M101 Test image

[CCD-Freak]

I spent several nights at SRO testing my galaxy imaging setup before heading to New Mexico. I used my AT10RCF and ASI2600MCP camera for this shot of M101.  As usual everything was working against me.  The Moon was up, the seeing was bad with wind and dust in the air.  After I threw out bad subs I ended up with 18 x 300s (90 minutes) of exposure, captured and processed with Asto Art 8.  For some reason my Flats did not correct so I had to use the gradient removal tool to correct most of the vignetting.  Even with all the issues I am fairly happy with this "engineering test image".   I am still working with the data.

 

Edited April 17, 2022 by CCD-Freak

[juno16]

That is quite a nice image especially considering the low integration time.

You achieved a really nice balance which is something that I struggle with on M101.

New Mexico! How nice! Are you going there to image?

[CCD-Freak]

Thanks...I was a bit surprised too considering how everything was not going my way.

A bunch of my imaging buddies get together down in the "boot heel" of New Mexico for a week of imaging under almost Bortle 1 desert sky.   It is a fun week of visiting and imaging.

 

 

[ollypenrice]

The jet back sky is a dead give-away as far as black clipping goes and here we see it:

I'd be inclined to take another look at the stack and keep the black point much higher so as not to lose the faint stuff. I know it's tempting to use the black point to reduce gradients but I think it's best not to do so.

Love the location!!!

Olly

[CCD-Freak]

Yeah...I thought I had clipped the black point.   I was not too careful when I processed the image.  I had moonlight making the background fairly bright and I over did it.  8^P

Now that I know there is some good data there I plan to process it again and pay a bit more attention to the details.

The M101 image was shot at my SRO site which is almost Bortle 1 (bottom end of Bortle 2) but the weather is a bit more variable than the NM desert.