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M31 from Lydd - Work in Progress

Started by MarkS, Sep 27, 2009, 21:56:44

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MarkS

Taken at the Norwood Farm campsite near Lydd last night.

5 hours of data in 5 minute subs.
Modified Canon EOS 350D on Skywatcher ED80 with William Optics MkII 0.8x reducer/flattener.
Ambient temperature 9C.



Larger scale is here:  http://gallery.orpington-astronomy.org.uk/albums/userpics/10046/M31_260909.jpg
This larger scale image is 2x2 binned and cropped.

This is still a work in progress - this is a very quick initial process.


Mark

Tony G

Great image again Mark,

That for me would be processed enough and I would be over the moon (pardon the pun), but I know you'll get more out of it.

Excellent.  ;)

Tony G
"I'm normally not a praying man, but if you're up there, please save me Superman." - Homer Simpson

Daniel

Just Awesome Mark!!! love the colours and the detail in those dustlanes reaching right to the outside

Daniel
:O)

Carole


JohnP

yummy.. yummy... yummy.... superb mate... sounds like you & dee had a great night - John

RobertM

Wow Mark, you have been busy!

I think you could consider dimming the core a little to show more of the central dust lanes (personal preference that one).

Looks like everyone is raising the bar with their imaging now the cooler darker nights are starting to appear again - great stuff.

Robert

The Thing


Rocket Pooch


Mike

Excellent Mark. Once you have processed it to even out the core brightness it should be fantastic.
We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology. Carl Sagan

MarkS


Robert, Mike, you are right.  I processed it like that to disguise the fact that I burnt out the core!

The annoying thing is that the previous week, at the unofficial DSC, I used exactly the same exposure (5 min at ISO800) and it didn't burn out.  I guess the light must have been attenuated by thin cloud.

What I will do is combine this weekend's data with the 4 (!) subs taken at unofficial DSC.

Mark

MarkS

Here is version 2 - it's slightly more restrained than version 1:



It took ages to get the core looking right.

Larger scale is here:  http://www.markshelley.co.uk/webdisk/m31_260909v2.jpg
This larger scale image is 2x2 binned and cropped.

Mark


Daniel

That's wonderfull mark, core is ooksing much softer and you've retained all that lovely blue out colour, awesome stuff man!

Might be worth getting some Ha for this one too!

Daniel
:O)

RobertM

Much better Mark, though I think you've perhaps lost some of the vibrancy of the original.

I'm looking forward to doing a really deep M31 with a cooled camera when chance presents itself.

MarkS

Quote from: RobertM
Much better Mark, though I think you've perhaps lost some of the vibrancy of the original.

Thanks - after a few (in fact, many) abortive attempts I managed to apply Photoshop "curves" to the core region alone - this balanced out the brightness whilst preserving dust lanes and even stars (have a look on the Net and you'll notice how few M31 images preserve any stars in this region).  But I think I still need to increase the contrast in this region.

I've definitely lost vibrancy - which is a disappointment.  I'll try blending the colour planes from version 1 into version 2 - that might do the trick.

Mark

Mike

Some of the outer edge detail has been lost too. Definitely need to apply the processing to just the core region.
We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology. Carl Sagan