M45

[Daf1983]

1st time out imaging in months because of work, kids and mainly clouds! This is my 2nd attempt at M45, taken over 2 nights, to give about 8 hours of data. I think I've overdone it a bit is processing, and made the image a bit noisy. But I'm out of practice and it's the best I've managed this far. Let me know what you think. Processing done in Siril and Photoshop.

Let me know what you think, CC welcome as always

 

Thanks

Dafydd

[geeklee]

6 minutes ago, Daf1983 said:

I think I've overdone it a bit is processing, and made the image a bit noisy. But I'm out of practice and it's the best I've managed this far. Let me know what you think.

A little, but you've brought good nebulosity into the faint areas.  It's at the point just before where you are that you need to decide if you'll push it that bit further  Don't worry, for my own, I did the same  

Look out for the background (not dust/nebulosity), it's got some red/magenta creeping in.  Here's a side by side with most of it removed.  It's not perfect, just an quick example.

Edited December 18, 2022 by geeklee

[Daf1983]

13 minutes ago, geeklee said:

A little, but you've brought good nebulosity into the faint areas.  It's at the point just before where you are that you need to decide if you'll push it that bit further  Don't worry, for my own, I did the same  

Look out for the background (not dust/nebulosity), it's got some red/magenta creeping in.  Here's a side by side with most of it removed.  It's not perfect, just an quick example.

Thanks! It's the background I tend to struggle with in processing, I will have another go and look out for this.

[Daf1983]

Had another go at this data last night. I restacked everything this time without the bias frames(I noticed that they were at a different gain to the other frames), and the results we're much less noisy. Still not completely happy with the processing(looks a bit 'fake'). But an improvement I think😬

[geeklee]

3 hours ago, Daf1983 said:

results we're much less noisy. Still not completely happy with the processing(looks a bit 'fake'). But an improvement I think😬

It does look cleaner - there's a touch more subtlety in the first image for me (on star sizes and some of the really faint dust) and the FOV is slightly smaller here too? 

Also - the image appears to be ~10000x10000 instead of the native 533MC size like the earlier image.  If you're drizzling x3 for any reason (although that would only be 9Kx9K) - I wouldn't bother - I don't think you'll be seeing extra details and you want as much SNR as you can get if you're pushing the faint stuff.

Both are images to be pleased with 👍

[Daf1983]

Hmmm, I hadn't noticed that! I have no idea why the image is 10,000 x 10,000, it certainly wasn't on purpose!! The FOV is slightly smaller because after restacking I had some artefacts which I cropped out. I'm still not happy with it to be honest, so I will have another go tonight. Thanks for your comments

[Daf1983]

Ok, this is my 3rd (and final) attempt!! I'm much happier with this one. I did this all in Photoshop, I think the stretch in Siril was a bit too aggressive, giving it the 'fake' look of the last attempt. 

[geeklee]

18 hours ago, Daf1983 said:

Ok, this is my 3rd (and final) attempt!! I'm much happier with this one. I did this all in Photoshop, I think the stretch in Siril was a bit too aggressive, giving it the 'fake' look of the last attempt. 

Lovely Dafydd 👍

[tooth_dr]

Great job there Dafydd, nice progression of improvement.