Posts Made By: John Krawczyk

Hi All,

Tired of the Crescent yet?

Last night was good enough for me to collect color data for my Ha image. I constructed my images using a combination of techniques. The image is a Ha(Ha+R)GB image. I shot 2 hrs of Ha and 1 hour each of RGB. After calibration and registration I combined the Ha image and the R image using the "lighten" layer combine in Paintshop. Then i combined the new R image with the G & B images. After an intial color balance, i them did a "luminace" layer overlay with the Ha image as the luminace image to bring out the detail better and reduce star bloat by over half. Here is my shooting data for the image.

Scope: Stellarvue SV-102 APO @ f/7.8 (native focal ratio)
Camera: Starlight Xpress HX-916 1.3MP monochrome CCD
Exposures: Ha(Ha+R)GB - 120120+40):30:30 - All unbinned
Mount: Losmandy G11
Guiding: ST-4 w/SV-80/9d Guidescope
Filters: Astronomik Type 2 LRGB & 14nm Ha in a Homeyer MFW

I used Maxim DL for image aquisition and processing. I also used Images Plus for image calibration, and Paintshop pro for the layering.

Here is a link to a full size uncompressed JPG:

http://ardenastrophotography.com/NGC6888_HaRGB_rev1.jpg

You need to flat field divide the image.

This is a simplisitic off the cuff but efffective approach in the absense of real flat field. I hope you dont mind but i tried it with your image.

I use paintshop pro 8.1

I made a copy of the image and gaussian blurred it at about 70%

I inverted the original image and pasted the new gaussian blurred image as a new layer and set the blend mode to multiply and opacity at 50%.

I merged the image and reinverted it.

I readjusted the levels and histgram.

That removed most of the vignetting but left a little uneven illumination.

I made another copy and gaussian blurred it again set at 80%

I inverted the image again and copyed the gaussian blurred image to it and set the blend mode to Dodge and opacity at 50%. I merged the layers and reinverted the image.

That took out most of the vigentting and uneven illumination.

Birding.

Hi Raymond

Very nice job. I am processing a set of images at this time of the Cresent also. Same amount of exposures, time, and ISO setting. Only differnce is the camera and scope. Im using a Nikon D70 and an Orion 120 f/8.3 achromat refractor on an autoguided G11 mount. I also used a IDAS LPS filter too. My images are as faint as yours when i stacked them with Registar using Average Combine, but doing Adadptive Add in Images Plus helped to bring more of the fainter part of the nebula out. The downside is more background noise. I think the key here with doing this with unmodded DLSRs will be more exposures and averageing out sets of addaptive added exposures. I will post my result later. I think it will compare about the same as yours.

Reguards,

John

Nice shot of the moon Dave. The D70 takes great lunar shots. I did this one 1 week after i got mine. You should be able to get even better ones with the larger aperature of your ar6

http://members.rennlist.com/blueshark/Moon_43004_1_800X600.jpg

John Krawczyk
Crownsville, MD

This is a front view of the Catbird later in the day. (At least i think its the same bird)

Its amp glow. You can subtract it out with dark frames.

I have a D70. It's a truly outstanding camera. It will probably be redundant when the D200 arrives.

If your primary reason to buy a DSLR is for astrophotography, you might as well get the Rebel. The red response is slightly better. And its a still a wonderfull camera. My reasons to by the Nikon was photography in general coupled with that fact that i already own nikon stuff. No point in having to invest in a new line all over again. The D70 will work with 90% of the lenses Nikon ever made from the 'F' to the present.

Astrophotography is just a bonus untill i buy a real CCD camera. I've been getting decent results with it.

BTW - The Nikon from what i read is much eaiser to do the IR modifications as a DIY project than the Rebel.

John Krawczyk

John Krawczyk

Ohhh! That is nice. Great capture.

Wonderful lunar portrait. The exposure is perfect. The lower limb is not overexpoused like i see in many (mine included) other moon photos.

The casing. Thats it. The internals/electronics are identical. I cant answer for sure about the windows 98 driver.