M31 Photo

[cwit1]

I managed to get the scope out the other night again  thats two nights now in the past couple of months, things are looking up.

Anyhow here's my attempt at M31, still struggling to get it to all come together, especially the processing bit, but I think i'm making progress.

[Dave Lloyd]

Nice indeed.

[laudropb]

Very nice image. Nice detail.

[paul mc c]

Looking good,i am in the middle of this image my self,although i am just at the really new stage of  AP,definately takes lots and lots of lights to see any progress.

If i get to your stage i will print it off and frame it.

[JemC]

cracking image well done

[cwit1]

Looking good,i am in the middle of this image my self,although i am just at the really new stage of  AP,definately takes lots and lots of lights to see any progress.

If i get to your stage i will print it off and frame it.

paul mc c

I to am a newcomer to this AP also and I really struggled to get any result from my data - 20 x 240sec + flats darks and bias.

I found that I was getting all kinds of colour casts after stacking in DSS but set everything to average and then got a far better start image from DSS.  Lots of little curves adjustments later  happy man.

I am used to processing normal photo's but I find this AP is a different ball game altogether !!  I'm sure you will get the result.

Chris.

[Pompey Monkey]

I managed to get the scope out the other night again  thats two nights now in the past couple of months, things are looking up.

Anyhow here's my attempt at M31, still struggling to get it to all come together, especially the processing bit, but I think i'm making progress.

Excellent first image!

[JR1987]

Looks fantastic, So much better than my M31,  Unfortunatly I live in South east london so M31 is nothing but a wash of london orange now, have to wait till september. 

the colours are subtle but it looks good like that. Did you try upping the saturation much to see if you could draw out the yellowish core?

[Jepjep]

Woah, almost looks like a picture taken by the Hubble Space Telescope in my opinion.

[Pankaj]

Excellent image. Can you please share the equipment and exposure details. 

Regards

[StargeezerTim]

That is very nice!

[cwit1]

Excellent image. Can you please share the equipment and exposure details. 

Regards

Hi Pankaj

Yes sure

I used a canon 5d mk2 camera with a Skywatcher ED80 on a NEQ6 mount.

It was guided with a ST80 and QHY5-2. 

Lights 20 x 240sec , the same darks with about 30 bias and some 20 flats.

Processed using DSS and photoshop.  Hope that helps.

Chris.

[cwit1]

Looks fantastic, So much better than my M31,  Unfortunatly I live in South east london so M31 is nothing but a wash of london orange now, have to wait till september. 

the colours are subtle but it looks good like that. Did you try upping the saturation much to see if you could draw out the yellowish core?

Hi James

Thanks,  No I haven't upped the saturation much but I might have a play with it some more to see what else I can get out of it while the weather is bad.

I suppose I'm lucky in as much that the light pollution down here is not to bad.

Chris.

[cwit1]

Thank you all for your comments, I feel quite chuffed now !

Chris.

[JR1987]

Hi James

Thanks,  No I haven't upped the saturation much but I might have a play with it some more to see what else I can get out of it while the weather is bad.

I suppose I'm lucky in as much that the light pollution down here is not to bad.

Chris.

If your using photoshop try a little trick I learnt a while ago from a tutorial.

In photoshop, Create 2 new copied layers of the main image, the the top layer set the mode to luminosity, then set the second to soft light. Leave the bottom layer as normal, merge all 3 layers and you should notice an increate in saturation but without increasing the colour noise. I think the technique is called 'saturate block'.

repeat it as many times as you fancy!

[Phil-lost!]

Looks great, well done.

[ollypenrice]

If your using photoshop try a little trick I learnt a while ago from a tutorial.

In photoshop, Create 2 new copied layers of the main image, the the top layer set the mode to luminosity, then set the second to soft light. Leave the bottom layer as normal, merge all 3 layers and you should notice an increate in saturation but without increasing the colour noise. I think the technique is called 'saturate block'.

repeat it as many times as you fancy!

...or create two copy layers, set the first to Soft Light and flatten then the second to Colour.

This is a great first result. For me the tones are a bit cold so I'd slightly lift the reds and manage the greens for the balance but if we're talking at this level you did a cracking first image!

Olly

[cwit1]

Hi Olly & James

Thanks for the tips, much appreciated, I'll give them a go ... So much to learn,    but I'm lovin it !! 

Chris

[cwit1]

Hi 

Warmed up image and saturated a little using the techniques advised by Olly and James. 

Although it seems a bit more colorful on my monitor than showing here on the forum, tried saving as a PNG as I've read in another post but still not showing the same saturation.

Its a big improvement for me though so thanks again for the info gents .

Chris.