M27 - Dumbell Nebula

[Ivor]

This is my first attempt at processing with PixInsight and I'm already a convert, really impressed in the functions available and I've probably only used about 10% of what's there. I did a fair bit of the process on the nebula in PS CS5 as I was struggling to learn the right PI functions, I might revisit this when I've watched more tutorials.

Telescope: WO FLT110
Guiding via OAG Lodestar
Camera: QHY8L
Captured in AstroArt5: 14 x 600s @ -20c, Bias, Darks & Flats applied
Processing in AA5, PixInsight, PS CS5

It's very easy to over cook this target so I've tried to go for softer colours, which created it's own problems while trying to pull the inner detail out.

Tempted to do a half crop but not sure the detail is there.

[Carole]

Nice to see you imaging again Ivor, your guiding problems seem to have been sorted out.

Carole

[ApophisAstros]

"My God, it's full of stars!"

Roger

[Kenny]

"My God, it's full of stars!"

Ditto. Amazing starfield to then find that lovely deep sky object in the middle of. Glad to see you've got your imaging rig up and running again. Well done.

[Ivor]

With no new data to play with I have been trying to hone my PixInsight skills having taken the plunge. This cropped reprocess is solely done in PI and personally I think it is improvement especially in the Star colours, what do you think?

[Carole]

I think it is definitely an improvement on your first process.

Carole

[julian]

Nice  image Ivor.

[The Thing]

Nice gloss on The Dumbell, looks almost shiny. Very nice.

[RobertM]

The reprocess looks good, it's brought the colours out better and there is a faint skirt showing around it in the background.  It also looks like pretty good focus as well - was that with a focus mask ?

Robert

[Ivor]

Thanks for the feedback, I'm now definitely a PI convert.

The reprocess looks good, it's brought the colours out better and there is a faint skirt showing around it in the background.  It also looks like pretty good focus as well - was that with a focus mask ?

Robert

I now have a Sharpcam autofocuser which I focused once at the start of the session. I'm considering changing my script to refocus between filter changes.