Flame and Horsehead nebula

[Jannis]

I finally modded my 550D last week, so this is also my "new first light" with it.

78x 180s exposures at ISO 800, and i mixed in some Ha from a stack of 16x 600s at ISO 1600. Captured with the Explorer 200.

Was struggling a bit with light pollution, but didn't feel it was bad enough to throw in the CLS filter, and i think it turned out quite OK after all.

[Sunshine]

It is a beautiful image!

[MarsG76]

What a beauty....

 

[shropshire lad]

Just wonderful

 

[peter shah]

Superb colour balance ...just beautiful

[teoria_del_big_bang]

That really is a nice image 🙂 

Steve

[callisto]

Yeah, you got a good un there 

 

Mark

[Gerr]

Absolutely stunning.

I love this nebula but am struggling to get a decent shot at it. May I ask how you get the flame nebula colour to stand out yellow?

Gerr.

[Jannis]

Thank you for all the great feedback!

Gerr, I don't think i did anything special to get the flame color. Basically just aligned color channels and stretched in Photoshop with curves and levels until color balance looked OK. Your modded 650D should give similar colors.
However, that's also one of the reasons i decided to avoid using the CLS filter unless it's really really needed, because it kills so much of the yellow colors. If you're using a light pollution filter, that might be why you're struggling with the colors.
This is a single frame with no processing other then a quick aligning the color channels and stretching it strongly to see the colors. It looks quite similar to the end result i think?

Edited February 7, 2021 by Jannis

[Gerr]

Hi Jannis,

Thanks for the reply (only just seen it now) and I think you are quite correct in what you said about the filters.

This evening I swapped out my Optolong L-enHance filter for an L-pro light pollution filter and when the first image on APT popped up I could clearly see the yellow colour in the flame nebula. It seems that the L-enHance filter coupled with my astromodded 650D was killing the natural colours of this nebula making it over rich in red H alpha. The telescope is still outside capturing subs of the horse head and flame but I am really encouraged and pleasantly surprised by the L-Pro. I cannot wait to stack and process tomorrow.

Cheers,

Gerr.

[Jannis]

That sounds great, glad you sorted it out! Isn't the Optolong L-enHance a dual narrowband filter? I would think it killed most colors in general. The Optolong L-Pro filter seems to let trough much more light, and also a lot more of the yellow light then my CLS filter, so I can't wait to see your results!

[Gerr]

Hi Jannis,

Here is the result.

36 x 3minute lights at ISO1600, Optolong L-Pro Filter.

I am pretty stoked with this image.