NGC6888 Crescent Nebula, Soap Bubble and Dust!

[Grant]

I'm not always one to share but I am very pleased with this one - I think it represents my best ever processing effort so far. There's still a way to go and I am sure I will keep playing with this! Feedback, criticism and suggests are very welcome - I am keen to get better with my processing!

This represents around 270 hours of initial image in Ha, OIII and SII using one of the rigs at https://www.remoteobservatory.com/. I then cut the data down dramatically to around 130-140 hours to try and take the best of the data and the processed that.

Processed in Pixinsight using a whole variety of modules including BlurXterminator, NoiseXterminator and NarrowbandNormalization with some final tweaks in Photoshop...

[Ouroboros]

Wow! That is a fantastic image. You really have pulled out the detail in the dust.  Nice to see the bubble so well. 

Personally, and this isn’t a criticism because it’s all a matter of personal taste, I don’t like the colour pallet. But then, I instinctively react against false colour astrophotography unless it’s for justifiable scientific reasons. I know that’s against the current trend, but there you are.  That’s my view.

Given the obviously good quality of your data, have you considered processing it more realistically?  Might be interesting. The crescent nebula looks like you’ve got lots of OIII there. Keeping Ha as red and OIII as green/blue might look very striking. 

[Grant]

Thank you and appreciate the feedback - I had a quick play with a HOO palette and it does look nice with the reds 🙂