M31 Andromeda Galaxy ED80 WIP

[tooth_dr]

Looks like it is going to a war of attrition this season.  Last night I only got 11 x 300s in luminance in one scope and 8 x 300s red and 3 x 300s blue in the other, then clouds rolled in.

I'm delighted with the improvements in guiding since the belt mod, and consistently get under 1"/pixel RMS, which is ok since I'm imaging at 2.13"/pixel.

I didn't process the colour but used all the data to create this luminance.

Comments welcome.

CS, Adam.

 

[Allinthehead]

Great start Adam. Lots of detail already showing.

[tooth_dr]

Thanks Richard.

I have added another night of luminance to this, and also captured some RGB, but I spent a couple of hours at the RGB tonight only to get a brown mess.  I'll get Steves book out and have a read.

Below is my luminance, now sitting at 5 hours and 10 minutes of exposure, I wonder if I've overdone the processing 😕

Comments welcome

 

 

 

Edited September 11, 2019 by tooth_dr

[dave_galera]

That is basis of a very nice image, lots of detail, should be superb when finished with RGB

[alan potts]

I must try and understand this pixels/second figure, cracking image there, I was going to post my effort, saw everybody else's and thought , er no. Look forward to the finished item, I realise black and white image are lovely and highly detailed in many cases but i do prefer colour .

Alan

[tomato]

I agree with the other posters, that’s  a cracking luminance image, great balance between the core, dust lanes and spiral arms, keep persevering with the RGB and I think you will have a mighty fine M31 result.

[Peter Drew]

Lovely M31, I always prefer mono DSO images as they mostly appear like visual images, colour for me, always looks false, however real it might be.    😀

[Allinthehead]

The extra data really shows in the second image, looks like it's going to be a great image. Regarding the rgb if your lum is overpowering you end up with the brown mess. Have you tried lowering the opacity of the lum layer and adding it iteratively? 

Edited September 14, 2019 by Allinthehead

[Mr Spock]

That is looking great so far. I have a feeling the finished image is going to be special.

[tooth_dr]

7 minutes ago, Allinthehead said:

The extra data really shows in the second image, looks like it's going to be a great image. Regarding the rgb if your lum is overpowering you end up with the brown mess. Have you tried lowering the opacity of the lum layer and adding it iteratively? 

Thanks Richard. It was a mess before I added the lum. I have no idea how to combine the R and G and B really.  Getting each channel right and ‘equal’ before combining seems beyond me at the minute.  I’ve had success combining OSC with lum following the advice you gave me at the start of the year (blend low opacity, blur, increase sat etc). It is getting my mono RGB filtered data to an image stage that’s eluding me. 

[dave_galera]

Hi Adam,

Have you ever seen this tutorial for combining RGB using Photoshop, before I switched to PixInsight I used this method with  much success. Just ignore the fits liberator bit and the use the layer structure.

https://www.spacetelescope.org/projects/fits_liberator/stepbystep/

I do have template PS files with all the layers set up if you want a copy of them

Edited September 14, 2019 by dave_galera