Double Cluster and Caroline's Rose Cluster

[Mognet]

First images that I'm happy enough to share now I've worked through all my issues with KStars and Ekos, etc.

Double Cluster is two panels of 60 x 30 second subs stitched in MS ICE. Caroline's Rose Cluster is a single panel of 60 x 30 seconds. Both gain 252, stacked in ASTAP, and processed in GIMP.

I suspect my capture data isn't up to scratch yet as I had to stretch aggressively to get these, and I haven't set the black point equally either. The histogram from a single sub looks like this, so I think I should either take longer subs or raise the gain level. One of the FITS files for NGC7789 is attached too.

Double Cluster (NGCs 869 and 884)

 

Caroline's Rose Cluster (NGC 7789)

NGC_7789_Light_060.fits

[Snoani]

To be honest considering the amount of data you have, they look ok.  You have colour and detail, my personal feeling is that you need more data.  

I don't know what equipment you are using to capture these, so don't know how much light you are able to gather etc, but generally 30 minutes isn't a lot in my experience.  I would think this is why you are having to stretch the data aggressively.  The more data you gather, the less you need to push it when processing. 

Again it is hard to say not knowing your equipment but I would personally always be looking for a minimum of 2h and then as much as I could get after that. 

All in all these are better than my first tries and you learn from experience, so keep going 🙂

[Mognet]

Thanks. I'm using a William Optics ZS73 III APO with a flattener, a UV/IR cut filter, and a ZWO ASI585.

[Snoani]

Thanks for confirming.  You are shooting at a reasonable f ratio (5.9) so I again think that you need to capture more data.  I'm sure that you'll notice a difference between processing 30 minutes of data to a few hours+ worth.  

[Mognet]

I'll go for more data next time. I'd rushed things as it was the first clear sky in weeks so I wanted something on both.