StarTools

This is old data from June 2014 which I've reprocessed using v1.4a, I knew it was noisy because there were only 5 x 900s subs in total, M16 is very low for me @ 53deg N and it is at it's highest mid-June (when it doesn't really go dark!). I only managed to capture the Ha channel, clouds prevented anything else. Ah well, excuses aside... the scope was my venerable NP127is and the CCD my Atik490EX operating @ 1x1 binning, which in theory at 1.1arc-sec per pixel is way over-sampled for my usual atmospheric conditions. So much for theory, the scope still produced amazing resolution and StarTools expertly controlled the noise to produce the images below:

Full frame (almost, cropped about 50pxls per side):



and zoomed in to the centre bit which should show here at full resolution:



And yes, I tried processing this data in PixInsight too and couldn't get close to this result - which probably describes my expertise with PI more than its limitations but hey - the job was a whole lot easier in StarTools...

ChrisH

Oh, and in cse you were wondering what the raw data looked like, this is a jpg of the DSS stack, just stretched so it's visible but otherwise unprocessed (so the noise is still apparent)



ChrisH

Chris
even your stretched only image is wonderful. You get some amazing results.
Che