Cassiopeia

[happy-kat]

Currently deciding between capping green to yellow or brown or leaving as above which is normal. Capping to brown is just in the lead.

[happy-kat]

The problem with only binning 70% is the PC is taking so much longer to process in StarTools...currently doing the same stack 1 to see if I prefer the extra resolution of 70% versus 50% before processing the other stacks.

[happy-kat]

Looking like the 50% bin is giving better results, just trying a noise pass on the 70% to see if that improves it, though my star mask before Life Isolate needs a shrink grow grow grow as I have some part halos now on the image from just two grows. There are more yellow orange stars in the 70% version on the left (even with a minor crop corner stars are nice and round).

^ the image got very pixelated on adding to this post.

[happy-kat]

Used the magic function so now pondering shall I redo the 70% bin on stack 1 but prevent star halos forming (from my process) or stick with the 50% bin which carries better contrast on the interesting bits. Maybe the 70% bin looks more natural though on pixel peeping it carries a bit more noise.

[Bobby1970]

Just my 2p worth but the image on the right looks better to my eyes at least. Looks really good. 

[happy-kat]

Thank you. (by the way I did a process earlier that matched those blotchy stars it was using one of the functions without an inverted star mask).

When I get the process to something more as I learn more I will do the rest and hope they still all match up in colour and tone. 

[happy-kat]

ICE can't stitch full processed images, so it will be 60% process, then stitch the stacks together, then back in StarTools to pull out more data.

This is a proof of concept image so resized small for easy upload.

[happy-kat]

Interestingly the image is very dark when viewing this thread on my 5 inch phone thing. If I make it brighter for mobile viewing it could be over bright for desktops so I'll process based on desktop monitor I think.

[Ags]

The barn door is really paying off! The results are looking gorgeous.

[happy-kat]

Thank you, I'm most pleased with star shapes too.

I'm fighting processing analysis paralysis and trying to read my new book. Tomorrow I'll have a go at producing a new mosaic and then get that entered into the challenge #8 as I'm at risk of missing the closing date if I don't get something uploaded. 

[laowhoo]

This is my favorite patch of sky (our non-existent south is blocked). I've never seen it this way (tend to avoid images that don't come w/ spoiler alerts as a visual observer only). Thank you for this.

[The Admiral]

I think that's brilliant, happy-kat, and to think you used a barn door tracker too! Now that's impressive 

Ian

[happy-kat]

Thank you Ian.

Still working on this processing, haven't been able to get any more data. Had made in roads tonight only to discover I forgot as step!! doh. Will need to check the log file tomorrow to make sure I do the right things (so they all match enough to stitch). 

[happy-kat]

Argh just on pixel peeping there's aeroplane trails in one image that haven't gone in kappa sigma clipping. I'll have to start again on that one. Installed fits liberator that's a cool app.

[happy-kat]

Currently trying to stack batch 3 so there are no plane trails in the result (3 of the 12 images, 2x plane 1x satellite). I have selected a good reference frame and now testing which method is best KSC still showed them, MKSC is currently running. Didn't work.

What worked was median for the lights and kappa-sigma clipping on the other files.

[happy-kat]

Having spent hours and hours on this I am finally getting somewhere on the mosaic and will hopefully have my entry for the challenge done and uploaded this weekend.

[The Admiral]

Looking forward to seeing it!

Ian

[happy-kat]

Done. I tried to replicate it today to get rid of the slight star halo on some stars my mask had not been big enough last night. Unfortunately even using my processing workflow I could not replicate the overall image and I like the version posted as it has the most milky way flavour I could get out of my data.