Image Fest... Les Granges....

[JohnP]

Hi All,

Been playing with the images I took at Les Granges. Still can't get to grips with some of them (especially the Elephant Trunk Nebula). My intention is to add a page to my website with the images & put all processing details down etc. but at the moment my Virgin BroadBand is down so I have temporarily uploaded to OAS 'work in progress album' I'm hoping the links etc. will work. Anyway a few comments about some of the images are as follows:

1. All images taken with Atik 16ic through my WO ZS66
2. M44 - Beehive open cluster - this was only 10X30 secs images (no filters) & on close inspection you can see UGC2546 top left which is a mag 15.4 galaxy.... ! Image acquired at 5.30am
3. The Helix Neb is only 3X5min Ha subs only. I had big guiding issues that night - I was hoping to get back to it but didn't get the chance. Even at Les Granges it barely rises above the hills... Shame but I thought I would post anyway as you can't get this from UK & it is a very interesting object.
4. M42 - Taken very late at the end of a session - I was too tired to take multiple exposures to layer the core.
5. M33 - A quick L image whilst I was waiting for something else to rise.
6. The Elephant - This object is a real pain in the *rse... I have still not got a good HaRGB image. I took colour data but am struggling to process it. I decided to post L only for now.
7.The Crescent - again a pretty quick image - just took some Ha & G,B.
8. The horsehead - I was amazed how Alnitak illuminates the whole left of the image.

Like I said I will post full details when I put webpage together. One thing I learnt from Les Granges is that I need to get myself a decent larger format camera. I'm pleased with the results from the little Atik but the images still lack the 'wow factor' of Chris's & Fay's....

Here are the images in no particular order:

[Fay]

Gosh, John, they have come up well. Forgot you had taken so many. You have worked really hard.

You have done the hard work & can now take your time doing any finishing touches that you want to do.
I'm glad we don't do this many all the time, I have got copies all over the place. Must tidy up......again.

I have just sat for 2 hours reprocessing M45 & Eastern Veil. As we all know, they may look ok on your computer but are different when posted, I will see what to do.

Hope you are pleased with your results.

[Jim]

John, these really are great. Amazing to think you took all these in under a week. You'd need a month here....

[JohnP]

A month....! I think that's about as many images as I took all last year....!!!

Anyway thks for the comments... just need to document all the details now & play some more with the elephant.

John

[RobertM]

John,

These are really amazing !  the only thing you lack is a bigger format camera.  It would take months to accumulate enough data for all those images over here.  I especially like NGC6888 and M42, well done and well processed ...

Robert

[JohnP]

Thks Robert - I appreciate your comments. Yep a larger camera is definitely on the books - just need to save up some pennies first

Cheers,  John

[Mike]

Fantastic images John.

[JohnP]

Cheers Mike... If only I had your H9.......

[Rocket Pooch]

A cheeseboard of images 

[Mike]

Cheers Mike... If only I had your H9.......

You're welcome to borrow it.

[Mike]

A cheeseboard of images 

We certainly will be spoiled for choice when planning the Calendar this year !!!

[MarkS]

That's a great set of images John!  Each one of them is sharp, well guided and brings out a lot of faint detail.

My favorites are the Horsehead, The Elephant's Trunk and, believe it or not, M42.

True, a larger format camera would make them a bit larger but you certainly can't complain about the quality you've captured there!

Mark

[JohnP]

You're welcome to borrow it.

Thks a lot Mike - I may take you up on the offer sometime.... cheers, 

Mark - Many thanks for your comments. I'm not complaining - I think the results I've got from a relatively inexpensive camera/ scope setup is way beyond my expectations - it's just when I put them side by side with Chris or Fay's images I think... 'if only...'

When I post the images on my webpage I may well include the L's along side the colours also as they really do contain a lot of whispy stuff which sometimes get lost a little when you do the colour.

I think the M42 along with the beehive where the quickest images to capture. It was a funny night that started off very cloudy so the whisky bottle & red wine & hugh amounts of cheese came out.. then at about 12'ish looked outside & it was clear as a bell. Chris & Jim decided enough was enough & went to bed while I dragged all my camera's/ scope etc. up to my mount. Fay keep me company for a few hours though...Decided that I was too 'under the influence' to mess about with goto alignments etc. so decided that whatever I was going to image that night I had to be able to find manually... yep you guessed it that was the night I did The Pleiades, The Orion Nebula & finally The Beehive Cluster...  The orion was a stack of 12X3min subs Ha for the L & 5X1min each for the RGB. I should have taken shorter exposures as well for the L so I could layer the core to prevent burnout but I was too pooped at 5am....

Anyway, glad you like it - it was worth the effort - John

[Daniel]

Beautifull Images John, especially nice to see Helix there since this is such a bugger from where we are (I now know I'll never get it from my garden) Cocoon's looking lovely, might have to have another go at this now we've got the nice weather.

[JohnP]

Cheers Daniel - Yep I was determined to get Helix because I know I can't do it from here - just a shame I didn't get to do it for longer or in colour - it's a beautiful object.

John