.

Scope 1: FLT-98, FF IV, Sx wheel, Baader filters, SBIG ST830M

Scope 2: EdgeHD 9.25, Hyperstar 3, SX M26C

This is a bunch of different exposures and from both telescopes:

20 x 5 seconds each of R, G and B from the FLT-98

12 x 50 seconds each of R, G and B from the FLT-98

60 x 180 seconds from the Hyperstar 3

Capture with Nebulosity 2, guiding with PHD. On the Edge I guided through a finderscope (9x50).

I did all pre-processing in Nebulosity 2 (Bias and flats). Registration, integration, combination, background neutralization and pre-stretch in Pixinsight. PI also took care of registering images of different resolution. After that,Olly and I did a detailed stretch in PS followed by layer masking to merge the images. Mild color corrections, noise reduction and sharpening followed next and that was it. It was a good lesson in processing flow and, specifically, layer masking to merge the different xposure levels. Thank you, Olly!

Full resolution (33MB) can be had at http://filer.frejvall.se/2012-02-29_M42_Composite.jpg

/per

[Tom OD]

Lovely pic Per,

Lots of that nice brown dust, and a resolved core.

I'm a big fan of Les Granges, so enjoy the clear dark skies and the excellent tutition. Give him a Duvel beer and he might tell you some processing secrets!!!

Tom.

[ollypenrice]

Per's teaching me!

Note that this was in bright moonlight so all the more remarkable.

Olly

[RogerTheDodger]

That's just lovely, full of dust and detail and I prefer the more muted look you have there... sometimes it comes out over bright for my taste.

[symesie04]

Wow fabulous image. As if imaging wasn't hard enough, the thought of the complexity of combining data from 2 different scopes just humbles me. Top stuff.

[1981suede]

Very nice indeed. I'm new to this game but that contains details i have never seen before. Stunning.

[Quatermass]

That a lovely image lots of nice detail and colour with the bonus of being at ollys of course'- nice one.

[perfrej]

Thanks folks!

Being here is great and having conditions like this (except for Luna) is fantastic. Other added bonuses are the surroundings - climbed the ridge today - the quiet and the expert help and advise you get from Olly Penrice. I'll be back for sure!

Currently running Ha on the cone nebula and waiting for the moon to sink below the horizon so I can start up the Hyperstar OSC.

As for the M42, well, I'm very pleased with it myself, and it was shot with the moon intruding a lot.

/per

[tollytastic1]

Lovely image Per . How are you getting along with the Hyperstar now that you have had a bit more time with it?

Paul

[Jessun]

Per that is a very nice detailed composite and very delicately processed! From a fellow Swede - brutally honest bunch - I would erase any trace of the composite/angular difference evidence such as the black border and multiple diff spikes. OK some HST images are stacked from multiple cameras so maybe you've started a trend Per!

Well worth the trip for sure! Hope you have more to share.

[Zul]

Very nice!

[perfrej]

I love the Hyperstar, it's a great system. Focusing worksfine and all I need is a tad beter collimation.

I thought about the spike differences and the corner... I agree it should be fixed but didn't really have the time.

/per

[Shibby]

Gorgeous image. I really love the natural looking colour.