First Light Bubble Nebula in NB with MN190 and 460EX - WIP

[Gina]

Another clear sky last night and I wanted a different target from the Eagle Nebula that wouldn't cross the meridian soon after starting imaging. I also fancied a change and I had seen some nice images of the Bubble and had set my heart on capturing the Bubble for some time - so the Bubble it was

I used the same sequence of subs as I had for the Eagle as a start to see what exposures I would want. This was Ha 5m, SII 8m, SII 8m, OIII 10m, OIII 10m, and repeat - all unbinned. I collected relatively good images starting at 23:12 and finishing at 04:18 - the nights are drawing in nicely now It would have been an earlier start if I hadn't had mount connection trouble. Anyway, I got 8 Ha, 14 OIII and 15 SII. Here are the results of stacking the subs in DSS and stretching histograms in PS. They need a spot of sorting out

There's a lot of gradient in these but my trial copy of GradientXterminator has expired and I'm considering buying it. I have Noel's Actions which I think will do the same thing though I haven't got it working yet. Anyway, I combined them into one Hubble pallette image, gradient and all, and cropped it to remove the worst of the gradient.

[x6gas]

Yeah - it looks a bit "acid house" as it is Gina, but I reckon sorting out the gradient will free the data for a nice capture. What length subs were you using? I had trouble getting a good signal on the OIII - I tried 15 minute subs last night but it didn't help as much as I was hoping.

It's a lovely target...

[iksose7]

Looks good Gina think i may have a quick go at this tonight with my EF200L. I will get no where near the bubble, probably wont even be able to make it out in the final stack! But it will be a nice conjunction between the Bubble, M52 and Comet Lemmon

[Gina]

Yeah - it looks a bit "acid house" as it is Gina, but I reckon sorting out the gradient will free the data for a nice capture. What length subs were you using? I had trouble getting a good signal on the OIII - I tried 15 minute subs last night but it didn't help as much as I was hoping.

It's a lovely target...

Yes, this was pretty much a test run but I though I'd post it anyway. I agree that it's a lovely target and I think there's promise there. Definitely need to sort out the gradient for a start. This was 8 x 5m Ha, 14 x 10m OIII and 15 x 8m SII. There are a couple of overexposed stars so maybe shorter subs would be better. I'll try again tonight weather permitting.

[Ibbo!]

A nice start, sort the gradient & more data will help no doubt

The longer nights will help and we will have astro dark soon

Steve

[Gina]

Looks good Gina think i may have a quick go at this tonight with my EF200L. I will get no where near the bubble, probably wont even be able to make it out in the final stack! But it will be a nice conjunction between the Bubble, M52 and Comet Lemmon

Thank you

[davew]

As a terminal Ha freak I have to admire your Ha version. Looks rather nice to me. You've captured a 3D effect.

Do I read correctly that you did 5 minutes in Ha ? Have a go at 10 and more of them

Dave.

[Gina]

As a terminal Ha freak I have to admire your Ha version. Looks rather nice to me. You've captured a 3D effect.

Thank you

Do I read correctly that you did 5 minutes in Ha ? Have a go at 10 and more of them

Dave.

Yes that's right. That seems to be the maximum exposure before the stars start to bloat with the equipment I'm using (MN190 - f5 and Atik 460EX mono CCD). I might change the ratio of Ha to the others to get a larger number of Ha subs.

[Gina]

Well I got Noel's Actions working and used the light pollution gradient removal action. Can't say I'm very impressed so far. May need some fiddling with but I found GradientXterminator better and quicker. NA removed the gradient and left the DSO but seemed rather harsh.

[RAC]

Have you tried PixIsight yet? With that you can takes a few short subs and hdr out the saturated stars. Its very easy and works very well.

Do you know what is making that gradient? Its in all the shots but a lot more in the SII but that may be because its the most stretched?

Your guiding looks good as.

[davew]

I would ask the same as RAC. Do you know what's causing those gradients ? They look more than I would expect from the sky.

I downloaded your subs and the Ha looks as good as I thought it would. The other two are hard work. Hope it's ok with you but after downloading I had a proper mess about and produced this image. Not my usual processing ! Not quite as golden as I like and now I see it of the post preview it looks more green. I despair of my monitor set up. I couldn't use the SII channel in the end.

Dave.

[Gina]

Have you tried PixIsight yet? With that you can takes a few short subs and hdr out the saturated stars. Its very easy and works very well.

Do you know what is making that gradient? Its in all the shots but a lot more in the SII but that may be because its the most stretched?

Your guiding looks good as.

No I haven't tried PI.

I'll look through the individual subs and see if there's any variation. I don't know where the the gradient is coming from - I was surprised to see it - I normally only get gradients in NB when the moon's out and it wasn't.

[Gina]

I would ask the same as RAC. Do you know what's causing those gradients ? They look more than I would expect from the sky.

I downloaded your subs and the Ha looks as good as I thought it would. The other two are hard work. Hope it's ok with you but after downloading I had a proper mess about and produced this image. Not my usual processing ! Not quite as golden as I like and now I see it of the post preview it looks more green. I despair of my monitor set up. I couldn't use the SII channel in the end.

Dave.

Thank you Dave Nice image - so there is some decent data in there Thank you for that The SII still looks pretty poor, maybe it wants longer subs (or at least more of them). I've now bought GradientXterminator and used it to remove the gradient in the three NB stacked and aligned images.

[Gina]

Here's the result of combining Ha OIII and SII in Ps. Curves equalised and Selective Colour applied to give Hubble Pallete. Then Lab colour contrast increased and (back to RGB) a touch of Exposure and gamma to brighten it up a bit. Not cropped, just resized for upload.

[Freddie]

Comming along there Gina. Nice work on your gradient but maybe the colours are a bit "in your face" on this one. Have you tracked down your gradient yet? Like you say, I've not seen a gradient like that in any of your previous images.

[Gina]

Comming along there Gina. Nice work on your gradient but maybe the colours are a bit "in your face" on this one.

Perhaps you'd prefer this one - before I brightened it up.

Have you tracked down your gradient yet? Like you say, I've not seen a gradient like that in any of your previous images.

The only thing I've discovered about the gradient is that these images were stretched in curves more than I usually need. I think I'll try longer subs.

[Gina]

I'm up and running - aligned to target, guiding, adjusted focus and started imaging proper about 10:45 though it's not really fully dark yet. I've set up to take 10m Ha, 15m OIII and 15m SII. So that's twice the exposure on the Ha and SII and 1.5x the OIII. First image any minute now

[Gina]

Here we have a 10m sub in Ha converted to TIFF in FITS Liberator and opened in Ps, resized for upload and nothing else. The brighter stars are overexposed but we'll see how it comes out. This is all experience.

[Gina]

First OIII and SII both 15m.

[Gina]

A good night's imaging run with 8 clear subs of each colour. And NO gradients! Where the gradients came from on the previous ones is a mystery. Here are the stacked and stretched results from 8 x 10m Ha, 8 x 15m OIII and 8 x 15m SII.

[Gina]

I haven't been adding flats so I thought I'd take a collection and add them to my stacking. It's a disaster! I'll do it again without flats.

Here's the result of the usual processing but with flats.

[davew]

Hi Gina.

Those individual images are well on the way. I like the Ha even more now. I downloaded them and had a play around again and I must say they are really getting there.

Those gradients are puzzling. It's as if some errant hedgehog was shining a torch down your scope !

Now that's sorted, what's going on with the flats ? If you once again post the individual channels, with flats, someone may recognise any faults.

Press on and beat the thing into submission

Dave.

[Gina]

Here's the redo without flats and a few Noel's Actions applied.

[Gina]

With a bit of brightening with curves.

[Gina]

So far the sky is clear tonight so I'm back imaging the Bubble. Just captured one each of 10m Ha, 15m OIII and 15m SII subs.