M27 - first attempt

[LouisJB]

Hi, well it's not great and nor was the weather. Hoped to capture lots of images and stack but clouds came, actually some of this was shot through partial cloud.

Also, was using 130P with a 2x barlow in order to get focus, so a very slow setup.

So, sorry about the noise, the sky was not very dark or clear.

Anyway enough of the excuses, it was my first go at this lovely object. Expect now it's moving out of the sky it'll be sometime next year before I try again and hopefully by then I'll be better at it and have the right bits of equipment in place to get a better image.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/31369139@N06/10787510874/lightbox/

[jambouk]

Nice. I was going to say it's one of my favourite of the messier objects, but i think i say that every time about all 110 of them

But i do like M27 muchly, and this is a nice image. You've capture the shape nicely. Your colours are different from what other people get, but that's not a criticism just an observation.

I like it. I'd be very proud to print that off and have it on my office wall or to post on facebook and show off to friends and family

Well done. I look forward to your next venture.

James

[NIGHTBOY]

Well done!! What camera was you using and on what settings??

Great pic.

Steve

[LouisJB]

Thanks! got to start somewhere right?

Camera was a Pentax K5 (APS-C), settings were ISO 1600 and I stacked a few subs and a few darks into DSS, but really I don't know what I'm doing with DSS and post-processing yet. Basically experimenting.

The colours are a bit odd. Interestingly another blurred shot I got by accident the core was blue! Maybe white balance etc will need work.

[LouisJB]

Oh, is it possible that white pixel right in the middle is the central white dwarf, or is that too dim to see?

[jambouk]

Louis, i don't know about the pixel, sorry.

There are several tutorials online on how to use DSS, and threads about it on here. I need a master class on it myself as i just have no idea what i am meant to do.

But it's a smashing image to start with.

James

[LouisJB]

thank you, much appreciated. I think I need to follow those tutorials, as it's a bit of a mystery what to do and when. Like all of astrophotography is seems a bit of a learning curve best approached by trying it out, failing, reading and then trying again (and maybe spending lots of money!)...