Lobster Claw, Bubble and Northern Lagoon

[powerlord]

So, a bit of an experiment this one - I think it will be anathema to some, but it seems to me we get stuck in a 2 palette world - HSO and HSO, when there is a wealth of options out there for NB. And with dual band filters, we seem bound to trying to recreate them with 'fake Sii' layers, etc when we could be celebrating the incredible definition and detail we can get from there new narrow dual band filters and colour cameras.

In particular - having Ha as red loses a lot of fine detail since our eyes are not as sensitive to it, and it's quite dim compared to a white luminosity range. Especially once stars are added.

So here I present my experiment in a new palette - I call it Silver and Gold. Ha is shown in white (or mono if you like) until the top 25% or so of luminosity, then blue to blended in. For Oiii, it's the same white/mono with the top 25%-50% in yellows and oranges.

8 1/2 hours of 10 min subs. Shot with Stellamira 90ED and 0.8x reducer, asi2600 and L-ultimate filter.

It's making Dual NB "its own thing" really, rather than it trying to ape SHO.

In-keeping with the silver & gold look, stars are shown only in 'mono', and reduced in luminosity considerably so that the intricate structures in the nebulosity can be seen. I'm moving towards hardly any stars here, but present 2 options.

I imagine this ain't going to be appreciated by everyone.. well maybe of anyone! - But I think it's a nice solution which allows the incredible fine details of very dim nebulosity to be front and centre, separates main/bright nebulosity by colour, and 'solves' the issue of what to do with stars without having to shoot RGB ones.

I'll be trying this on a number of other targets to see how it turns out. I hope others might give it a go ?

stu

With only the very brightest stars shown, the swirling detail of the nebulosity even in the dim sections draws your attention:

As more stars are added, the fine dim detail is hidden. Here is about as much stars as I'd want to put in, though if I was printing this, I think I'd go with the first one.

Edited September 18, 2023 by powerlord

[TakMan]

Very nice. 
Sharp, nicely framed, processed, plenty of detail to enjoy, like the colours as well !
A reasoned argument for your rendition. And why not - one of the advantages of NB data - you can try all sorts of interesting things to bring something different to the table…

Will have to try this technique with my own data (have also started this region as well, but with other targets requiring exposure time to finish them, it’ll be next year before this data set is complete!)

Personally, if I was “printing this” - I’d go with the second (stars) image. Whilst I get the reasoning for reducing the starfield to enhance nebulosity, to my eyes, stars add their own structure to the composition… either with stars or without.

Nature’s large, striking, powerful nuclear reactors reduced down to something akin to odd bits of dust, plus the countess smaller others removed to the point of looking like underlying ‘noise’ just (to my brain anyway) make the image look oddly fake - I can get that sort of ‘space image’ from the Deviantart website…

https://www.deviantart.com/search?q=Space

Damian

[Clarkey]

Great image. Personally, I am a bit 'old school'. I like stars...

I like the palette you have used. Gives nice highlights with the surrounding dust clouds.

[Lee_P]

Forget "Silver and Gold", this is the "Powerlord Palette"! I like it, and the idea behind it. Bravo.

[TakMan]

Could you add the exposure times and total imaging time spent on this at some stage…?

[powerlord]

sorry, I usually do. forgot. added now

[ollypenrice]

I really do like these. To my eye, NB images look so much better with a reasonably light, dusky-looking and colour-neutral background sky, of which this is a perfect example.

Olly

[Blauvista]

Very nice - like the choice of colour palette makes the Lobster Claw much more interesting ... well worth going into the large view for a look round the image ... 

Mark