False Colour and Hubble - First Attempts

[Stub Mandrel]

Last night I got my first OIII and SII data, enough to try combining with my Ha froma few nights ago.

Both runs were spoilt more than a bit because I used automatic dark subtraction but the system loaded the 'dark flat dark' of a afew tens of milliseconds instead of the 500 second 'dark dark' 😞

For some reason half of the OIII subs were very dark despite having the same settings, and I got better results just stacking relatively few, but they weren't too bad.

The SII subs were incredibly dark, and it took a lot of stretching and some quite scurrilous star mask and blur to get anything usable, but it does pick up some wispy bits at the left of the image.

I won't pretend these are either pefectly aligned or well processed, but I'm treating this as 'throw away' data to just find out how it/if works. These are my first attempts at false colour (Ha-red, SII-green, OII-blue) and 'Hubble' palettes.

No Pixel-Peeping allowed!

 

[wimvb]

Throw away data or not, I think you have a very nice image there with lovely detail. I'm not sure Sii adds anything to the image. Have you tried processing the data as a bi-colour?

[Stub Mandrel]

1 hour ago, wimvb said:

Throw away data or not, I think you have a very nice image there with lovely detail. I'm not sure Sii adds anything to the image. Have you tried processing the data as a bi-colour?

Here are the Oiii and Sii layers so you can see how bad they are! Just jpegs to save room. You can see the remains of amp glow on the Sii (because I used the wrong dark) and how feeble the data is, but it does add some features, I've outlined them in yellow.

[carastro]

That's pretty good for a first attempt at combining narrowband, you got all the stars aligned well.  Sometimes Oiii and Sii can be very faint indeed and sometimes not even worth adding, and on occasions I have stacked HOO or HSS (HSS in California nebula as no Oiii to see).  

Carole 

[Stub Mandrel]

Thanks, I think I can improve the alignment even more by using a Ha reference frame.

[Stub Mandrel]

I've gone back to the start with the Oii and Sii, I stacked them using the Ha as a reference so alignment stands up to papixel peep now. I remembered a technique for pulling out faint nebulosity that rescued many of my early images that saved the Oiii layer. I got more defined colours, then used the original Ha as a luminosity layer as it included all the O and S areas.

Now, I'm starting to feel happy with this.

 

[maw lod qan]

Like always, I'm in awe at the talents the members have here imaging.

I wont live long enough to acquire such ability.

[Stub Mandrel]

27 minutes ago, maw lod qan said:

Like always, I'm in awe at the talents the members have here imaging.

I wont live long enough to acquire such ability.

Not at all, it's taken me five or six years, but I have benefited by starting with very basic gear and very ordinary skies which forces you to learn how to get the best out of short subs, and adding bits piecemeal so I learn a step at a time. If I dove straight in now with my present setup I would struggle - in fact I am struggling!

None of it would be possible without SGL as a source of advice and a signpost to other sources of information - or the encouragement of fellow SGL and RAG club members!