A shortish noisy Helix

[Benjamin]

Got 3.5 hours each of Ha, O3 and S2 plus 10 minutes each of R,G and B for the stars. It’s become pretty apparent (during processing) that for reducing noise and getting outer detail this nebula needs time! I’m happy with the start I’ve made but once that moon starts staying below the horizon it’ll be back to the yard and getting as much Ha, O3 and S2 as I can get. The S2 is quite minimal but still there behind the Ha. Astrobin link here: https://www.astrobin.com/full/xin80t/G/

[Juno16]

Hi Benjamin,

You have managed to produce a very beautiful Helix image with the “shortish” data. Very, very nice!

Thanks,
Jim

[Benjamin]

You have managed to produce a very beautiful Helix image with the “shortish” data.

“Shortish” seemed about right :-) 10 hours is kind of long for what I’ve been doing lately (at f4) but just saw an image of of the Helix consisting of 100 hours of Ha! Incredible details lurking in the outer rim.

[MariusD69]

Looks great Well done!

[jthommes]

Looks good Benjamin.

[BABOafrica]

Noise? What noise.

Looks fantastic.

BABO

[Benjamin]

Well, after lots of stuffing around in PixInsight I managed to learn a few more things. Realized that I was aiming at a HOO colour palette, so I ditched the Ha reinforcing (and noise adding) S2. I also looked back through each stage of the processing to simplify things and deal with noise better as it arose or (even better) not add it in the first place. In the end the processing (to a point I was happy with) was really straightforward. Live and learn! New and last revision here: https://www.astrobin.com/full/p6idc2/B/

[JimMinCT]

Very nice...
I have a couple of hrs of Ha and OIII on this from the past few nights.
I haven't had a chance to put it together yet, but I hope it comes out half as good as this!
Well Done!

[helicon]

Thanks for sharing the images Benjamin - excellent work!