Cocoon Nebula from Kelling Heath Star Party

[NickMorris]

Hi,

I thought it was about time I finally posted an image.  This was taken at Kelling Heath Star Party recently and many thanks are due to Phil J and Martin (Baz) from East Midlands Stargazers who helped me sort out some tilt in my optical train, cheers Guys!

I haven't spent much time learning post processing so would welcome criticism and pointers from more knowledgable people.

It was shot over two nights with a 5" APO reduced to 698mm FL and consists of :-

24 x 900s Luminance

10x 600s Red

10 x 600s Green

10 x 600s Blue

Flats, Darks and Bias frames

All unguided

Thanks for looking,

Nick

[Moonshane]

Beautiful.

[laudropb]

Very nice. Thanks for posting.

[NickMorris]

Appreciate the comments, thanks very much

Nick

[NickMorris]

Tweaked the black point a bit, I think this one is better?

Cheers

Nick

[swag72]

That's looking really good - Like it

[NickMorris]

Many thanks Sara, very kind...

[brendant]

Very nice image, well done.

[StuartJPP]

I prefer the 2nd one, but both are great images!

[NickMorris]

Appreciate the comments, thanks very much.....

[carastro]

Excellent work.  Unguided 900s ?????? 

Give me a yard stick as I just started imaging this one.

Carole 

[NickMorris]

Many thanks Carole,

Unguided was possible due to the 10micron mount and a 70 point model....very handy when the sky gets patchy. No lost guide star, just throw out the clouded out subs :-)

All the best

Nick

[tony210]

Superb,but how did you manage unguided subs at 10 minutes ? Was the polar alignment crucial? Best wishes Tony.

[NickMorris]

Thanks for looking Tony, appreciate the comments,

The subs were 15m for L and 10m for RGB.  Unguided imaging is possible with a 10 Micron mount if you have a very stable rig and run modelling software that places synchronisation points all over the sky.  The mount then creates a 3D model internally that tracks the sky extremely accurately.  It is subject to other factors like a tripod sinking into the ground which will throw the model off as happened to me at subsequent nights at Kelling.  Normally you would just run a model again during twilight...

If you look at some of ChrisLX200's posts recently, you can see some of his narrowband images that are 30 minutes unguided!

all the best

Nick 

[NickMorris]

Polar alignment isn't crucial either as the mount corrects for polar misalignment.  If the mount is off the pole by a way then field rotation will occur between first and last subs which will mean cropping when stacked.....

One user ran his rig with 55 arc minutes of polar misalignment.

cheers

Nick 

[tony210]

Thanks,unguided imaging is something alien to me . Great image, probably need to invest in a 10micrcn mount! Best wishes Tony.