M33 from Kelling Heath - done over 4 nights

[Carole]

24-9-11, 22 x 5min
26-9-11, 13 x 5min
27-9-11, 14 x 5min
28-9-11, 18 x 5min
Total 5 1/2 hours

All Modified Canon 450D 800 ISO no filter, using the ED120
Guided with QHY5 and PHD

Unfortunately a combination of my old WO flattener (on 24th) and my new TS flattener (remaining nights).
Don't ask!!!  
This is a crop towards the top left as I didn't centre it the first night and as this night has the most subs I am reluctant to leave them out.  

Preliminary process using DSS and Photoshop CS3.  Trying different stacking methods as when I use the "stacking in groups" method I always seem to get those horrid streaks.  
These are stacked as individual nights and then I stacked the stacks.

[RobertM]

That looks very promising Carole.  I'm looking forward to seeing the final version at a more decent size as this jpeg definitely isn't doing it justice.

Robert

[Carole]

Thanks Robert.
You can view the larger size in the gallery, but I don't think this site will accept anything other than a JPeg or similar.

Gallery link:
http://gallery.orpington-astronomy.org.uk/albums/userpics/10047/M33_Kelling_24%2C26%2C27%2C28th_Sept_2011_67_x_5mins_2.jpg

[Fay]

Very nice Carol, well worth the effort.

[Carole]

Thanks Fay.

Carole

[MarkS]

Carole,

That's a remarkable result on a fairly difficult subject and it clearly shows the benefit of obtaining many hours of data in a dark place.  You've done a good job of processing it.

I hope you don't mind, but I took the liberty of further processing starting with your full size image.  I did a 2/3 scaling by resampling upwards by a factor of 2 then binning by a factor of 3 - this reduces noise as it rescales, so the image appears both sharper and cleaner.  I then applied a little more noise reduction.  All done in Iris as usual!

http://www.markshelley.co.uk/webdisk/carole_m33_postproc.jpg

Mark

[mickw]

That's really nice Carole.

You do have some eggy stars in the left corners, are they a product of your old flattener or the new TS ? - Hopefully the old one 

[doug]

     You are getting up to the heights of the elite now, Carole.  A very nice image indeed. Well done and carry on the good work.

     Doug.

[Carole]

I hope you don't mind, but I took the liberty of further processing starting with your full size image.

Hi Mark, I never have a problem with some-one trying to improve my images, it often results in me learning something.  Yes that certainly is better Mark, I must learn how to do some of these things but I think Iris is a bit beyond me having tried it.  Is binning and scaling available in any other software that I could cope with?

Some-one on PAIG also suggested Neat image to me, which seems to work only on 8bit, it seems to work but I think might be just smearing the data slightly, does any-one have an opinion on this?

You do have some eggy stars in the left corners, are they a product of your old flattener or the new TS ? - Hopefully the old one

Yes Mick, I think it's the old flattener, the crop is top left so that is definitely towards the top left corner.  I shouldn't have used it but I realised at the 11th hour that I hadn't used the new flattener on the ED120 and did not know where focus was and it was already dark and no Moon to focus on, so took the cowards way out and went with what I knew as I thought I was going to have a difficult job finding focus.  As it happened I tried it the following evening and it wasn't at all difficult.  C'est la vie.

Thanks Doug.

Carole

[PhilB]

Very nice, Carole, great work..

[Carole]

Thanks Phil.

Carole

[Carole]

Greg Parker who is a member on PAIG has started up his own Image of the week on his website as he has become disillusioned with APOD where he feels there is a political agenda as to which images get picked.

I got POW first week with this image of M33 (though I am suspicious that I could have been the only entry being as it is new)  
http://www.newforestobservatory.com/

Carole

[MarkS]

I got POW first week with this image of M33 (though I am suspicious that I could have been the only entry being as it is new)  

Congratulations in any case!  It was certainly a fine image.

BTW what is PAIG?

[JohnP]

http://www.progressiveastroimaging.com/index.php

[RobertM]

There seem to be a lot of celebrities on that Forum