1st DSO... well proper go at it..

[LaVey]

Heres my first real attempt at something with the 350D... had it strapped to the scope, 30x30 seconds, 3 darks and 2 flats.

Processed in Nebulosity, had a go with iris, ps, dss and maxim (done a few tutorials today!) - but this was the best output.

Am pleased with it as a first go...

comments/improvements welcome

(looking forward to goodies at crimbo to make longer exposures possible)

[Doc]

For a first proper attempt that is awesome.

M31 is quite hard to get right and considering it's only 15 minutes it's really good.

[steve51450]

that's a fantastic 1st image

[Starflyer]

That's a very good first attempt and a huge improvement over the original process you posted in the Imaging Discussion board. Keep em coming

[RobH]

Well done La Vey, as said, a very fine start and a very tricky object due to its large dynamic range.

I see that you've isolated the stars when stretching the faint bits of the galaxy.

Did you do this in PS?

Cheers

Rob

[gary1968]

A good first DSO LaVey, keep up the good work.

Gary

[LaVey]

hey rob..

I used ps to do some slight changes with levels and curves and a noise reduction with Neatimage, although I did an orginal stretch in Nebulosity (as per the tutorial i followed!). Just need to do a few more to get a work flow together...

edit:

on another note.. how do I add data to this at a later date.. can you just take the combined fit file and add it to a new one, erm.. in ps as a layer? or is there a smarter way to do this?

[RobH]

Hello LaVey,

The reason I asked is that there are some odd rings around the stars and was wondering what they were. They look like the stars have been selected and then the backround has been stretched, or something similar.

If you want to add data to this later, the best way to do it is to go back to the beginning, and add the new data to your original data, and then combine them all into a new image. This will get you the best results as you'll be significantly increasing your S/N ratio by having more subs to stack, and will then be able to go further in the processing.

This does mean you'll need to process it over again, but the more practice one can get, the better, and you'll find that a lot of what you're doing now will become second nature after a while.

Cheers

Rob

[LaVey]

ahh.. I see what you mean now with those stars and I know how that happened.. it was in the curves stage in ps - I had to drop the top left corner of the curve in order not to blow out the centre, I guess it affected the stars ... didnt even see that till now.. thx for the pointer, will need to keep an eye on 'over doing' it.

[thing]

That's a pretty impressive first image, keep them coming.

[LostNSpace]

A good start Lavey, it can be a difficult object to process

Mark

[Sam]

Nice first go Lavey, it's a tricky object.

[Psychobilly]

Very nice first DSO Lavey...

You picked a big but tricky target and got a very nice image...

Billy...