North American and Pelican Nebulae - Deep Integration

[kirkster501]

Here is 46 x 10 minutes with FSQ85 and Moravian G2-8300 camera and Astrodon 3nm filter.

I had forgotten about this data set that I captured in 2018!   I have been desperate to process something with not getting anything in the can lately due to shocking UK weather so was looking into my data lake and found these unprocessed jewels.  As it happens, with a huge dataset like this, you hardly need to do any processing at all since the output from image integration is so good.  All I did after preprocessing was do an Automatic background Extraction, a masked stretch and a bit of HDR with a mask.  That's it.

I hope you like it and it gets you looking forward to summer again.  This will be an excellent foundation for a colour North American/Pelican project as well.

[sloz1664]

Wow that looks a little like a 3d image as there is so much detail. I really like Ha images as the detail is so rich & sharp. Love how this as been detailed Steve.

Steve

[kirkster501]

Thanks Steve. 

It's not what we want to hear in the UK with our clear sky time at such a premium but the truth is that more subs equals better result.  It's as simple as that isn't it.....  We are told this all the time but still try to do 10 subs instead of 25 to try and get something in the can.  There are 46 in this picture.  OK, maybe that is overkill but forms the basis of a good experiment.  I'd say based on my experience now of struggling with processing and noisy images is that the luminance or Ha master providing the detail on any subject needs 20 lights at least and this picture is an epiphany moment for me - 8 - 12  subs like I have been doing is not enough for a super result.

I hardly did anything to this picture.  So many subs and the noise averages itself out

[tooth_dr]

38 minutes ago, kirkster501 said:

Thanks Steve. 

It's not what we want to hear in the UK with our clear sky time at such a premium but the truth is that more subs equals better result.  It's as simple as that isn't it.....  We are told this all the time but still try to do 10 subs instead of 25 to try and get something in the can.  There are 46 in this picture.  OK, maybe that is overkill but forms the basis of a good experiment.  I'd say based on my experience now of struggling with processing and noisy images is that the luminance or Ha master providing the detail on any subject needs 20 lights at least and this picture is an epiphany moment for me - 8 - 12  subs like I have been doing is not enough for a super result.

I hardly did anything to this picture.  So many subs and the noise averages itself out

I would find that 8 hours is a sweet spot for my images, and it's probably no coincidence there is 8 hours here.

[ollypenrice]

Spot on. Tip top.

Olly

[kirkster501]

26 minutes ago, tooth_dr said:

I would find that 8 hours is a sweet spot for my images, and it's probably no coincidence there is 8 hours here.

Very true.  It is very hard to be disciplined and focus on the one object in our skies for so long.  By the time you've got the data on one subject it's possible that two, three or four months can pass sometimes and the object disappears from view!  I have about six data sets I am working with like that.  For example,  my deep-detail, multi-panel Andromeda project with my TEC140 is going to be a decade long one at this rate.  I hardly got anything on it this/last year, the weather has been so diabolical.

Edited February 19, 2020 by kirkster501

[tooth_dr]

3 minutes ago, kirkster501 said:

Very true.  It is very hard to be disciplined and focus on the one object in our skies for so long.  By the time you've got the data on one subject it's possible that two, three or four months can pass sometimes and the object disappears from view!  I have about six data sets I am working with like that.  For example,  my deep-detail, multi-panel Andromeda project with my TEC140 is going to be a decade long one at this rate.  I hardly got anything on it this/last year, the weather has been so diabolical.

I agree! And since I’ve been fettling with my kit, I’m finding data that I had planned to add to from a few months ago is now no good due to mis-alignment of diffraction spikes etc.