IC 342, Unhidden

[Shibby]

Here's my image of the Hidden Galaxy, a surprisingly large but very well shrouded galaxy. Certainly a different one to process and I'm not too sure about the result; the colour balance isn't perfect, but this is just how it came out for me. Also, I need to work on my star handling processes as I struggled a bit with them as you can probably tell.

Anyway, I gathered LRGB and some Ha data for this one, totalling around 11 hours.

MN190 + Atik 460ex

• L: 33x600s
• RGB: 3x18x300s
• Ha: 10x600s

Thank you for looking

[tomato]

That’s a cracking Hidden Galaxy, for me the colours are spot on and captured with a supposed “old tech” CCD. 

Spot on framing as well, with this combination.

[Sunshine]

Amazing image, some other fuzzies in there too!

[Shibby]

Hi,

I've been trying out some new techniques for star reduction, noise reduction and sharpening so thought I'd post an updated (hopefully improved) version of this image!

[assouptro]

First image is my favourite 

I love the star colour, great image! 
 

Thanks for sharing 

Bryan 

[CCD Imager]

I prefer your first posted image, it looks the most natural and very nice. Many galaxies dont actually have a lot of blue in the outer arms, I suspect people tweak the colour to suit their taste!

Have you tried the Photometric colour calibration technique in Pixinsight to guide you?

Adrian

[ollypenrice]

The second one has slewed into the magentas (too much green removal?) and has lost its naturalness for me.

But the first one is great going!  I found this target absolute murder to process before turning StarXterminator loose on it. There really are so many bright stars in the field. I think you have a great result. The strong and convincing star colour keeps the character of that bright starfield but keeping their size down has let the galaxy emerge nicely.

Olly

[Shibby]

Thanks! I very much appreciate the feedback and it's interesting to know that everyone prefers version 1!

Can I ask, is that only because of the colour balance? I think what I've done is focus too much on the noise and star reduction that I lost track of the colour balance. I totally agree that the first is more natural looking.

 @ollypenrice I did use star removal this time before reducing noise and lifting the background in an attempt to bring out more of the galaxy's structure. I then utilised the starless layer to reduce star bloat using @Xiga's photoshop action: https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/398793-i-made-a-photoshop-action-for-bill-blanshans-new-star-reduction-method-based-on-pixel-math/

 

[ollypenrice]

3 hours ago, Shibby said:

Thanks! I very much appreciate the feedback and it's interesting to know that everyone prefers version 1!

Can I ask, is that only because of the colour balance? I think what I've done is focus too much on the noise and star reduction that I lost track of the colour balance. I totally agree that the first is more natural looking.

 @ollypenrice I did use star removal this time before reducing noise and lifting the background in an attempt to bring out more of the galaxy's structure. I then utilised the starless layer to reduce star bloat using @Xiga's photoshop action: https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/398793-i-made-a-photoshop-action-for-bill-blanshans-new-star-reduction-method-based-on-pixel-math/

 

Yes, I was pretty sure you'd done that and it worked well.

Olly

[Shibby]

Once more, with the colour balance addressed!