M42 not the best but hey ho!

[blinky]

This is a mix of 5min and 30sec subs, found it very very hard to match the colour of the diffrent sub lengths. I am also a little dissapointed with the lack of colour but think this ay be due to sky conditions at the time.

I will keep thrying with M42 until it's gone for the year as I really want a better image than this. I dont mean to sound too dissapointed but I was expecting to be able to pull a little more....

(click to enlarge)

[steppenwolf]

Craig, plenty of outer filamentary detail and nicely framed too.

[MartinB]

It's good that you are setting your standards so high Craig. What was your overall exposure time?

[Psychobilly]

Very Nice Craig... I think were both chasing the samer sort of image I got another 7200s of 540s at ISO400 subs last night to add to the 13,030s I already have....

Thats the next job...

Stacking all the sub stacks including darks and bias this time then processing the multilayer image.

Billy...

[blinky]

It was around 1hr 45mins a mix of 5 mins and 30secons exposures. I just feel the 'middle' of the neb is a bit lacking..likely due to my using a non modded camera

[Psychobilly]

Hi Craig,

Whilst the 2 sub lenght approach works I preffer to take many more different sub length as I think it results in a smoother blend in the Neb..

In traditional "photgraphy" terms I look to use 1 EV increments especially round the bottom end so I double the exposure time between sets and also you need to make sure that you have the same number of subs at each exposure to maintain this realtionship when you stack.

[blinky]

Peter,

I was going to do this as I do have some 36, 60, 120 and 240 second subs froma previous night. The thnig is when I stuck 'em all in DSS it always burned out the core and I am not sure how else to do it in Photoshop!

If you want to give a wee tutorial......

[barkis]

Being critical of your own work is no bad thing Craig, The image would have probably have

made you very happy not too long ago, but you have moved ahead a bit since then.

You will triumph. (Did you get my email by the way.re. The eqmod polar align question?)

Ron.