SGL 2023 Challenge 8 - Novice deep sky imaging

[Bluesboystig]

After the previous entry this is going to look silly, but I'm very happy with it as I started in this hobby only 2 months ago. Soul nebula, 30x300" subs, 4 darks, 15 flats, 15 biases. Bortle 5/6. No moon. Equipment: SA GTI, WO z61 with flattener, Canon 2000d modded, Optolong L-Extreme, Asiair Mini, ZWO Mini Finder-Guider & ASI 120MM-Mini guide camera. 

Processing details:

Siril: crop, background extraction, photometric colour calibration, green noise removal. Separated the nebulosity from the stars using Starnet. 

GIMP: stretched the nebulosity, separated the nebula from the background and applied levels and curves, adjusted brightness and contrast.

Siril: Star desaturation and full resynthesis. Star recomposition. 

Topaz Denoise AI for noise reduction.

[OK Apricot]

I got back from a trip to Vegas last week for my birthday. I drove 125mi north of Vegas to escape the light pollution and found Class 2 conditions at the other end 😁. I had to toss several sub frames due to gusty winds, but otherwise the data was gorgeous - very excited about this one!

This is a first concerted attempt at a HDR blend of M42, The Orion Nebula. I used three separate stacks of data in the hopes of taming the bright core but adding some punch to the fainter dust. 

I stretched the 10s stack in a way as to highlight the details in the core region, so a couple gentle arcsinh stretches along with gentle sharpening. I separated the stars with StarXTerminator in hopes of using these in the final image but I wasn't quite happy enough with them, so opted to use the 120s stack's stars instead. The 120s and 240s stacks were stretched with arcsinh curves with some aggression to make the dust pop, but I paid attention to not blow anything out of the nebula itself. I found blending the three quite tricky as each stack didn't quite have the same frame centre, and I'd already separated the stars so had to align it in the end on the more wispy details available! Finally I added some luminance and saturation to the stars to try to bring out their natural colour and reintroduced them into the final image. A touch of Camera Raw Filter sharpening, a subtle Gradientxterminator and NoiseXterminator, selective colour adjustments and a weak application of HLVG. 

60x10s IR cut, 70x120s IR cut, 38x240s L-Enhance. Shot with the Sharpstar 61EDPH II @f/4.5, ASI533MC-Pro, mounted on the SA GTI, guided OAG with ASI120MM-Mini, controlled by ASIAIR Plus, EAF.

[AstroNebulee]

10 hours ago, OK Apricot said:

I got back from a trip to Vegas last week for my birthday. I drove 125mi north of Vegas to escape the light pollution and found Class 2 conditions at the other end 😁. I had to toss several sub frames due to gusty winds, but otherwise the data was gorgeous - very excited about this one!

This is a first concerted attempt at a HDR blend of M42, The Orion Nebula. I used three separate stacks of data in the hopes of taming the bright core but adding some punch to the fainter dust. 

I stretched the 10s stack in a way as to highlight the details in the core region, so a couple gentle arcsinh stretches along with gentle sharpening. I separated the stars with StarXTerminator in hopes of using these in the final image but I wasn't quite happy enough with them, so opted to use the 120s stack's stars instead. The 120s and 240s stacks were stretched with arcsinh curves with some aggression to make the dust pop, but I paid attention to not blow anything out of the nebula itself. I found blending the three quite tricky as each stack didn't quite have the same frame centre, and I'd already separated the stars so had to align it in the end on the more wispy details available! Finally I added some luminance and saturation to the stars to try to bring out their natural colour and reintroduced them into the final image. A touch of Camera Raw Filter sharpening, a subtle Gradientxterminator and NoiseXterminator, selective colour adjustments and a weak application of HLVG. 

60x10s IR cut, 70x120s IR cut, 38x240s L-Enhance. Shot with the Sharpstar 61EDPH II @f/4.5, ASI533MC-Pro, mounted on the SA GTI, guided OAG with ASI120MM-Mini, controlled by ASIAIR Plus, EAF.

Beautiful image and a fantastic walk through. 

Lee

[Lucas M]

Managed to squeeze another one in!

Caldewll 27/NGC6888 The Crescent Nebula.

First time shooting this target and first time trying some more fancy processing techniques.  I was aware this target (and some others I want to play with) had quite strong blue/green emissions in the Oiii and Hb range and I wanted to really try and pick them up so I added an Hb+Oiii filter to my rig to add to the Ha+Oiii I already had.  I took about twice as much Ha+Oiii data as Hb+Oiii because the Ha is still the main emission from this target.

For processing I removed the stars from each set of data after stacking (first time I've done that as too!), processed the starless images separately, then combined the two processed images and added the star back in from the Ha+Oiii data and did some final processing on the combined image...in hindsight I wish I had taken 30 minutes or so of stars with just a UV/IR cut filter to get better colour on them.  

I am please with the final image but think I could get more of the blue/green with a bit more practice.

Imaging done Monday 16th October, Ansdell (Bortle 5), UK, Northwest Coast

• William Optics RedCat 51
• ZWO ASI 533MC PRo (gain 101, cooled to -10°C
• ZWO EFW with:
  • Optolong L-Extreme Ha+Oiii filter -  60 x 300 second subs (5 hours)
  • Antlia Hb+Oiii filter - 27 x 300 second subs (2hrs 15mins)
• SVBONY 30mm guide scope
• ZWO ASI120mm mini guide cam
• ZWO EAF
• ASIair mini
• Star Adventurer GTI
• 30 each darks/bias
• 30 each flats per filter
• Dithered every 2 frames
• Stacked in Siril (drizzle)
• Processed with Siril, Photoshop and Graxpert

 

Edited October 20, 2023 by Lucas M

[Justin richens]

messier 16 - the eagle nebula

 

pillars of creation visible in the middle

 

only 16x 180 second stack before it went below my fence
 

[OK Apricot]

This will be my last entry I promise 😂

M31 from my trip to Vegas. 

This is 90x30s IR Cut, 166x120s IR Cut and 21x240s L-Enhance. 

The 30s stack was used to HDR blend the core, 120s was used to push the data quite far and bring out the fainter details and the 240s solely for the red speckled clouds within the dust bands. 

I found it hard to isolate and blend the Ha into the RGB image but managed to get there in the end, though I'm not really sure how. I was playing with blending modes in PS, aligning using the "difference" blend, and I think it was either soft light or saturation that I managed to get the two looking something like what I wanted. Then your usual StarX, NoiseX (gradient not needed here), camera raw filter adjustments, a touch of curves and a bit of saturation added to the stars. I've learned a good bit recently while processing my latest images so look forward to being able to use these techniques for some more winter targets. 

Shot with the mini rig Sharpstar 61EDPH II @f/4.5, ASI533MC-Pro, mounted on the SA GTI, guided OAG with ASI120MM-Mini, controlled by ASIAIR Plus, EAF. DSS and PS for processing. 

 

[AstroNebulee]

31 minutes ago, OK Apricot said:

This will be my last entry I promise 😂

M31 from my trip to Vegas. 

This is 90x30s IR Cut, 166x120s IR Cut and 21x240s L-Enhance. 

The 30s stack was used to HDR blend the core, 120s was used to push the data quite far and bring out the fainter details and the 240s solely for the red speckled clouds within the dust bands. 

I found it hard to isolate and blend the Ha into the RGB image but managed to get there in the end, though I'm not really sure how. I was playing with blending modes in PS, aligning using the "difference" blend, and I think it was either soft light or saturation that I managed to get the two looking something like what I wanted. Then your usual StarX, NoiseX (gradient not needed here), camera raw filter adjustments, a touch of curves and a bit of saturation added to the stars. I've learned a good bit recently while processing my latest images so look forward to being able to use these techniques for some more winter targets. 

Shot with the mini rig Sharpstar 61EDPH II @f/4.5, ASI533MC-Pro, mounted on the SA GTI, guided OAG with ASI120MM-Mini, controlled by ASIAIR Plus, EAF. DSS and PS for processing. 

 

That's a really stunning image, well done. 👏

[Justin richens]

Messier 27 - the dumbbell nebula

 

50x 180s subs

[Bluesboystig]

On 16/10/2023 at 19:23, Bluesboystig said:

After the previous entry this is going to look silly, but I'm very happy with it as I started in this hobby only 2 months ago. Soul nebula, 30x300" subs, 4 darks, 15 flats, 15 biases. Bortle 5/6. No moon. Equipment: SA GTI, WO z61 with flattener, Canon 2000d modded, Optolong L-Extreme, Asiair Mini, ZWO Mini Finder-Guider & ASI 120MM-Mini guide camera. 

Processing details:

Siril: crop, background extraction, photometric colour calibration, green noise removal. Separated the nebulosity from the stars using Starnet. 

GIMP: stretched the nebulosity, separated the nebula from the background and applied levels and curves, adjusted brightness and contrast.

Siril: Star desaturation and full resynthesis. Star recomposition. 

Topaz Denoise AI for noise reduction.

Managed to get 3 more hours of data on the Soul Nebula. The AsiAir mini doing an excellent job at recentering exactly on the same patch of sky and helping with rotating the camera for good framing (managed to get it 0.5 degrees off, pretty decent I'd say).

Soul nebula, 68x300" subs, 11 darks, 30 flats, 30 biases. Night 1: Bortle 5/6. No moon. Night 2: Bortle 6, 57% Moon. Equipment: SA GTI, WO z61 with flattener, Canon 2000d modded, Optolong L-Extreme, Asiair Mini, ZWO Mini Finder-Guider & ASI 120MM-Mini guide camera. 

Processing details:

Sirilic: pre-process multiple sessions.

Siril: crop, green noise removal. Separated the nebulosity from the stars using Starnet. 

GIMP: stretched the nebulosity, separated the nebula from the background and applied levels and curves, adjusted brightness and contrast.

Siril: Star recomposition. 

Topaz Denoise AI for noise reduction.

[MonsterMagnet]

NGC1499 - Californian Nebula.

Taken on the 22nd October 2023 (the only clear day for about a month!).

36 @ 300 seconds in Bortle 9 London skies.

William Optics Z73 III, Skywatcher AZ GTi, WO Flattener ZS73, ZWO ASI224MC, SVBony 50mm Guidescope, ZWO ASI553MC Pro, Asiair Mini, Optolong L'Extreme, ZWO Electronic Focuser.

Processed using Siril, StarNet, Affinity, PI, NoiseXT.

MM.

[MartinB]

This challenge has now closed.  The results will be announced within the next 2 weeks.

[MartinB]

The results are in.

https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/415968-sgl-2023-challenge-8-novice-deepsky-imaging/

 

[Justin richens]

My first ever mosaic made from four panels with only an hour of data on each

 

Skywatcher 120ds pro with 0.85 reducer

Heq5

Asiair plus

Zwo asi533 pro

Evoguide with asi 120 mini