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Recommend books for Astrophotography processing


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2 hours ago, smr said:

Hi,

I'd like to buy some good books for Astrophotography processing. I use Adobe Photoshop so books relevant to this software would be most beneficial. 

Thanks.

Joel

Some excellent books on (Photoshop dominated) processing of Astronomical images would be:

1 - Photoshop Astronomy by R Scott Ireland - incredibly detailed but maybe slightly dated.

2. - The Deep Sky Imaging Primer by C Bracken - also covers acquisition.

3.  Lessons from the Masters - Edited by R Gendler -  Advanced.

Whilst the above books are very good, I would also suggest that you consider some world class video tutorials from Adam Block - see https://adamblockstudios.com/categories/DimensionsOfPhotoshop

Alan

 

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8 minutes ago, smr said:

Thanks for the above books. I'm not sure I need the imaging primer though? I thought that was to do with gear needed and acquisition rather than image processing?

Although the book "The Deep Sky Imaging Primer by C Bracken" is called a primer I would regard it as an intermediate level book. It's contents are about 50% about processing images.

Personally, if you want to learn on how to improve your Astrophotography Photoshop skills I'd first go to the Adam Block video tutorials. 

Alan

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8 minutes ago, alan4908 said:

Although the book "The Deep Sky Imaging Primer by C Bracken" is called a primer I would regard it as an intermediate level book. It's contents are about 50% about processing images.

Personally, if you want to learn on how to improve your Astrophotography Photoshop skills I'd first go to the Adam Block video tutorials. 

Alan

Thanks Alan. Yes I've just been looking through Adam's website, it's $99. But it does sound like it's exactly what I'm looking for. May well be worth the investment.

Have you purchased it yourself?

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1 minute ago, smr said:

Thanks Alan. Yes I've just been looking through Adam's website, it's $99. But it does sound like it's exactly what I'm looking for. May well be worth the investment.

Have you purchased it yourself?

I have indeed and it is excellent.

Alan

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It does seem very good. I've watched quite a few videos and am onto the realm of pixels part... 

but I'm a bit confused...Adam uses CCDstack and stretches the image / adjusts brightness etc. before Photoshop showing a really nice result already..

But I use Deepskystacker to stack and then use Photoshop for everything - stretching etc.

So should I be using a program similar to CCDstack before Photoshop? I also don't record FITS files, and instead capture RAW files as I use a DSLR. But CCDstack only seems to work with FITs.

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When I first started processing in Photoshop I bought a DVD by Adam Block, and it was great.  I am sure he probably has a more updated version of it now in fact I think it's available now as a download. 

It was called "Making every Pixel Count", not to be confused with Steve Richards making Every photon Count.  

Really learnt a lot from watching Adam's videos which I still use today.

Carole 

 

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13 hours ago, smr said:

It does seem very good. I've watched quite a few videos and am onto the realm of pixels part... 

but I'm a bit confused...Adam uses CCDstack and stretches the image / adjusts brightness etc. before Photoshop showing a really nice result already..

But I use Deepskystacker to stack and then use Photoshop for everything - stretching etc.

So should I be using a program similar to CCDstack before Photoshop? I also don't record FITS files, and instead capture RAW files as I use a DSLR. But CCDstack only seems to work with FITs.

It is not necessary to purchase CCDstack (although it is a very good program).  When processing in Photoshop, Adam primarily uses CCDstack for a Digital Development Processing (DDP) stretch of the luminescence image such that the object of interest will end up with a lum level that is around 180 (ish) - if you end up with lum values more that 200 then it will be very difficult to colour.  So if you don't have CCDstack, then all you need to do is find a program that can perform a DDP or similar stretch on the lum data.

Alan

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On 11/09/2019 at 21:17, carastro said:

When I first started processing in Photoshop I bought a DVD by Adam Block, and it was great.  I am sure he probably has a more updated version of it now in fact I think it's available now as a download. 

It was called "Making every Pixel Count", not to be confused with Steve Richards making Every photon Count.  

Really learnt a lot from watching Adam's videos which I still use today.

Carole 

 

I learned a lot from this source as well at one time. Also Steve's book is excellent. 

What I really believe, though, is that there are various ways to use Photoshop's vast box of tools. The key thing is to get to know what they are and how they work, then you're in a position to devise your own ways of exploiting them. This means that your images will develop in ways which are unique to you. It would be a shame if we all followed a set path to a predictable result.

Olly

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