First go at Flame Nebula and Horsehead

[Stub Mandrel]

Loads of photos from last night, but I had to make this one a priority, sneaking it between real work...

I'm kicking myself ... my first ever few shots of the Flame nebula looked great - I could see it clearly but there was a dust bunny near it. So I changed the framing, and nearly cut off the 'osses 'ead :-(

To rub in the insult, no sign of the dust bunny other than on the full run of subs. 19 subs of ~90 seconds each for 26 minutes

Still this is my first quick and dirty processing of it, probably a bit garish:

[MartinFransson]

Toning down the saturation of the blues would help Would it be possible to rotate the camera by 90 degrees? The would make the framing perfect. Go get it again! I have yet to catch that region of the sky as good as I want it.

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[Marky1973]

Nice one! - one that is on my list for the next clear night....sometime in 2016.....

[StargeezerTim]

Nice one. I did some imgaing up to 12.30 last night. Unfortunately, I was babysitting today so had to go to bed with several hours of very rare clear skies going spare!

Looks like that is it now for another several weeks! :-(

Cheers, Tim.

[wimvb]

Nice one!

I agree with Martin: rotating the camera would give a more pleasing framing.

The mottle is an unfortunate side effect of DSLR imaging, and is hard to remove, other than increasing the exposure time and the number of subs.

[Pompey Monkey]

Nice one!

I agree with Martin: rotating the camera would give a more pleasing framing.

The mottle is an unfortunate side effect of DSLR imaging, and is hard to remove, other than increasing the exposure time and the number of subs.

And dithering. In spades.

[Stub Mandrel]

I think I found the source of (some) of the noise. As well as my 1'30" darks, I included all my 30" darks in DSS when I stacked it the first time as well.

Try again..

<edit> and teh 135mm flats as well as the 400mm flats. I wonder what this 'clear list' function does

[almcl]

I think I found the source of (some) of the noise. As well as my 1'30" darks, I included all my 30" darks

Stub

Have you tried stacking without any darks at all?

I ask because I have given up using them altogether as they were either making very little discernable difference or actually making things worse. As well, the EXIF data suggested that the temperatures were all over the place and notning like the ones recorded for the lights.

[Stub Mandrel]

This is better!

[Stub Mandrel]

Stub

Have you tried stacking without any darks at all?

I ask because I have given up using them altogether as they were either making very little discernable difference or actually making things worse. As well, the EXIF data suggested that the temperatures were all over the place and notning like the ones recorded for the lights.

I'll try.

My problem was that the temperature plunged during the session from well above zero to a heavy ground frost.

I did my darks the next day by putting the camera in the coldest part of the fridge for a couple of hours.

[Stub Mandrel]

Interesting. This is a no darks version, still with flats and bias (saved at a higher jpeg quality too):