My First M42 ever

Well Here it is, my first image of M42 and my 5th astrophoto ever. It seems like I should be able to bring out more detail but I am afraid of washing out the sky background.

Still lovin the 30D and GM-8!

21 minutes total exposure @ ISO800 using a Canon 75-300mm zoom at 300mm and f/8. Coma is still present and i believe i see chromatic aberations(?) It is interesting that my images of M31 at 200mm and f/7.1 do not exibit any signs of coma or chromatic abberation.

Processing was 100% photoshop, I did a quick job of it, and if I get time tonight, i will try to tweak it a bit.

Thanks for looking and any comments or suggestions!

-KDG

Attached Image:

Congrats on your first & very nice M42! 8)
How long were your exposures?

Hi Kerry,
Very good for one of your first. Try adjusting the Histogram in the FITs Liberator when you import each to Photoshop. This will allow you to bring out more detail and even color.
Longer exposures will give more data and better noise to signal ratio too.

Thanks,

Subs were 90sec, 60sec, 30sec and 10sec. Unfortunatley until i get my hand controller for the GM-8, thats about as long as I can go without PEC. Better polar alignment might help too. Right now i only use the polar scope. I've not used FITS liberator, These were all JPEGs converted to TIFFs.

Hi Kerry,

Imaging's addicting, isn't it? Nice job on this!

Eric