IC 1396 in two palettes

[roundycat]

Here is IC 1396 taken over two nights in August, the 9th and 11th. First night was not good seeing/transparency but last night was very good apart from a 60% moon.

120m Of Ha and 60m each of S2 and O3 all in ten minute subs. Very likely the S2 and O3 could have been 20m but it wouldn’t have made the night any longer. To do this justice I should wait for the next hour or two of S2 and O3 as they were by far the dimmest.

I did all the pre processing in Maxim as usual and combined the colour with Ha set to 0.8 as it was a strong signal and far outweighed the other two. The 16bit TIFFs were then operated on in PS as follows. Three iterations of Levels, mid point only shifted, three or four iterations of Curves to refine the contrast and improve the colour balance. (How you do this when the colours don’t make sense is tricky to say the least.) The more normal looking picture had several goes of Curves to change the star colour to something more acceptable (than their ‘natural’ green).

Stars were selected with the Magic Wand set to 4-6 and Shift Click to add to the selection, many times, the selection then expanded and feathered then Ctrl J to make a star layer. Duplicate of the background layer set to Overlay, High Pass at 4 pix brought out detail in the shock fronts whilst the star layer masked off the sharpened stars.

Numerous applications of a Quickmask gradient to relieve the brightness and colour gradients that were all over the place. A mixture I guess of light pollution and the Moon.

Neat Image using a pre set filter I made earlier and then USM to brighten the stars.

That was about it really, here’s hoping that when the rest of the S2 and O3 comes in processing it all will be a bit easier.

Dennis

[PH-R]

Those pictures are awesome, thxs for sharing. I do prefer the red though.

Paul

[Tim]

Great detail coming through in the Ha layer Dennis. The narrowband filters really transform these nebulae from something pretty, to something with form, shape and texture.

I'll look out for the finished version, should be fantastic. I vote for the HST palette one

Tim