Too many stars - looking for tips

[vlaiv]

Those stars are indeed much tighter - the way they are supposed to look like.

I do however have a slight worry about that flaring present with some of the brighter stars. Not sure what could be causing it.

In either case - not sure what FF/FR to recommend.

I do know the one I'm looking into getting for my setups - one of scopes is 80mm F/6 triplet.

It is this item:

https://www.teleskop-express.de/shop/product_info.php/info/p11122_Riccardi-0-75x-APO-Reducer-and-Flattener-with-M63x1-Thread.html

Not sure how it would work with shorter FL scope though and how it would behave on ED doublet.

[wimvb]

22 hours ago, 69boss302 said:

Seems odd saying I have too many stars in my pictures on an astrophotography board!  But when I do some Nebulas...actually almost anything... I get predominant stars where I want the nebula to be the main attraction. Example below...  I do all my calibration frames, stack in DSS, and process in PI. Pretty basic processing.  The image below, Soul Nebula,  was about 57 lights at 300 sec each.  Is the secret more lights but shorter duration?  I really dont love the outcome of a lot of the stuff I do.  As always, any tips much appreciated.

Bob

 

What camera are you using? To me it looks like this image was taken with an unmodded dslr. When dealing with problems, look for the source of the problem. If you want to image emission nebulae, use a camera with good sensitivty near the Halpha line and use narrow band or dual band filters. A narrow band filter will block much of the star light, keeping their intensity and size down in the stacked image.

[vlaiv]

40 minutes ago, wimvb said:

What camera are you using?

ASI2600mc-pro if I'm not mistaken.

[69boss302]

 

That is correct, 2600MC Pro OSC, no filters (yet). I do have a zwo duoband though.   Vlaiv, it seems what I need to do is pay closer attention to my atmospheric conditions next time, before I do any dramatic changes. Or any changes at all in fact.  I remember the other night I tossed a bunch of lights because of whispy clouds in the shots, so that does tell me it wasnt great.  I tend to dismiss it as just that though and didnt really consider that the evening was not great for shooting. I will pay much closer attention next time.  Its been really rough here for the last month and a half, so even a semi reasonable night, Im going out there! Its been 2-3 nights in the last 2 months

 

 

[69boss302]

On 14/12/2021 at 18:46, Budgie1 said:

Once you've removed the stars with StarNet in PI, you can work on the stars separately.

For reducing the stars I use Morphological Transformation set as below. The "Amount" setting I use gives a 30% reduction, but you can alter it to your own requirements, sometimes I run it twice at 30% to get what I want.

Like with most things in PI, there are a few ways to achieve something, this just the I use most.

@Budgie1 I just tried this but didnt have a lot of luck    When I remove stars with with starnett and try the process above, I dont see any stars at all still.  I think I am missing a step

 

[69boss302]

Got it!! Thank you, let me play with this a bit, it might do just what Im looking for

[Budgie1]

3 hours ago, 69boss302 said:

@Budgie1 I just tried this but didnt have a lot of luck    When I remove stars with with starnett and try the process above, I dont see any stars at all still.  I think I am missing a step

 

Just to confirm for others who may read this, as it maybe wasn't that clear in my original post;

When you use the StarNet process, be sure to tick the box marked "Create star mask" so you end up with two images, a starless version of your galaxy or nebula in one image and a star field in the other.

Then you can work on just the star field or just the galaxy/nebula. When you're finished, combine the two images using PixelMath.