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NGC 891 with a dual scope rig.

RobH

By RobH
in Imaging - Deep Sky

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RobH

RobH

Posted
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NGC 891 is one of the most photogenic edge-on spirals around and about 30 million light years away.

I find it fascinating finding out what sort of planet Earth was when the light left these objects we view, so here’s a brief synopsis.

We are looking at light that left near the start of the Oligocene epoch, the time of the transition between the tropical Eocene and the more modern ecosystems of the following Miocene.

This is the time when grasslands, and the associated grazing animals were spreading, and the tropical forests were becoming limited to the equatorial belts.

The planet was getting cooler and more seasonal, and in Europe, the Alps were rising as the African landmass continued to push northwards.

There was also a major extinction event, where Asian fauna replaced the previous European fauna.

Some species of terrestrial mammals returned to the oceans about this time. Amongst these were the ancestors of the dolphins.

This image is the first I’ve posted that has used my dual scope imaging rig, and I’m pleased with the way it’s come together. Over 10 hours of data gathered in a little over 5 hours. Very handy in our climate.

I used my TMB 152 @ F8 and SXVF-H16 camera to capture the luminance, and my William Optics ZS80FD and Atik 16HR for the RGB.

The 16HR data was then rescaled using Registar, and the data combined with the luminance in the usual way.

I was amazed how many galaxies are in the background in this shot….it’s full of them, individually and in clusters.

Large images here

Flickr Photo Download: NGC891-Sept09-LRGB

Flickr Photo Download: NGC891- Sept09-LRGB-crop

Luminance 31 x 10 minutes

Red 17 x 4 minutes

Green 22 x 5 minutes

Blue 19 x 7 minutes.

Total imaging time. 10 hrs 21 minutes.

Cheers

Rob

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Tim

Tim

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That's beautiful Rob, I love the detail in the dusty edges :D

I spent a few hours on this at kelling, and havent looked at the pics yet, I hope they turn out a quarter as good as this! I have also stumbled on a way to do the same as you have done with your kit, with an almost matching FOV, I'll post a first result later.

You might like to have a go at NGC5907 too, although it will be easier in spring. I'm not sure how it compares in size to 891, but it is incredible in the eyepiece!

This one has gone into my folder of "exceptionals", where it will find a lot of your other piccies too :D

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RobH

RobH

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Thanks all :D

I was really pleased with how everything worked using 2 imaging scopes/ cameras and Registar to match the scales.

I've attempted to do a similar thing with images caught on different scopes at different times in the past, but although Maxim can deal with rescaling, it cant cope with the slightly different FOV distortions caused by differnt OTA's.

I finally took the plunge and bought Registar, and it makes short work of this.

I now see entirely why the likes of TJ, Psychobilly et al rave about it.

What would be brilliant is if you could get its star recognition algorythm as a plug-in for photoshop

Tim, thanks for the call on NGC5907, it looks fascinating, but with a 6 inch scope it'll need a lot of subs to bring out the star hoops surrounding it. I do miss the 14 sometimes!

I could use both scopes for luminance at the same time, combine the data and just use that for the background and star hoops as I wouldn't need full resolution on them :D

Got me thinking :)

Cheers

Rob

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barkis

barkis

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It sure is a splendid bit of work. 10 hours halved by the use of two imaging units working together. The classic edge on view of a spiral galaxy, and such a professional result. If this doesn't get recognised by one of the monthly magazines, there is no justice.

The condition of earth when the light left on it's journey to us, is also appreciated Rob.

Ron.:D

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Tim

Tim

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Glad you got Registar Rob.

If you want a quick look at how your rgb will turn out, or more especially HST palette pics, then the "Merge to RGB" is a great tool, makes it an absolute doddle to do things like

ha+o3+o3 or ha+o3+(ha+o3) etc, you can just choose which pic you want for which colour and away it goes, saves all the manual colour application or dragging to channel etc. Also fastest way I know of trying the various narrowband palettes.

Also, by using the combine tool repeatedly, and including the last combined image in the pic, you can produce a much smoother image from poor quality data.

As you say, a PS plug in would be the daddy :D

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Spider

Spider

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Stunning image and I now have another heads up from all of you that contribute to this forum, use your eyes and appreciate the background of the image not just the main object ddooohhhh thank you :D

colin

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ollypenrice

ollypenrice

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Lovely Rob, especially the colours in the galaxy core and the halo. These are the best I've seen.

I'm another Registar nut but one thing I've found is that the best way to combine mosaics or do overlays is not to do the final combining in it. In fact the system I do use is based on something you posted, I think; I calibrate the 2 images in Registar but then paste one onto the other in PS and use a soft erasor to blend the overlaps. Then I flatten the image. Registar doesn't always get them to be invisible.

Did yo use two laptops, I wonder?

Olly

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dark knight

dark knight

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WOW, I never tire of seeing your fantastic images Rob, wish I could produce a good image, never mind something as wonderful as yours, it's so full of detail, I also know how much time you put into them too, simply stunning yet again, somehow you keep raising the bar. Whats next on the list then? Also do you ever go back to old images to add even more data or is there a point reached where the extra data would make no difference to the final image?

carl

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RobH

RobH

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Thanks folks :D

Olly, I do use 2 laptops. Registar was used to rescale, but once that was done, I used Maxim to align the separate LRGB channels.

Colin, one of the great things about processing is that you tend to end up looking at every tiny bit of your image in great detail, which is a real joy when you find all sorts of interesting objects hiding in the background :D

Carl, now I'm settled with the TMB/AP1200 rig, I do plan to add more data to some of this years images, notably M51 and NGC 3718, as there is a lot of faint stuff in the background that I'll be able to capture using longer subs, which I couldn't get before as the Celestron mount struggled with the TMB on it.

As for what's next, I have the data for a 4 pane mosaic in Ha, OIII & RGB of the network nebula to put together, again done with 2 scopes, plus the Iris nebula, and some more data in Ha and OIII to add to my Crescent neb from earlier in the year.

Cheers

Rob

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