California Nebula - 1st Post

[Andyb90]

Hi Everyone,

This is my first post in this section so please be gentle. 

It's the California Nebula (NGC1499) in Ha. I had originally intended to setup my OAG in the afternoon and do my first guided session with it, but just couldn't get the QHY5iii174 to focus with the ASI1600. So gave up in the end and decided to go with short unguided exposures. I managed 150 x 30s exposures in total, at gain 400 and -20c before having to pack up. Image is calibrated with darks and flats.

Processing is fairly basic in Photoshop CC. I've spent most of my time trying to resolve image capture issues lately rather than learning processing.

C & C would be welcome. I've used a high pass filter to Sharpen. But it has sharpened the whole image which I think has a detrimental affect on the background. Is there a way to selectively sharpen parts of the nebula in Photoshop with the high pass filter.

Andy.

[spillage]

Very nice for 30s subs and no guiding. Are you going to add any other data, can I ask what setting you used for offset?

spill.

[coatesg]

Nice image! In terms of sharpening, I think you'll need to create a mask and mask off the areas you don't want to sharpen up - you may need to include stars in this if they start to get a bit blocky. 

[Andyb90]

2 hours ago, spillage said:

Very nice for 30s subs and no guiding. Are you going to add any other data, can I ask what setting you used for offset?

spill.

Thanks.

Yes, I want to add more data. I've now managed to get the QHY5 and 1600 focused together with the OAG. So will try to guide next time.

I selected the pre-defined 'lowest read noise' setting in the camera setup dialog with offset 50 and increased the gain to 400.

Andy.

[Andyb90]

1 hour ago, coatesg said:

Nice image! In terms of sharpening, I think you'll need to create a mask and mask off the areas you don't want to sharpen up - you may need to include stars in this if they start to get a bit blocky. 

Cheers. Thanks for the tip. I'll look for a tutorial on masking.

Andy.

[Allinthehead]

That's a great start. A very simple way to sharpen would be to duplicate the image. Filter-smart sharpen to taste. Paste the original image over the sharpened image. Use the eraser to let the areas you want sharpened through. In the long run masks are well worth learning. 

[Andyb90]

3 hours ago, Allinthehead said:

That's a great start. A very simple way to sharpen would be to duplicate the image. Filter-smart sharpen to taste. Paste the original image over the sharpened image. Use the eraser to let the areas you want sharpened through. In the long run masks are well worth learning. 

Thanks. Will give the smart sharpen a go and have a look for a layer masks tutorial.

Andy.