SGL Challenge 10 - Stars

[MartinB]

I think this was quite a tough challenge, stars can be very beautiful but it is difficult to capture vibrancy of the view through a scope in a photographic image.  We felt our winners did indeed rise to the challenge with 3 superb images.  As usual there were other images which we could happily have included.  I was a little surprised that no one submitted a Sirius animation showing the rapid changes of colour.  That would have been difficult to compare alongside a static image so perhaps it was for the best!  

Many thanks to everyone who took part.

1) Fegato - Kemble's Cascade

This beautiful binocular target and been superbly rendered in this two pane mosaic.

 

2) Alacant - HD34452 and friends

Working with a humble Bresser 150 newtonian and a Canon eos 700d Alacant has captured a beautiful, immersive image.  Star spikes can be a bit like marmite but here they are a feature of the scope and help to emphasise the scintillating dynamic quality of the stars.

 

3) Red Chilli - The Double Cluster

It guess it was inevitable that everybody's favourite cluster pairing would make an appearance.  There were some wonderful contributions.  This image  has managed to capture the intense brightness of some of the stars alongside the subtle colour variations.

[Simon Pepper]

Well done all three great images here 👍

[Fegato]

Wow, well, that was unexpected. I found it quite hard processing this image, and there were plenty of excellent other images in there to choose from. Well done to the other two top three winners. And thanks Martin (and any others involved) for the effort in organising and judging.

 

[alacant]

Congratulations to @Fegato for a wonderful cascade and to @Red Chilli for the most starry chi I've ever witnessed.

Loads of other great images here so let's hope we've done enough to help bring the stars to the forefront where they belong. Is anyone else fed up with the current starless processing craze?!

Cheers, clear skies and stars to all who entered.

Edited January 16, 2023 by alacant

[ollypenrice]

9 hours ago, alacant said:

Congratulations to @Fegato for a wonderful cascade and to @Red Chilli for the most starry chi I've ever witnessed.

Loads of other great images here so let's hope we've done enough to help bring the stars to the forefront where they belong. Is anyone else fed up with the current starless processing craze?!

Cheers, clear skies and stars to all who entered.

 

I very much like your image with its frank and effective emphasis of the stars, and I think that the original challenge was an excellent and timely idea.

However, would it be possible to have this discussion without such loaded and prejudicial language? Dismissing the work of others as a 'craze' is not, in my view, what we do on SGL. I have no personal axe to grind, here, since I have never posted a starless image. However, I certainly don't think that the stars always belong at the forefront of every image.  Have you imaged IC342?  Do you think that the stars should be at the forefront of IC342? This is a genuine question and this whole discussion might be best located elsewhere.

I heartily applaud Fegato's Cascade. A very good call on the balancing of the stars against the background.

Olly

Edited January 16, 2023 by ollypenrice
typo

[MartinB]

Thank you Olly for this carefully lobbed grenade 😁

Obviously the challenge was for star only images and software such as StarXterminator would have had no place.  

An interesting topic for discussion so I have started the ball rolling here 

https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/405192-what-to-do-about-stars/

 

[tomato]

Congratulations to the winners, I had a go but none of my efforts were worthy of an entry. Imaging just stars is hard.

[ollypenrice]

12 hours ago, MartinB said:

Thank you Olly for this carefully lobbed grenade 😁

Obviously the challenge was for star only images and software such as StarXterminator would have had no place.  

An interesting topic for discussion so I have started the ball rolling here 

https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/405192-what-to-do-about-stars/

 

A very fluffy grenade, Martin, or so I hope! Lest anyone think otherwise, I really do think this challenge was a great idea, and a timely one. There was no irony intended.

Regarding the dificulty, I've said for over a decade that the background sky and the stars are the hardest parts of an image to get right and, when you do get them right, the rest will follow.

Olly