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Captured by
Byron Davies

M-52, NGC-7635, SH2-157, SH2-158, SH2-159, SH2-161, NGC-7510

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Tak fs-78 first light revisited...

Started by inbred, 02/06/2003 04:14AM
Posted 02/06/2003 04:14AM Opening Post
Sorry for the dual post if you saw this in 'user photos' This is the first light image from my new Takahashi fs-78. It was originally a straight RGB @ 10:10:10 minutes, but my blue channel had bloated stars due to thin clouds that came through as I was acquiring the blue image I believe (or perhaps chromatic shift due to the focal reducer). I wasn't too worried about it, I was just checking to see if everything worked right (first time self guiding on the mount) and stars looked ok. So tonight I had some time while shooting some other images, so I reworked the data into this. What I did was to sum the red and green images to make a master luminescence frame (to counteract the bloated blue image), then did some magic with layer masking and unsharp masking the bright areas while blurring the dim. I then redid the rgb combine with better layer masking and sharpening. I also cut the size in half for ease of upload and viewing (original is 1600x1200). I'm very happy with this, although I think the lum image lacking a blue component kind of skewed my color balance in some places.

Attached Image:

inbred's attachment for post 3628
Posted 02/06/2003 02:56PM #1
Very nice Andrew, I am putting together my first M42 with my ST8XE. What was the shortest exposure you made? You've defined the core quite well. I've got an NABG and I had to shoot 45sec with Ha to really see the core without saturation. Thanks!
Posted 02/07/2003 12:59PM #2
Hi Andrew,

thats a brillant first light. I really would like to include it into my gallery! It would reach a top ten position. A link back to your site and full copyright credits is guaranteed.

If you wish to do that please upload the full resolution it here:

http://www.licha.de/AstroWeb/send_content.php3?sCont=pix

You can check the gallery here:

http://www.licha.de/AstroWeb/gallery.php3?iCal=0

Thanx a lot
Tom
Posted 02/09/2003 10:30PM #3