A year on - M27

[RichieJarvis]

Its almost the anniversary of the purchase of my first proper CCD camera, so to celebrate, I thought I would re-image my first target and see how I have come on.

So last night (or early this morning actually!) I started shooting Ha, OIII and Hb of M27 through my AP 102ED at F/7. I had to wait until after midnight before M27 had cleared the tree though

Of course, nowadays I am shooting narrowband with Astronomik 13nm filters, whereas last year I was using a Baader LRGB set (and I didn't realise that I have to put the IR cut filter in front of the RGB filters either - I only used it for the Luminance frames!)

Am I happy with my improvement? You betcha! I think I am going try and revisit M27 each year and compare how things have moved on in my understanding and ability in Astroimaging.

For comparison, here is the original image from first light with my SXV-H9 using LRGB filters:

And a year on using narrowband filters:

Full image details can be found at http://www.deepsky.org.uk/nebula/m27.shtml

I would be interested to hear what others have to say about these 2 images as well

Thanks for looking!

Cheers,

Richie

[Hipolito]

Wowee ... a couple of great shots. I don't think I've ever seen so many star as in the first shot

[RobH]

You've caught some of the really faint stuff in the outer halo there Richie, and the second is a big improvement over the first, not just the capture, but the processing too.

How do you like the colour you get with the H-beta for blue?

I really like it, and have a couple of shots from last year of this with the same filter combination.

I think it can be good to image the same object on a yearly basis, as it is easy to guage how ones imaging has come on in this way.

I too plan to shoot the dumbell this summer, my 3rd summer imaging, as I've got a different scope now and really would like to go deep on it. Plus, I've got loads of decent narrowband data from the 14 inch to add to the image if I want.

That's the great thing about this hobby....you can build up masses of data if you take the long view.

Cheers

Rob

[Aza]

Wow what an improvement! Its a great way to see how far you've come each year!

[RichieJarvis]

Thanks all for the comments - really appreciate it!

Well - it is right in the Milky Way - anything round that area with reasonably long exposures shows up thousands of stars

How am I finding the Hb? I tried it with the Ring Nebula the other day for the first time - interesting - the colour it gives is not quite what I expected! (I don't know what I was expecting, just not that ) Yet to process and post that - wasn't that happy with it, although looking at how M27 came out, I think I was expecting too much!

I think one of the frustrations I am having at the moment is that I didn't realise quite how different each filter is from an imaging perspective. What I mean by this is that most objects using Ha come out very very nicely - crisp, clear, small stars, beautifully defined nebulae. OIII I found very different - at first, I didn't realise that the 2 filters were not quite parfocal (its a long story) - my dual colour imaging improved significantly once I realised and adjusted focus between the 2 filters.

Now I think about it sitting here, I realise that any Hydrogen emissions are going to be significantly brighter than anything else - its obvious, its by far the most common element in the universe. But that didn't even occur to me when I got the OIII filter - I just thought 'oh, a new filter - I'll just shoot through this in exactly the same way as the Ha filter' - noooo - s'not quite that easy, is it? Some camps say shoot twice as many subs for OIII than Ha, some say twice as long - at the moment, I am still shooting the same length subs for OIII as Ha - something that will probably change now I have the Hb filter.

Jeez - 3 paragraphs, and I still haven't actually said what I wanted to say! LOL

Its this:

Ha = pinprick stars + beautiful fine detail

OIII = larger stars (even when in exact focus!) + much dimmer

Hb = seem to be even larger stars (I had to remove the blue halos from the M27 image above that came from the Hb channel)

Essentially, I think the point is that narrowband imaging has a learning curve just like every other aspect of this hobby. Personally, I think its worth it, despite the longer sub lengths required - the results (to my mind anyway) are alot crisper. And besides, who cares if it takes several years to accumulate enough subs to make a REALLY deep and well defined image? - I can shoot when the moon's up!

Anyway, enough prattling from me.... can you tell I've had my first Bank Holiday Weekend tipple??

Cheers,

(hic)

Richie

[Taff]

They are great captures with you Richie.Roll on clear nights to observe the neb once again.Mark

[narrowbandpaul]

thats a great NB M27, richie

bear in mind that at shorter wavelengths like O[iII] and Hbeta the atmosphere is more turbulent, or rather the atmosphere refracts blue light more than red....so stars would appear a touch larger. Also, if one of the filters has even the slightest mark, if light from a star passes through a smudge, it can also fatten a star.

however, your image looks very good to me. I hope to achieve a NBI version myself sometime soon. Missed it last year.

[Beyond_Vision]

Well done Richie the dim outer regions are starting to show through which youdont often see .

Regards

Kevin

[RichieJarvis]

Thanks Kevin - I think I will have to go a bit longer and see how much I can bring out

Cheers,

Richie

[MidnightSun]

That's a real beauty there...... Live and always learning...

[ASIGN_Baz]

What a difference! Love the second one!

Baz.

[daveslk]

you realy do have your eye in. gourgeous detail. my vote for POTW.. :-)