Horsehead and Flame Nebulas 21-01-2021

[Nicola Hannah Butterfield]

Hopefully this is an improvement on last year's image, this should have been 4 hrs or so, but what with wind and cloud (it was supposed to be clear) it ended up at 75 mins of 60's, 60's due to wind and cloud.

[Nicola Hannah Butterfield]

which was this

[peter shah]

Very nice, Its a lot cleaner and you have managed to control Alnitak well....that not easy to do.... and you have a good colour balanced

[ultranova]

Great improvement over the last take on it,

Shame about the weather, none the less a much smoother with

better colors.

As Peter said, excellent control of Alnitak.

Well done,

Paul

 

[Nicola Hannah Butterfield]

@peter shah@ultranova Thanks for you comments. I used a lot of masking, I have learnt some new things processing this one. One thing I have stated doing (though not sure if has helped, is to cover the camera with a black bag type thing, also a home-made (basically a piece of cardboard) light shield, to help cut down on  excess neighbours lights from going straight down the focuser, I either need to change that or the scope at some point, as it is the standard 200P focuser and extends into the tube an inch or so, though I have painted it black, I suspect it is still effecting the final image. Just need some clear nights to practise, you tend to forget from one month to the next. I have however got the computer side sorted for the most part, guiding (when not to windy) plate solving, dithering (though not aggressively enough on this sequence), flats are always an issue, so tend to take these during evening twilight, and leave the camera in the same rotation. I have an idea what I am shooting so rotate accordingly. I got a bahtinov mask for  Xmas, first time I used my eye focus was spot on anyway, but handy to check.