m33, think im getting there

[Daniel-K]

well what a great night was in the obsy till 5am this is one of the two images i took last night the other M42, shot as follow

37x200-250 secs total 2.4 hrs

iso800

modded 550d running at about 16+ deg

guiding st80-mammut guider via PHD

scope-ED80

unmatched darks

im well pleased with this i was very disciplined last night staying on just two object and it payed off, probably the best galaxy pic i have done and i want to add more data plus the moon was at 57% or somthing last night

comments advice improvements all welcome i kind of prefer the not processed one, i really need to learn how to do it without looking so harsh

[Daniel-K]

i think this is better

[fwm891]

That's coming on well, prefer your last post but would like a slightly lighter background - you may have clipped your black levels a bit. Otherwise very nice.

[Daniel-K]

i think so too the only way i could get rid of the gradient though

[MikeD]

Looking good.

Less is more IMHO the temptation to push the data as hard as you can is tough to resist.

But an image always looks better if you can keep a natural feel to the processing.

Out of the three images posted I would Also go for the second one?

Mike.

[andyo]

Nice image plenty of colour I also prefer the second one

[Gina]

Very nice

[SJJ]

That image is coming on nicely. I'm no expert by any means, but i'm wokring on M33 at the moment and the processing is proving very difficult, so well done.

[earth titan]

i think this is better

I agree. Very nice!

[Kenza]

well what a great night was in the obsy till 5am this is one of the two images i took last night the other M42, shot as follow

37x200-250 secs total 2.4 hrs

iso800

modded 550d running at about 16+ deg

guiding st80-mammut guider via PHD

scope-ED80

unmatched darks

im well pleased with this i was very disciplined last night staying on just two object and it payed off, probably the best galaxy pic i have done and i want to add more data plus the moon was at 57% or somthing last night

comments advice improvements all welcome i kind of prefer the not processed one, i really need to learn how to do it without looking so harsh

Hi! Nice pic. I am just starting in AP and have a similar setup like yourself. I have an Equinox 120 + Canon EOS 550d. But that's it, I don't have a guider or a finderscope. What do you suggest?

Also, what do you mean by "modded 550d running at about 16 + deg".

Thanks in advance!

[Daniel-K]

modded means the ir blocking filter has been removed so the camera is more sensitive to HA and the +16 is just the temperature the camera was running at

[Quatermass]

Nice image the second one is great and this is quite a hard one to capture as well hoping for some clear nights in the coming weeks so I can have another crack at it myself.

[Daniel-K]

the data is there just not sure on how to process it properly, hoping to add another 2 hours on the nest clear night,should help with the noise too

[Kenza]

Did you use the Brightstar mammut camera L429?

[Daniel-K]

just for guiding, i used the DSLR for the image

[ollypenrice]

I'd beg you not to use black clipping to remove gradients. It desn't work. The third image is terribly clipped and you have thrown away a lot of your data. That is not the way forward.

You need a good clear intoroduction to the levels and curves routine. Try Rob's. http://www.middlehillobservatory.co.uk/articles-primers/Levels%20and%20curves.htm

To lose gradients try something like GradientXterminator by Russel Croman. DBE in Pixinsight is even better but you already have Ps.

A healthy background sky will show a brightness in Ps of around 23 per channel (use the colour sampler tool on three different bits of sky.) Some say a bit brighter and some like blue brighter than the others by a few points but there's the ball park. Below 20 and you are going to have an over dark sky.

Olly

[Daniel-K]

just had a go at reprocessing spent a bit of time trying not to clip the data and followed a tutorial how to remove gradient i think this is a vast improvement also i have attached a pic of the histogram if it doesn't look right can some one point me in the right direction?

[michaelmorris]

Nice image. IMHO the last incarnation is the best one. I bought Jerry Lodriguss's excellent video tutorials on image processing and these have proved invaluable in developing an image processing workflow that I'm happy with.

http://www.astropix.com/GADC/GADC.HTM

[ollypenrice]

You're really getting there now. But look at your histogram: you have a gap before the data begins on the left hand side. This means that you are not using the full range of brightnesses. Try just moving the left slider to where the low line of data begins. That will mean you are using the full depth. It may make the image look clipped so keeping an eye on that left hand edge of data at each stage would be the way for another time.

However, you are now seeing what you data had to give you.

Olly

[earth titan]

This wasn't a bad place for me to start. Helped explain data loss and a workflow. Some of it I can't get work but the curves and levels are great.

http://www.askc.org/Astro_Photo%20Workshop.html

[Daniel-K]

thanks tom