This image shows a giant star-forming region in the Orion constellation. These two nebulas, as well as a group of bright stars nearby to the left, create the "sword" of the Orion constellation, which hangs diagonally down from Orion's belt. it is located approximately 1.600 light years from Earth. M42 Great Orion Nebula on the right, Running Man Nebula on the left.
This image gets me much closer to where I want to be with this part of the sky. A lot of acquisition work and processing work here. The outer edge of the image shows a lot of warped stars - I need a field flattener. Happy with this though!
Image Details:
- Imaging Scope: Astrotelescopes 80mm ED Refractor
- Imaging Camera: Nikon D7000
- Guiding Scope: William Optics 66mm Petzval Refractor
- Guiding Camera: Meade DSI-C
- Mount: Celestron CGEM
- Exposures: 7 * 7 minute lights for the expanded nebulosity, 10 * 1 minute lights for the bright stars, 10 * 20 second lights for the core of M42, 6 * 7 minute darks
- ISO 640
- Aligned and Stacked in Deep Sky Stacker
- Post-Processing in GIMP (layering, image matching, contrast, saturation and unsharp mask, level adjustment)
- Tone mapping in Photomatix Pro
- Noise Reduction in NeatImage
8 comments:
Realy nice picture Phil.
Thanks, Jon! Did you get out this past weekend?
No Phil, It was clear skys but it was also a bit of fog so all glass was wet. No pictures from me this weekend.
Ah, very nicely done! Great color and depth, and nicely processed Trapezium v. the fainter dust! Congrats on a fine piece!
M101 is very nice, too.
Oooh man I'm so jealous of your equipment! Gorgeous image :)
Also, big like for using GIMP :D
Val - thanks! I think I need bigger glass for M101!
Dubravko - Cheers!!! I love GIMP - excellent freebie! :-)
Incredible detail. Beautiful.
Thanks, Arun!
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