Cheating?

[MilwaukeeLion]

The airplane giveth on my solar image and taketh away on my Rosette.  This is crop of 4 x 600 sec stack, 4 darks, 20 bias, 20 flats, non-mod Nikon DSLR, ISO 500,  f6 ED80.  Had two more lights but tree limbs ruined em.  Stacked in DSS, stretched FIT in Nebulocity (Haven't figured out right debayer settings for camera in Neb so use DSS stack & debayer) then final adjustments in Lightroom.  

First image is about best I can balance everything & bring out nebula with red/purple tones, takes lot of time, messing with all the sliders.  The second I just do quick radial filter to darken the background, highlight the nebula and boost red - 5 min.  Does it cheapen my astrophotography?   I still did most of the work / set up / imaging up to the point of letting software take over / clicking on radial filter.

[MarsG76]

My opinion on this matter is that if the data you present is what you actually captured, and didn't add any fake details or features and all you done was adjust levels, sharpen, masking or what you done, radially select a section to darken it, than its doesn't cheapen your Astrophotography or is it cheating.

Essentially you just did a form of a flat field. Adjusting levels, or colors is fine as far as I'm concerned. I don't think there's anyone here who's final image hasn't been processed in some way. Processing your captures, stacked subs is a part of astro imaging, simply because the atmosphere will lower contrast, and add color hues that need to be compensated.

[wxsatuser]

It's called processing.

Just did a wider version of the Rosette and here is roughly what I did to it.

Your can see the result over in the Widefield section.

11x300secs Canon 60Da Sigma 105mm Macro f/4 ISO 1600 Astronomik CLS.

PixInsight

Slight crop

Backgroundneutralisation

Colourcalibration

ABE

Histogramtransform with STF

LRGBcombination

Over to Photoshop

Deepspace noise action

HLVG medium

Selectivecolour

Boost star colours action

Make stars smaller action

Space noise action

[RSM]

Hi, wouldn't call it cheating at all. They're all photons you've managed to capture with your equipment, setup and patience. All the processing allows you to take out the rubbish and noise you don't want allowing you to accentuate the good stuff that's left. If you're happy with the result in your eye then you've done a good job.

[ollypenrice]

I prefer the first image. Call it by whatever name you will but the second image is simply black clipped. The ideal would be between the two and that means learning your way around Levels and Curves. There are good net tutorials out there.

Olly

[graemlourens]

I had this struggle myself in the early days where the boundries lie of processing.

Not to forget: your eyes perception of something is already 'not accurate' as its not linear. So its really a matter of taste, even if there are some basics that most AP'lers (and i guess people in a general) would aggree on. Oversaturating / nuclear stars / overclipping / 'unrealisticly dark background' you will seldomly see. But you will see 4 million different versions of the same target, thats the creativity of this passion. We're all looking at the same targets, but everybody will interpret them differently with different data and different eyes.

I agree with Mars - if the data is your and you shot it with your blood and sweat, anything you create is authentic as long as you manipulate the data realistically.

Kind regards, Graem

[steppenwolf]

I firmly believe that if you are working with your own data then anything in the way of post processing is fine.

Cheating takes place when you use someone else's data or add something that wasn't there in the first place. Examples of the latter would be cloning an area of sky to replace a duff area, enhancing an image of a portion of sky taken before a supernova by brightening the original star to show the post supernova appearance etc.

That said, if it's your data then it's your image so whatever pleases you is all that matters!

[jimbo747]

I firmly believe that if you are working with your own data then anything in the way of post processing is fine.

Cheating takes place when you use someone else's data or add something that wasn't there in the first place. Examples of the latter would be cloning an area of sky to replace a duff area, enhancing an image of a portion of sky taken before a supernova by brightening the original star to show the post supernova appearance etc.

That said, if it's your data then it's your image so whatever pleases you is all that matters!

Is creating an image where a minority percentage of data is taken by another member, even with permission and credit, looked down upon or classed as cheating on here then?

[StuartJPP]

Is creating an image where a minority percentage of data is taken by another member, even with permission and credit, looked down upon or classed as cheating on here then?

I'd say not, it is usually considered a collaborative effort...happens quite often.

[steppenwolf]

I should perhaps have qualified my comment by adding that 'claiming' such collaborative work as purely your own is the misdemeanor! Clearly, combining other peoples' data with your own by consent is fine - many great images have been produced by this process but personally, I would acknowledge the collaboration.

[laudropb]

I think we all agree that processing data that you have collected can not be called cheating. In the pre-digital era I worked in a dark room and we used various procedures during printing to enhance contrast etc. so this is not something new.

[Astrosurf]

That's very good with an unmodded camera! It's an emission neb so is best taken with a  modded camera to collect Ha photons. 

I also prefer the first one, and, as Olly says, the best would be somewhere between the two without darkening the black so much. Try to keep the colour red and not pink. I don't know your processing software so can't help there I'm afraid!

Alexxx

[StargeezerTim]

I've been thinking about this.... perhaps too deeply! ha ha..

What is seen depends firstly on the sensor, and each different sensor will capture different data. Then we use software to interpret and develop that data. That is no different to our own 'seeing'. Our eyes (the sensor) capture the scene (the data). No two pairs of eyes are the same and there will always be variations in what it 'captured'. The data is then interpreted and processed by our brain (e.g. DSS, Pixinsight etc). Now I may perceive a scene as beautiful or exciting whereas another may perceive danger and dread. I may even grow to see beauty in something I used to find ordinary, as my brain (the software) learns to see things in different ways.

So it is not 'cheating' to interpret and develop data... there is no absolute 'reality' out there to capture in any case. And remember we have only been talking about data in the visible spectrum, if we developed, over time, the ability to see in the radio wave spectrum, things would look very different!

So carry on processing! the main criteria is that it should be pleasing to the eye and our images will develop more and more as we learn to get the best out of software and new programmes and techniques are developed.

I said I had been thinking a bit too deeply! Tim. 

[glowingturnip]

not sure that a radial filter would be my tool of choice if a natural presentation is wanted though, it's effectively introducing extra vignetting to hide defects in the background.

That original pic needs some background flattening - I would have thought that the flats should have helped with that better than they have (?), and I'm not sure if there's a tool similar to gradient xterminator or DBE in Nebulosity/Lightroom ?

The plane trails are not a problem - use a sigma-clipping stacking routine and they will automatically disappear - you should go for more lights though.

[michaelmorris]

If you have Photoshop, Gradient Xterminator is brilliant at removing the uneven background.

http://www.rc-astro.com/resources/GradientXTerminator/

[cjdawson]

Nope, I don't think it's cheating at all.  Some people may like, or may not like your final image.  That's their opinion, as it is you that's taking the image, it's up to you if you are happy with it.  Post processing of an image in photoshop or similar is akin to the dark room processing that used to happen with film.    It's not cheating, it's part of the process of producing a photo, rather than a snap.

I personally draw the line at the point when starting to introduce artefacts that were not in the original image.  For example using an SCT to take an exposure, then adding star points afterward - whilst I would be happy to do it "for artistic reasons" I would also have the image without them as they were not in the original capture.  This is where things get a bit contengious, and where the magazine industry has alot to answer for - you know when they airbrush images to make skintimes looks smoother, or paint out parts of a body to make someone look thinner.  That's way over the line, but on the same front, adding points to stars when there was no refraction creating them is the same in my eye's.

At the end of the day, it comes down to what you as the artist are happy to do, and yes, I see Astrophotography as an art.  Highly complex, but getting that perfect image is really down to your own personal taste.

[kroy]

I wouldnt call it cheating because you are not putting anything additional in the image that wasn't there. The final image is still the same as captured by you .. all you are doing is processing it to supress unwanted noise and get the best of the object in concern.

[r3i]

.

At the end of the day, it comes down to what you as the artist are happy to do, and yes, I see Astrophotography as an art.  Highly complex, but getting that perfect image is really down to your own personal taste.

Agree with you there Colin.  It all boils down to the reason why you are processing the image.  For most of us it is simply to create a 'pretty picture' and is an artistic endeavour as much as anything.

If you were producing images for a scientific purpose then that's a different matter entirely.

[MilwaukeeLion]

Thanks for the opinions and suggestions,  perhaps I just need to stop treating my DSLR like high end CCD.  The SSAG became a bit of a crutch for me, makes it too easy for long subs, so I went without it this past weekend.

After this weekend's outing i'm finding 2 to 5 min subs are very appealing to me for what i'm after vs 10 min or > subs no matter how low ISO is.  For some objects 600 sec with my Nikon will work but for others my mount is more than sufficient by itself snapping off 2 -3 min subs without the SSAG.  If I study up on PEC, sure I could get it to near 5 min.

I didn't like much about my Rosette at all so I trashed all the data, along with Leo's Triplet from other week (sorry buh bye).  I find trashing my work very therapeutic.  Strangely addicted to the set up, viewing and imaging more than final result.  Will enjoy targeting them again.

ML

[cjdawson]

I'd have been proud of that Rosetta image.

Whilst you find it theraputic, I still highly recommend that you never ever ever ever ever destroy your original images.  Always keep them, every single one, not matter how good or bad.  It might be that in a few years, you come across a new processing technique that would imrpove the image - without the original data you'd have no chance to turn what might have been a good capture into something special.

Or alternatively, there might be something in the image that you don't currently know about - like a SuperNova or something new, that no one else has captured.  You never know.

[ollypenrice]

Is creating an image where a minority percentage of data is taken by another member, even with permission and credit, looked down upon or classed as cheating on here then?

Not if it's credited. I think that the sharing of data is a nice idea and, naturally, we do a lot of it here since many imagers come and go.

Olly

[Drop Of Sun]

I prefer your second image because I feel there is more of you in it. I like seeing how other people "see" these objects. For me it's very apt to have a bit of "life" in the image as that's what most excites me about the universe. What life could be out there? And how do they process their astro images?

I mainly do solar and lunar and there are so many ways you can shift emphasis in the image, I don't think there is a single "correct" way to do it. I try to highlight what the key structures that I found interesting.

For me the most important things are that you are happy with the image yourself and that with a bit of luck you had some fun too.

For me go black sky if you want, it's your image and arguably no image is truly realistic, but they do all show structures that really are there and your second one certainly does that too.

One of my favourite images I have seen on SGL would not be considered to have been well processed I should think, but I thought it was a lovely picture.