Soul Nebula work in progress

[MarkS]

Here's a raw stack of the Soul Nebula (IC 1848) taken over 2 nights at Kelling Heath.  In total this is 10 hours of data in 5 minute subs at ISO 800 i.e. 120 subs!

The usual modded Canon 350D on the Tak Epsilon 180 ED.



You'll notice hot pixels because the sigma stacking didn't work across both night's data - probably because the sky gradients were very different on both nights.  So I'll have to process both nights separately and then combine.  I also need to shoot some shorter subs so I can control the brighter stars a bit better.

However, this quick stack gives a good idea of what the final image will be like.

Here's a larger version:
http://www.markshelley.co.uk/Astronomy/2012/soul14092012.jpg

Mark

[JohnP]

Looking very nice Mark- superb colours as usual... Impressed that you spend so long on a single target... john

[MarkS]

Impressed that you spend so long on a single target

Spending so long on a single target is necessary to overcome the limitations of the DSLR - in my opinion anyway.  Having said that, a long total exposure will make a big difference whatever camera you use. 

Mark

 

[RobertM]

Looking good Mark, can't wait to see the final version.

Robert

[mickw]

That's looking very nice and I agree with Robert - can't wait for the final. 

Are you processing in Iris or Pixinsight ?

[Mac]

Very nice.

Mac.

[The Thing]

It's going to be another corker Mark. Processed in IRIS?

[MarkS]

Are you processing in Iris or Pixinsight ?

Processed in IRIS?

Initial stack (or stacks) I do in IRIS because it's much quicker than PixInsight and because my humble XP machine runs out of memory doing huge stacks in PixInsight.  Subsequent processing is (or will be) a mixture of IRIS and PixInsight.

[Fay]

Will be fantastic, as always from you, Mark!

[Mike]

Mark, just out of curiosity why do you use Iris to stack and not something like Deep Sky Stacker? Is there any advantage or is it just personal preference?

[Carole]

Considering how much time you have spent imaging this and your excellent skills Mark, this must be one hell of a faint object. 

Looking forward to the final result.

Carole

[MarkS]

Tonight's forecast is for a clear night with excellent transparency and no dew.  I hope to get a 3rd night of data after shooting some short subs to better control the brighter stars.

Considering how much time you have spent imaging this and your excellent skills Mark, this must be one hell of a faint object.  

It's faint but not too faint.  I haven't processed it to its full extent yet.

Mark, just out of curiosity why do you use Iris to stack and not something like Deep Sky Stacker? Is there any advantage or is it just personal preference?

I use IRIS because I love its speed and flexibility.  Also, I've had one or two duff results with DSS for reasons unknown.
With IRIS I can save intermediate stages of the processing e.g. save the calibrated subs, the aligned subs etc.
I can then go back and do a re-process from an earlier stage.  e.g. if I discover a dodgy sub affecting the final stack I can remove it and simply re-sum the already aligned frames.
I wrote an IRIS script (I believe Duncan also uses it) which makes it almost as easy to use as DSS - I set it off and go to bed.
The only weakness I'm currently hitting is that it only uses a 16bit integer representation, so it can't create or save HDR (high dynamic range) files.
I'm gradually migrating to PixInsight because it is even more flexible and even more powerful.  But it is slower than IRIS and is a memory hogger - it crashes on XP with a memory exception when I process more than 100 subs.  But I can't complain because the documentation specifically says not to use it with XP.

Mark

[Carole]

Any nce of posting up that Iris script again Mark, perhaps on the stickys, I can't remember what I did with it, might have another go at it.

Carole

[MarkS]

Any nce of posting up that Iris script again Mark, perhaps on the stickys, I can't remember what I did with it, might have another go at it.

Here:
http://forum.orpington-astronomy.org.uk/index.php?topic=8232

[Carole]

There was one you wrote more specifically for the layman Mark, the one on that link looks very technical and mathmatical.

Carole