M45 the pleiades

[bri]

The first time that I've had a proper session getting to grips with the neq6. Wanted to try an easy target so went for the above, plus its one of my favourites.

Anyway, details:

43 subs of 90s each at iso 400 with 23 darks. The rest is in the signature.

Quite happy with the result but I'm not the worlds best at processing....not sure if I've overcooked it and more experience is definately needed.

I also had a go at M42 but I'm struggling to combine some short exposures with the long ones to keep the core from burning but its a nightmare for me. Looked at various tutorials but they are all for the full fat photoshop where as I have elements 6 which causes me to hit a dead end on some of the steps. Anybody had a similar problem but found a solution? I need baby steps! Would like this one to be posted also once its ready.

[Austin]

Great pic! love the sharp diffrac lines and nice 'swathes' of neb!

[VigdisVZ]

Good work on this one.

I recently did the same target with a very similar rig as yours (result is in my DSO gallery) , the extra data you have show in the nebulosity and background stars.

The next step would be to add flats (just like in my case).

Keep up the good work!

[bri]

Thanks austin.

Vigdis, had a look at your version and it is very nice. More friendly to the eye than mine with a lot less data. I will have another go at reprocessing mine. I originally wanted to get as much neb out as possible but it made the whole thing too bright and lacked contrast in my opinion (i need the practise!). But more importantly, was nice to finally get out and capture something better than I've managed before.

Flats is something that I haven't even looked into yet but I know I will have to at some point.

[sologuitarist61]

Beautiful image !!

[ShineOn]

And nicely framed too

[stellawolf]

Very nice well done

[StuartJPP]

That is very nice. Since I use a refractor (well a camera lens) I don't get any diffraction spikes, this is one of the DSO's that does look good with them.

[rick1]

i'm sorry to ask such a silly question but because you take a pic in black an white.. how do you make it into color like that? (i'm new in astronomy but i'd like to see some dso's soon

[bri]

Thanks everyone for the comments. Had another play. Hopefully it came out not as bright as last time

[VigdisVZ]

That's looking really good. THe trick is also not to overwork the processing.

You're using a coma corrector? Your stars seem finer at the edge than mine.

[heathenwoods]

That's a nice image :-)

In terms of wanting to go beyond the limits of Elements, have you looked at Gimp? It has most of the functionality of 'full fat photoshop' but doesn't cost anything*. I think you'll find it worth a look...

Edit: 8bit limit might mean needing to make sure you save in the correct format from DSS - not sure as I'm a 'FFP' user.

*'freely distributed' to be precise

[bri]

That's looking really good. THe trick is also not to overwork the processing.

You're using a coma corrector? Your stars seem finer at the edge than mine.

Yes I have the SW one. Does improve things noticably. The bright halos tell a story about my collimation, hmmmm....

That's a nice image :-)

In terms of wanting to go beyond the limits of Elements, have you looked at Gimp? It has most of the functionality of 'full fat photoshop' but doesn't cost anything*. I think you'll find it worth a look...

Edit: 8bit limit might mean needing to make sure you save in the correct format from DSS - not sure as I'm a 'FFP' user.

*'freely distributed' to be precise

I will investigate this one. thanks.

[VigdisVZ]

Cool, I'll be looking at a coma corrector myself pretty soon. Keep up the good work!

To use output from DSS in GIMP you might have to copy paste the image over instead of saving a file.