Second shot at NA Nebula

[Iem1]

Morning guys,

Just returned from a night of imaging, making the most of the clear and moonless night. I thought I would have another go at trying to capture The North America nebula to try and improve on my first attempt.

The first attempt, taken about 6 weeks ago: 1 hr 20 of 2 minute exposures at ISO 800 captured by a WO Z73 III  + field flattener with an astro modded Canon 600D, all riding on a SGP (Unguided)

 

I think it was my 3rd or 4th attempt at doing any astrophotography at all, so there was a lot that went wrong  

Tonight I decided to go for round 2, but this time I wanted to see what (if any) detail I could see in the Cygnus Wall and hopefully see some improvements on my first attempts. 

Second Attempt taken tonight: 1 hr 50 of 1 minute exposures at ISO 800 captured by a WO Z73 III  + field flattener with an astro modded Canon 600D, all riding on a SGP (Unguided)

I know it is a very noisy image with all that walking noise, being heavily cropped probably doesn't help and my processing skills are shaky at best, but I am super pleased with the progress considering it is with the same equipment about a 6 weeks apart!  

I stretched and balanced colour in PS and reduced stars a bit, but any suggestions for improvements are more than welcome  

 

As always, the original untouched tif:

Autosave002.tif

 

[Stuf1978]

Great progress, that looks way better. Some nice detail in the wall and the star colours are lovely  

Edited September 7, 2021 by Stuf1978

[Iem1]

Thank you Stuf  I am quite pleased with it!

Gave editing another go this morning after a nights sleep, same basic process but done a bit less stretching.

 

 

[Stuf1978]

58 minutes ago, Iem1 said:

Thank you Stuf  I am quite pleased with it!

Gave editing another go this morning after a nights sleep, same basic process but done a bit less stretching.

 

 

I'd be happy with it too. I'm busy shooting this at the minute as well. Managed a couple of hours on it last night and hopefully get some more data tonight 😀

[alacant]

10 hours ago, Iem1 said:

another go

Hi

Greatly improved. There's loadsa detail.

A touch of diagonal noise which could easily be eliminated by dither between frames.

Cheers

[Iem1]

4 hours ago, alacant said:

Hi

Greatly improved. There's loadsa detail.

A touch of diagonal noise which could easily be eliminated by dither between frames.

Cheers

That is a nice process! I really need to look into startools again  

I think I am going to try manually dithering tonight, am I correct in thinking I can simply use the RA keys on the SGP to move back and forth between frames? My subs are max 60 seconds, so it is a lot of extra work over the course of the night!

Do I need to adjust DEC too?

Pondering targets for tonight...Thinking about another run at the Triangulam galaxy to get a cleaner image than my last attempt!

Edited September 7, 2021 by Iem1