Integrated flux..... with an 80ED

[Uranium235]

This one came about by accident really, I was working on a stack of 6 hours worth of CCD luminance on m81/m82 when I accidentally over-stretched the image. And what I first thought was just dust bunnies or noise turned out to be part of the IFN when I compared it to other images. Chuffed to bits was an understatement, becuase not only is my back garden light polluted, but the telescope I was using isnt exactly speedy. Its only a whiff, but its my flux!

So last night I went out and grabbed a load of 900s subs to try and get more flux with less noise. The moon didnt help, and the occasional bunch of clouds - but I think Ive got something approaching acceptable now. Another 3 hours would do very nicely (preferably on a moonless night).

Ive really pushed the data on this one, to the detriment of star colour and a bit of noise around smaller stars. Hopefully it will look ok when uploaded!

M81 / M82: Bodes Nebulae - with (some) integrated flux

314L+ 36x600 + 14x900 (L)

1000d 40x600 RGB

Thanks for looking

Rob

[Gina]

Fantastic - absolutely fantastic and beautiful too - that's amazing

[Boren]

Indeed IFN it is

you can protect the stars using masks during stretching, so as so protect star color.

lovely image!

cheers,

Harel

[swag72]

I think you've done well to capture the IFN, tricky stuff it is indeed. It's also incredibly difficult to process for the IFN and hold the galaxy and star colour.

[Uranium235]

Indeed IFN it is

you can protect the stars using masks during stretching, so as so protect star color.

lovely image!

cheers,

Harel

Thanks Harel

I used 5 layer masks for the CCD luminance, but the DSLR data would not stretch very far without chromatic noise, so it was a case of clipping the black point in order to clean up the background. Also, the star sizes in the luminance were far larger than those in the colour data (its usually the other way round!), so most of the star colour got washed out when I combined them in PS.

Once I have a bit more data I will have another go at the star colour (considering getting some Ha tonight).

[Epicycle]

Great! It's amazing what can be achieved from a garden with some light pollution,

E.

[Pete Presland]

cracking image, definitely my next target!

[Uranium235]

cracking image, definitely my next target!

Cheers

If youre having a go, be prepared for a long wait then It takes ages to detect, and once you have the data it takes some severe processing to reveal it. Might be a bit easier from a dark site. Though I wish I had a bigger fov as there is tons of the flux in the general area.

Running out of darkness too, pretty soon I will find myself setting up at 11pm!