NGC2359 Thor's Helmet

Post your DSO images here.
User avatar
AstroBee United States of America
Moderator
Moderator
Articles: 0
Online
Posts: 2196
Joined: Thu Nov 14, 2019 11:03 pm
4
Location: Henderson, NV
Status:
Online

TSS Awards Badges

TSS Photo of the Day

NGC2359 Thor's Helmet

#1

Post by AstroBee »


Last night was our first clear moonless night in a while so a few buddies and I took advantage of the conditions and headed to a location in the Mojave National Preserve that is about 25 miles outside of Baker, CA.
Conditions were excellent and my SQM-L meter gave an overhead reading of 21.35. I'm not sure what that converts to on the Bortle scale but we all seemed to agree that it was a strong Bortle 2 sky. To the northeast, over 70 miles away, we could still see the lights of Las Vegas, NV, and the same with Barstow, CA, 70 miles to the west of our location.
I started out capturing 15 minutes of 60second subs for each of the LRGB channels and then proceeded to capture 200 minutes of Ha data with 5-minute subs. Finally, I started the OIII channel and managed to capture 65 minutes worth of 5-minute subs before my target reach 20°above the horizon and I called it quits for the morning around 1:30 am. That nearly 2-hour drive home is a killer after a long day of projects around the house followed by a long evening of imaging.
I'm hoping to get some more dark time in and add another hour or two of OIII data and see if there's any SII data in this target as well.

Explore Scientific ED127mm refractor with .7x reducer/corrector = 652mm f5.25
ASI ZWO1600mm camera - Gain 139: Offset 10: cooling to -10°
CGX Mount
NINA capture software handled everything like a champ, framing, guiding, auto-focusing, Meridian flip
Processed in Astro Pixel Processor and PhotoShopCC.

I am not a good post-processor and have little desire or tolerance to learn PixInsight. Processing took me 15 minutes. I'm planning on giving the individual masters for the channels to my buddy that is a PixInsight guru and let him have a go at the data to see what he comes up with. I'll post his results, which I'm absolutely positive will be much better than mine, later on in this same post. I'm still not happy with the green stars...

Image
Greg M.~ "Ad Astra per Aspera"
Scopes: Celestron EdgeHD14", Explore Scientific ED152CF & ED127 APO's, StellarVue SV70T, Classic Orange-Tube C-8, Lunt 80mm Ha double-stack solar scope.
Mounts: Astro-Physics Mach One, iOptron CEM70EC Mount, iOptron ZEQ25 Mount.
Cameras: ZWO ASI2600mm Pro, ZWO 2600MC Pro, ZWO ASI1600mm
Filters: 36mm Chroma LRGB & 3nm Ha, OIII, SII, L-Pro, L-eXtreme
Eyepieces: 27mm TeleVue Panoptic, 4mm TeleVue Radian, Explore Scientific 82° 30mm, 6.7mm , Baader 13mm Hyperion, Explore Scientific 70° 10mm, 15mm, 20mm, Meade 8.8mm UWA
Software: N.I.N.A., SharpCapPro, PixInsight, PhotoShop CC, Phd2, Stellarium
https://www.nevadadesertskies.com
User avatar
STEVE333 United States of America
Inter-Galactic Ambassador
Articles: 0
Offline
Posts: 3466
Joined: Sat May 11, 2019 5:01 pm
4
Location: Santa Cruz, Ca, USA
Status:
Offline

TSS Awards Badges

TSS Photo of the Day

Re: NGC2359 Thor's Helmet

#2

Post by STEVE333 »


Nice tight stars and lots of color. Pretty version of this target.

Steve
Steve King: Light Pollution (Bortle 5)
Telescope + Mount + Guiding: W.O. Star71-ii + iOptron CEM40 EC + Orion Magnificent Mini AutoGuider
Camera: ASI 1600MM Pro + EFW Filter Wheel + Chroma 3nm Siii, Ha, Oiii + ZWO LRGB Filters
Software: PHD2; APT; PixInsight ***** My AP website: www.steveking.pictures
Image
Image
User avatar
messier 111 Canada
Universal Ambassador
Articles: 0
Online
Posts: 9472
Joined: Mon Nov 09, 2020 2:49 am
3
Location: Canada's capital region .
Status:
Online

TSS Awards Badges

Re: NGC2359 Thor's Helmet

#3

Post by messier 111 »


magnificent picture.

thx.
I LOVE REFRACTORS , :Astronomer1: :sprefac:

REFRACTOR , TS-Optics Doublet SD-APO 125 mm f/7.8 . Lunt 80mm MT Ha Doublet Refractor .

EYEPIECES, Delos , Delite and 26mm Nagler t5 , 2 zoom Svbony 7-21 , Orion Premium Linear BinoViewer .

FILTER , Nebustar 2 tele vue . Apm solar wedge . contrast booster 2 inches .

Mounts , berno mack 3 with telepod , cg-4 motorized , eq6 pro belt drive .

“Your assumptions are your windows on the world. Scrub them off every once in a while, or the light won't come in.”
― Isaac Asimov

Jean-Yves :flags-canada:
User avatar
Thefatkitty Canada
Co-Administrator
Co-Administrator
Articles: 0
Offline
Posts: 4133
Joined: Sat May 11, 2019 4:20 pm
4
Location: Ontario, Canada
Status:
Offline

TSS Awards Badges

TSS Photo of the Day

Re: NGC2359 Thor's Helmet

#4

Post by Thefatkitty »


One word: Sweet! :D

All the best,
Mark

"The Hankmeister" Celestron 8SE, orange tube Vixen made C80, CG4 & AZ-EQ5 mounts.
Too much Towa glass/mirrors.

H/A - PST stage 2 mod with a Baader 90mm ERF on a Celestron XLT 102 (thanks Mike!)
Ca-K - W/O 61mm, Antares 1.6 barlow, Baader 3.8 OD and Ca-K filters with a ZWO ASI174mm.
W/L - C80-HD with Baader 5.0 & 3.8 Solar film, Solar Continuum 7.5nm and UV/IR filters with a Canon EOS 550D.

Oh yeah, and Solar Cycle 25 :D
User avatar
kt4hx United States of America
Moderator
Moderator
Articles: 4
Offline
Posts: 3489
Joined: Sun May 12, 2019 12:18 am
4
Location: Virginia, USA
Status:
Offline

TSS Awards Badges

Re: NGC2359 Thor's Helmet

#5

Post by kt4hx »


Excellent image Greg. The stars look very nice and I particularly like the delicate pink fringing of the nebular structure.

Regarding your comment about your SQM-L reading as it relates to the Bortle scale, there is no relationship between them actually. The Bortle scale was developed by John as an in the moment method to assess one's conditions using the naked eye only over 20 years ago. It is a fluid scale that can vary night to night at a location, or even hour to hour. The SQM meters of course measure sky brightness. The Bortle scale, SQM and colored LP maps are all based on differing criteria and methodology. They are all valuable tools, but not directly interchangeable, though they do compliment one another. I know John does not like people attempting to correlate his scale to either the maps or SQM - gets his dander up a bit! :)
Alan

Scopes: Astro Sky 17.5 f/4.5 Dob || Apertura AD12 f/5 Dob || Zhumell Z10 f/4.9 Dob ||
ES AR127 f/6.5 || ES ED80 f/6 || Apertura 6" f/5 Newtonian
Mounts: ES Twilight-II and Twilight-I
EPs: AT 82° 28mm UWA || TV Ethos 100° 21mm and 13mm || Vixen LVW 65° 22mm ||
ES 82° 18mm || Pentax XW 70° 10mm, 7mm and 5mm || barlows
Filters (2 inch): DGM NPB || Orion Ultra Block, O-III and Sky Glow || Baader HaB
Primary Field Atlases: Uranometria All-Sky Edition and Interstellarum Deep Sky Atlas
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Astronomers, we look into the past to see our future." (me)
"Seeing is in some respect an art, which must be learnt." (William Herschel)
"What we know is a drop, what we don't know is an ocean." (Sir Isaac Newton)
"No good deed goes unpunished." (various)
Some people without brains do an awful lot of talking, don't you think?” (Scarecrow, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz)
User avatar
AstroBee United States of America
Moderator
Moderator
Articles: 0
Online
Posts: 2196
Joined: Thu Nov 14, 2019 11:03 pm
4
Location: Henderson, NV
Status:
Online

TSS Awards Badges

TSS Photo of the Day

Re: NGC2359 Thor's Helmet

#6

Post by AstroBee »


kt4hx wrote: Sun Feb 07, 2021 3:21 am Excellent image Greg. The stars look very nice and I particularly like the delicate pink fringing of the nebular structure.

Regarding your comment about your SQM-L reading as it relates to the Bortle scale, there is no relationship between them actually. The Bortle scale was developed by John as an in the moment method to assess one's conditions using the naked eye only over 20 years ago. It is a fluid scale that can vary night to night at a location, or even hour to hour. The SQM meters of course measure sky brightness. The Bortle scale, SQM and colored LP maps are all based on differing criteria and methodology. They are all valuable tools, but not directly interchangeable, though they do compliment one another. I know John does not like people attempting to correlate his scale to either the maps or SQM - gets his dander up a bit! :)
Thanks for the compliment on the photo and thanks for the info regarding the SQM-L reading. Good to know and no dander riling was meant.
Greg M.~ "Ad Astra per Aspera"
Scopes: Celestron EdgeHD14", Explore Scientific ED152CF & ED127 APO's, StellarVue SV70T, Classic Orange-Tube C-8, Lunt 80mm Ha double-stack solar scope.
Mounts: Astro-Physics Mach One, iOptron CEM70EC Mount, iOptron ZEQ25 Mount.
Cameras: ZWO ASI2600mm Pro, ZWO 2600MC Pro, ZWO ASI1600mm
Filters: 36mm Chroma LRGB & 3nm Ha, OIII, SII, L-Pro, L-eXtreme
Eyepieces: 27mm TeleVue Panoptic, 4mm TeleVue Radian, Explore Scientific 82° 30mm, 6.7mm , Baader 13mm Hyperion, Explore Scientific 70° 10mm, 15mm, 20mm, Meade 8.8mm UWA
Software: N.I.N.A., SharpCapPro, PixInsight, PhotoShop CC, Phd2, Stellarium
https://www.nevadadesertskies.com
User avatar
Ylem United States of America
Universal Ambassador
Articles: 0
Offline
Posts: 7477
Joined: Sun May 12, 2019 2:54 am
4
Location: Ocean County, New Jersey
Status:
Offline

TSS Photo of the Day

Re: NGC2359 Thor's Helmet

#7

Post by Ylem »


That's beautiful 🤩
Clear Skies,
-Jeff :telescopewink:


Member; ASTRA-NJ



Orion 80ED
Celestron C5, 6SE, Celestar 8
Vixen Porta Mount ll
Coronado PST
A big box of Plossls
Little box of filters
:D



User avatar
MariusD69 Romania
Inter-Galactic Ambassador
Articles: 0
Offline
Posts: 3633
Joined: Sun May 12, 2019 1:22 pm
4
Location: Romania
Status:
Offline

TSS Photo of the Day

Re: NGC2359 Thor's Helmet

#8

Post by MariusD69 »


Looks great! Well done!
Marius
Mount: iOpton Cem60, HEQ5-for spare
Scopes: newt SW 150/750PDS, dobson SW 150/1200; SW 114/500; TS Photoline 80mm f/6 Triplet APO; SW ST80
Cameras: ASI294MC Pro; ASI1600MM Pro; Atik 314L+mono; Canon 1100D; QHY5III-178m; QHY5L-II-m ; ASI224; Altair GPCAM 290M, GPCAM290C
Accessories: Baader MPCC; GPU KomakorrF4; TS Flat2; TS 0.79x FR/FF
User avatar
kt4hx United States of America
Moderator
Moderator
Articles: 4
Offline
Posts: 3489
Joined: Sun May 12, 2019 12:18 am
4
Location: Virginia, USA
Status:
Offline

TSS Awards Badges

Re: NGC2359 Thor's Helmet

#9

Post by kt4hx »


AstroBee wrote: Sun Feb 07, 2021 3:58 am
kt4hx wrote: Sun Feb 07, 2021 3:21 am Excellent image Greg. The stars look very nice and I particularly like the delicate pink fringing of the nebular structure.

Regarding your comment about your SQM-L reading as it relates to the Bortle scale, there is no relationship between them actually. The Bortle scale was developed by John as an in the moment method to assess one's conditions using the naked eye only over 20 years ago. It is a fluid scale that can vary night to night at a location, or even hour to hour. The SQM meters of course measure sky brightness. The Bortle scale, SQM and colored LP maps are all based on differing criteria and methodology. They are all valuable tools, but not directly interchangeable, though they do compliment one another. I know John does not like people attempting to correlate his scale to either the maps or SQM - gets his dander up a bit! :)
Thanks for the compliment on the photo and thanks for the info regarding the SQM-L reading. Good to know and no dander riling was meant.
You are quite welcome Greg.

Regarding Bortle, no problems at all. There is a lot of erroneous info out on the internet about how the Bortle scale tracks with other methodologies then is repeated through no fault of the speaker. Different individuals have attempted to forge some correlation between Bortle and SQM/maps which is then proliferated through the internet. Whenever I see it, I just try to illuminate the fact that they cannot be consistently and accurately correlated one to another. Rather they are complimentary. When John's scale first appeared in the February 2001 edition of Sky & Telescope and we didn't have the SQM or colored LP maps around yet. They all assess things differently.

Just FYI, in a conversation that John was participating in at another site, someone made the following statement:
I live in a 5, with level 4 beginning about 10 minuets away, and level 3 a bout an hour and a half or so.
To which John replied:
Point of information, don't delude yourself. No one can claim that they live in one Bortle class zone of sky darkness, but have the next darker (or brighter class) region only a few minutes away. The odds are that in making that ten minute drive you will actually find that the skies there will be little to absolutely no different than at home. The sharp demarcations between class zones depicted on light pollution maps are at best a generalization. There actually will always be broad transition zones that separate where the relative darkness increases ever so slowly from the one zone to the next. At the same time , prevailing conditions at just about any site are changing from night to night, so there can be no absolute guarantee that the assumed class conditions will prevail upon arrival at a site, unless it is a pristine night to begin with.
Alan

Scopes: Astro Sky 17.5 f/4.5 Dob || Apertura AD12 f/5 Dob || Zhumell Z10 f/4.9 Dob ||
ES AR127 f/6.5 || ES ED80 f/6 || Apertura 6" f/5 Newtonian
Mounts: ES Twilight-II and Twilight-I
EPs: AT 82° 28mm UWA || TV Ethos 100° 21mm and 13mm || Vixen LVW 65° 22mm ||
ES 82° 18mm || Pentax XW 70° 10mm, 7mm and 5mm || barlows
Filters (2 inch): DGM NPB || Orion Ultra Block, O-III and Sky Glow || Baader HaB
Primary Field Atlases: Uranometria All-Sky Edition and Interstellarum Deep Sky Atlas
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Astronomers, we look into the past to see our future." (me)
"Seeing is in some respect an art, which must be learnt." (William Herschel)
"What we know is a drop, what we don't know is an ocean." (Sir Isaac Newton)
"No good deed goes unpunished." (various)
Some people without brains do an awful lot of talking, don't you think?” (Scarecrow, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz)
User avatar
BABOafrica Kenya
Local Group Ambassador
Articles: 0
Offline
Posts: 2757
Joined: Tue May 07, 2019 2:41 pm
4
Location: Kenya
Status:
Offline

TSS Awards Badges

TSS Photo of the Day

Re: NGC2359 Thor's Helmet

#10

Post by BABOafrica »


Yeah, LOTS of color in there. And it's hard to get all that detail. DARK sites trump all the rest.

BABO
"In lumine tuo videbimus lumen."

Scopes: Stellarvue SV80 Raptor Carbon Fiber ED Doublet / Celestron SCT C8
Williams Optics 66mm APO / DIY 8" f/4 Newtonian astrograph / Nikon 180mm f/2.8
Mounts: Orion Atlas EQ-G / Celestron AVX / DIY mini-equatorial
Cameras: QHY163m / Fujifilm X-A1 (modded) / Fuji X-A2 (not modded) / Orion StarShoot Auto Guider
Filters: ZWO 7nm NB set / ZWO LRGB set / ZWO Dual Band / Astronomics UHC
User avatar
Gordon United States of America
Site Admin
Site Admin
Articles: 1037
Offline
Posts: 8266
Joined: Wed Apr 24, 2019 10:52 pm
4
Location: Cottonwood, AZ
Status:
Offline

TSS Awards Badges

TSS Photo of the Day

I Broke The Forum.

Re: NGC2359 Thor's Helmet

#11

Post by Gordon »


Congratulations Greg on having your image selected as todays TSS APOD!!!

app.php/article/2-7-2021-tss-astrophoto ... of-the-day
Gordon
Scopes: Explore Scientific ED80CF, Skywatcher 200 Quattro Imaging Newt, SeeStar S50 for EAA.
Mounts: Orion Atlas EQ-g mount & Skywatcher EQ5 Pro.
ZWO mini guider.
Image cameras: ZWO ASI1600 MM Cool, ZWO ASI533mc-Pro, ZWO ASI174mm-C (for use with my Quark chromosphere), ZWO ASI120MC
Filters: LRGB, Ha 7nm, O-III 7nm, S-II 7nm
Eyepieces: a few.
Primary software: Cartes du Ciel, N.I.N.A, StarTools V1.4.

Image
User avatar
Makuser United States of America
In Memory
In Memory
Articles: 0
Offline
Posts: 6394
Joined: Mon May 06, 2019 12:53 am
4
Location: Rockledge, FL.
Status:
Offline

TSS Awards Badges

TSS Photo of the Day

Re: NGC2359 Thor's Helmet

#12

Post by Makuser »


Hi Greg. A wonderful Thor's Helmet image from you. I enjoyed the bi-color nebulosities and fine details in your capture. Thanks for posting this on here Greg, and congratulations on winning the TSS APOD Award today.
Marshall
Sky-Watcher 90mm f/13.8 Maksutov-Cassegrain on motorized Multimount
Orion Astroview 120ST f/5 Refractor on EQ3 mount
Celestron Comet Catcher 140mm f/3.64 Schmidt-Newtonian on alt-az mount
Celestron Omni XLT150R f/5 Refractor on CG4 mount with dual axis drives.
Orion 180mm f/15 Maksutov-Cassegrain on CG5-GT Goto mount.
Orion XT12i 12" f/4.9 Dobsonian Intelliscope.
Kamakura 7x35 Binoculars and Celestron SkyMaster 15x70 Binoculars. ZWO ASI 120MC camera.
>)))))*>
User avatar
jrkirkham United States of America
Orion Spur Ambassador
Articles: 0
Online
Posts: 929
Joined: Fri Jun 07, 2019 12:37 am
4
Location: Illinois United States
Status:
Online

TSS Awards Badges

TSS Photo of the Day

Re: NGC2359 Thor's Helmet

#13

Post by jrkirkham »


Congratulations on the APOD.
Rob
Telescopes: 50mm refractor, ED80 triplet, 90mm makcass, 10" dob, 8"SCT, 11"SCT
Mounts: Celestron CGX, Orion Sirius + several camera tripods
Cameras: Canon 6D, Canon 80D, ZWO-ASI120MC
Binoculars: 10x50, 12x60, 15x70, 25-125x80
Observatory: SkyShed POD XL3 + 8x12 warm room
AL Projects Completed: Lunar #645, Outreach #0280, Universe Sampler #93-T, Binocular Messier #871, Messier #2521, Messier Honorary #2521, Constellation Hunter Northern Skies #112, Planetary Transit Venus #1, Galileo #26, Outreach Stellar 0280, Meteor Regular #157, Solar System Telescopic #209-I, Observer Award #1
AL Projects Currently in Process: Double Stars, Comet, Lunar Evolution
User avatar
OzEclipse Australia
Moderator
Moderator
Articles: 2
Offline
Posts: 2327
Joined: Sat May 11, 2019 8:11 am
4
Location: Young, NSW, Australia, 34S, 148E
Status:
Offline

TSS Awards Badges

TSS Photo of the Day

Re: NGC2359 Thor's Helmet

#14

Post by OzEclipse »


Hi Greg

Lovely image.

I agree with Alan's comments about Bortle /SQM although I too have been guilty of saying that Bortle 1 is a mile down the road. I don't want to hijack your thread or steal your thunder with so I'll just say congratulations on the TSS APOD.

Cheers

Joe
Image
Amateur astronomer since 1978...................Web site : http://joe-cali.com/
Scopes: ATM 18" Dob, Vixen VC200L, ATM 6"f7, Stellarvue 102ED, Saxon ED80, WO M70 ED, Orion 102 Maksutov, ST80.
Mounts: Takahashi EM-200, iOptron iEQ45, Push dobsonian with Nexus DSC, three homemade EQ's.
Eyepieces: TV Naglers 31, 17, 12, 7; Denkmeier D21 & D14; Pentax XW10, XW5, Unitron 40mm Kellner, Meade Or 25,12
Cameras : Pentax K1, K5, K01, K10D / VIDEO CAMS : TacosBD, Lihmsec.
Cam/guider/controllers: Lacerta MGEN 3, SW Synguider, Simulation Curriculum SkyFi 3+Sky safari
Memberships Astronomical Association of Queensland; RASNZ Occultations Section; Single Exposure Milky Way Facebook Group (Moderator) (12k members)
User avatar
AstroBee United States of America
Moderator
Moderator
Articles: 0
Online
Posts: 2196
Joined: Thu Nov 14, 2019 11:03 pm
4
Location: Henderson, NV
Status:
Online

TSS Awards Badges

TSS Photo of the Day

Re: NGC2359 Thor's Helmet

#15

Post by AstroBee »


Wow, thanks again for the APOD recognition. I always appreciate it.
I'm eager to see my friend's version of the same data processed with PixInsight and way more skills than I have.
My goals are to try and master, if that's even possible, the data acquisition part of this hobby with the gear I have. Then eventually work on improving my data processing skills. I keep waiting for that next version of PixInsight to come out that does everything to perfection with 3 clicks of the mouse... :lol:

@OzEclipse I always encourage conversation, even if it changes the topic direction. Just since my initial post, I've done lots of reading and research myself on the whole Bortle/SQM topic so I'm always learning.
Greg M.~ "Ad Astra per Aspera"
Scopes: Celestron EdgeHD14", Explore Scientific ED152CF & ED127 APO's, StellarVue SV70T, Classic Orange-Tube C-8, Lunt 80mm Ha double-stack solar scope.
Mounts: Astro-Physics Mach One, iOptron CEM70EC Mount, iOptron ZEQ25 Mount.
Cameras: ZWO ASI2600mm Pro, ZWO 2600MC Pro, ZWO ASI1600mm
Filters: 36mm Chroma LRGB & 3nm Ha, OIII, SII, L-Pro, L-eXtreme
Eyepieces: 27mm TeleVue Panoptic, 4mm TeleVue Radian, Explore Scientific 82° 30mm, 6.7mm , Baader 13mm Hyperion, Explore Scientific 70° 10mm, 15mm, 20mm, Meade 8.8mm UWA
Software: N.I.N.A., SharpCapPro, PixInsight, PhotoShop CC, Phd2, Stellarium
https://www.nevadadesertskies.com
User avatar
helicon United States of America
Co-Administrator
Co-Administrator
Articles: 584
Online
Posts: 12275
Joined: Mon May 06, 2019 1:35 pm
4
Location: Washington
Status:
Online

TSS Awards Badges

Re: NGC2359 Thor's Helmet

#16

Post by helicon »


Nice image of Thor's Helmet Greg. Reminds me that I watched "The Dig" last night on Netflix since the skies were not cooperative. It's the story of the Sutton Hoo excavation back in 1939 in the south of England where a 6th century (probably) Anglo-Saxon ship was recovered along with a majestic helmet, surely belonging to a king, powerful chief, or warleader along with some other grave goods. The ship very much approximated Viking ship design, just a couple of hundred years earlier.
-Michael
Refractors: ES AR152 f/6.5 Achromat on Twilight II, Celestron 102mm XLT f/9.8 on Celestron Heavy Duty Alt Az mount, KOWA 90mm spotting scope
Binoculars: Celestron SkyMaster 15x70, Bushnell 10x50
Eyepieces: Various, GSO Superview, 9mm Plossl, Celestron 25mm Plossl
Camera: ZWO ASI 120
Naked Eye: Two Eyeballs
Latitude: 48.7229° N
User avatar
OzEclipse Australia
Moderator
Moderator
Articles: 2
Offline
Posts: 2327
Joined: Sat May 11, 2019 8:11 am
4
Location: Young, NSW, Australia, 34S, 148E
Status:
Offline

TSS Awards Badges

TSS Photo of the Day

Re: NGC2359 Thor's Helmet

#17

Post by OzEclipse »


AstroBee wrote: Sun Feb 07, 2021 10:00 pm Wow, thanks again for the APOD recognition. I always appreciate it.

@OzEclipse I always encourage conversation, even if it changes the topic direction. Just since my initial post, I've done lots of reading and research myself on the whole Bortle/SQM topic so I'm always learning.
It is an interesting topic but perhaps a topic for its own dedicated thread in a different sub-forum. I may start one.

Joe
Image
Amateur astronomer since 1978...................Web site : http://joe-cali.com/
Scopes: ATM 18" Dob, Vixen VC200L, ATM 6"f7, Stellarvue 102ED, Saxon ED80, WO M70 ED, Orion 102 Maksutov, ST80.
Mounts: Takahashi EM-200, iOptron iEQ45, Push dobsonian with Nexus DSC, three homemade EQ's.
Eyepieces: TV Naglers 31, 17, 12, 7; Denkmeier D21 & D14; Pentax XW10, XW5, Unitron 40mm Kellner, Meade Or 25,12
Cameras : Pentax K1, K5, K01, K10D / VIDEO CAMS : TacosBD, Lihmsec.
Cam/guider/controllers: Lacerta MGEN 3, SW Synguider, Simulation Curriculum SkyFi 3+Sky safari
Memberships Astronomical Association of Queensland; RASNZ Occultations Section; Single Exposure Milky Way Facebook Group (Moderator) (12k members)
User avatar
AstroBee United States of America
Moderator
Moderator
Articles: 0
Online
Posts: 2196
Joined: Thu Nov 14, 2019 11:03 pm
4
Location: Henderson, NV
Status:
Online

TSS Awards Badges

TSS Photo of the Day

Re: NGC2359 Thor's Helmet

#18

Post by AstroBee »


Same data, re-processed to work on the star colors. I felt like v1 had too many green stars in it. I'm always looking for improvement.

Image
Greg M.~ "Ad Astra per Aspera"
Scopes: Celestron EdgeHD14", Explore Scientific ED152CF & ED127 APO's, StellarVue SV70T, Classic Orange-Tube C-8, Lunt 80mm Ha double-stack solar scope.
Mounts: Astro-Physics Mach One, iOptron CEM70EC Mount, iOptron ZEQ25 Mount.
Cameras: ZWO ASI2600mm Pro, ZWO 2600MC Pro, ZWO ASI1600mm
Filters: 36mm Chroma LRGB & 3nm Ha, OIII, SII, L-Pro, L-eXtreme
Eyepieces: 27mm TeleVue Panoptic, 4mm TeleVue Radian, Explore Scientific 82° 30mm, 6.7mm , Baader 13mm Hyperion, Explore Scientific 70° 10mm, 15mm, 20mm, Meade 8.8mm UWA
Software: N.I.N.A., SharpCapPro, PixInsight, PhotoShop CC, Phd2, Stellarium
https://www.nevadadesertskies.com
User avatar
SkyHiker United States of America
Local Group Ambassador
Articles: 0
Offline
Posts: 2293
Joined: Sat May 11, 2019 8:40 pm
4
Location: Santa Barbara, CA
Status:
Offline

TSS Awards Badges

TSS Photo of the Day

Re: NGC2359 Thor's Helmet

#19

Post by SkyHiker »


Beautiful, the star colors look great too.
... Henk. :D Telescopes: GSO 12" Astrograph, "Comet Hunter" MN152, ES ED127CF, ES ED80, WO Redcat51, Z12, AT6RC, Celestron Skymaster 20x80, Mounts and tripod: Losmandy G11S with OnStep, AVX, Tiltall, Cameras: ASI2600MC, ASI2600MM, ASI120 mini, Fuji X-a1, Canon XSi, T6, ELPH 100HS, DIY: OnStep controller, Pi4b/power rig, Afocal adapter, Foldable Dob base, Az/Alt Dob setting circles, Accessories: ZWO 36 mm filter wheel, TV Paracorr 2, Baader MPCC Mk III, ES FF, SSAG, QHY OAG-M, EAF electronic focuser, Plossls, Barlows, Telrad, Laser collimators (Seben LK1, Z12, Howie Glatter), Cheshire, 2 Orion RACIs 8x50, Software: KStars-Ekos, DSS, PHD2, Nebulosity, Photo Gallery, Gimp, CHDK, Computers:Pi4b, 2x running KStars/Ekos, Toshiba Satellite 17", Website:Henk's astro images
User avatar
AstroBee United States of America
Moderator
Moderator
Articles: 0
Online
Posts: 2196
Joined: Thu Nov 14, 2019 11:03 pm
4
Location: Henderson, NV
Status:
Online

TSS Awards Badges

TSS Photo of the Day

Re: NGC2359 Thor's Helmet

#20

Post by AstroBee »


My friend Patrick finally had a go at my data on Thor's Helmet. I gave him the master calibrated files from each color channel, LRGB, Ha, OII, and here's his explanation of what he did with it in PixInsight and PS.

"I used a tone mapping approach - short version, MureDenoise on all channels, extracted the stars from HA/Oiii/R/G/B (didn't use the Lum), combined the RGB stars for the colors. Combined the starless H and O, re-linearized then heavily denoised and stretched for the chrominance. Combined the starless H and O to create a synthetic superluminance, re-linearized, usual masking, deconvolution, stretching, etc. Added the Ha stars back in, recombined with chrominance image. Extracted the a* and b* channels from RGB stars and recombined them with the main image through a mask created from the Ha stars. More tweaks, final color tweaking in Photoshop.
Used Starnet to create the starless images. Did some tweaking of the stretch and resulting images to reduce the Starnet artifacts."

Be sure to give Patrick some love and follow him on Astrobin. Check out his wide-field of Orion! https://www.astrobin.com/users/FlankerOneTwo/

Image

I love the way the stars seem so much more realistic in size and brightness.
Greg M.~ "Ad Astra per Aspera"
Scopes: Celestron EdgeHD14", Explore Scientific ED152CF & ED127 APO's, StellarVue SV70T, Classic Orange-Tube C-8, Lunt 80mm Ha double-stack solar scope.
Mounts: Astro-Physics Mach One, iOptron CEM70EC Mount, iOptron ZEQ25 Mount.
Cameras: ZWO ASI2600mm Pro, ZWO 2600MC Pro, ZWO ASI1600mm
Filters: 36mm Chroma LRGB & 3nm Ha, OIII, SII, L-Pro, L-eXtreme
Eyepieces: 27mm TeleVue Panoptic, 4mm TeleVue Radian, Explore Scientific 82° 30mm, 6.7mm , Baader 13mm Hyperion, Explore Scientific 70° 10mm, 15mm, 20mm, Meade 8.8mm UWA
Software: N.I.N.A., SharpCapPro, PixInsight, PhotoShop CC, Phd2, Stellarium
https://www.nevadadesertskies.com
Post Reply

Create an account or sign in to join the discussion

You need to be a member in order to post a reply

Create an account

Not a member? register to join our community
Members can start their own topics & subscribe to topics
It’s free and only takes a minute

Register

Sign in

Return to “Deep Sky Images”