Revisiting M45

[Horwig]

I had a strange night back at the beginning of the year, it was clear!

So out came the kit, cobwebs blown off, computer persuaded to talk to everything, and as they were high in the sky, I decided to revisit the Pleiades.

I'd imaged them last at the end of 2016, and had two clear nights in a row, but the resulting image was pants. I blamed the data (could it be my inability to process? No, why would it be 🙈)

After analysing this new data, the night had not been that great, lots of thin cloud, not enough to disturb guiding, but enough to give quite a few low contrast images.

I decided to go back to see if I could combine the best of this new data with my stuff from 2016, and this is the result. The camera angle was not the same, so some cropping had to be done.

(sorry for the long preamble)

 

Having looked at the old data, there seemed nothing wrong with it, so I processed an image with just the 2016 data, which naturally has a slightly wider FOV:

 

Can't decide which I like the best, any opinions?

 

Huw

Edited January 21, 2021 by Horwig

[Kinch]

Both are great 👀 - no need to decide between them. 👍

[Horwig]

19 minutes ago, Kinch said:

Both are great 👀 - no need to decide between them. 👍

Thanks for the kind words, I've spent so long trying different versions, I'm not sure of anything anymore.

 

Huw

[Kinch]

15 minutes ago, Horwig said:

I've spent so long trying different versions

...I know exactly what you mean.....sometimes I have so many different versions of an image....I just give up and go back to one of the originals. 🤓

[geeklee]

Agreed, both are excellent.  I really like the second, wider field - great view of the dust surrounding and in front of the Pleiades.

[Debo]

No 2 👍 !!

Edited January 21, 2021 by Debo

[callisto]

Love the wider view image 

[Horwig]

Thanks all. What I'm seeing is the deeper detail in the first image, that has 10 hours of L data and the wide one only 6.5 hours.

It's either that or my differing processing between both versions.

 

Huw

[AstroNtinos]

Both of them are nice. These are the most detailed images of M45 i've ever seen. Great job.

[MartinB]

The backgound of both is amazing with exceptional flux.  Managing the background brightness within the cluster must be quite a challenge and I think the first image looks better in this regard.

[peter shah]

That's a lovely deep rendition Huw.....there so much in the region it almost becomes unrecognisable 

[tooth_dr]

Both are fantastic and equally good in their own right.  But I do like the more intense contrast of the wider background