First Light NGC 2359 Thors Helmet

[Startrek]

Captured NGC 2359 Thors Helmet for the first time after 5 years into the hobby
A nice little celestial object to image , quite unique
Unfortunately only 4 hours of data due to the onset of cloudy weather but happy with the end result
Captured from my NexDome Bortle 3 dark site ( retirement getaway) under poor to average conditions ( Summertime high humidity, dew , sea mist etc.. Star were scintillating like crazy )
Haven’t used my Obs in months and months so required a clean out ( spider webs , dust ,mould etc…. )

NexDome Obs
Skywatcher EQ8-R pro mount
10” f5 Klaus Helmerich Carbon fibre newt
ZWO2600MC cooled to -10C , Gain 100
TS Optics GPU coma corrector
Antlia ALPT 5nm OSC Dualband filter
85 x 3 min dithered guided subs
40 x Flats
60 x Bias
EQMOD and Ascom Stellarium
APT
PHD2 Multistar guiding ( 0.60 to 0.70 arc sec total ) Dec waa rock solid but Ra was jumping a bit due to chasing the seeing
Stacked in DSS
Processed in Startools version 1.8
SV Decon worked extremely well again
Used Compose OSC Bi Color to load the data
Bi Color preset in Color Module with some saturation and bias tweaks
Only required 4 pixels in De Noise to clean up the residual noise floor ( minor )

Comments most welcome
Thanks
Martin

[fmeireso]

Looks nice to me. Nice detail. But unsure about the starcolor. It is as you say a beautifull target. Unfortunately for me too low placed...unless i would go out i the field, but i don't do that ...for AP.

[Startrek]

Captured NGC 2359 Thors Helmet for the first time after 5 years into the hobby
A nice little celestial object to image , quite unique
Unfortunately only 4 hours of data due to the onset of cloudy weather but happy with the end result
Captured from my NexDome Bortle 3 dark site ( retirement getaway) under poor to average conditions ( Summertime high humidity, dew , sea mist etc.. Star were scintillating like crazy )
Haven’t used my Obs in months and months so required a clean out ( spider webs , dust ,mould etc…. )

NexDome Obs
Skywatcher EQ8-R pro mount
10” f5 Klaus Helmerich Carbon fibre newt
ZWO2600MC cooled to -10C , Gain 100
TS Optics GPU coma corrector
Antlia ALPT 5nm OSC Dualband filter
85 x 3 min dithered guided subs
40 x Flats
60 x Bias
EQMOD and Ascom Stellarium
APT
PHD2 Multistar guiding ( 0.60 to 0.70 arc sec total ) Dec waa rock solid but Ra was jumping a bit due to chasing the seeing
Stacked in DSS
Processed in Startools version 1.8
SV Decon worked extremely well again
Used Compose OSC Bi Color to load the data
Bi Color preset in Color Module with some saturation and bias tweaks
Only required 4 pixels in De Noise to clean up the residual noise floor ( minor )

Added a cropped version

Comments most welcome
Thanks
Martin

[Startrek]

Looks nice to me. Nice detail. But unsure about the starcolor. It is as you say a beautifull target. Unfortunately for me too low placed...unless i would go out i the field, but i don't do that ...for AP.

Thanks
Yes, Star Color using any narrowband filter is always subjective and difficult to achieve true scientific colors ( whites , yellows , orange and blues ) It’s even harder using a OSC NB filter with Bi Color blends.
Obviously capturing RGB stars separately and Ha Oii for main object then use layering and some other modules could produce a more realistic image in relation to Star Color.

Clear Skies !!

[fmeireso]

Yeah, i have a L-enhance filter, duo band. Same problem there...originally the stars always come out blue...in most cases i saturate them to white but i will try for the future to take RGB stars and layer them in....i hope...

[decay]

Hi Martin,

such a fascinating object! Too bad that it isn't really visible from Europe.

Good to hear you found an opportunity to use your large rig. And obviously everything works fine, a nice image, well done I too have no problems with white stars in duoband images. At least for now, of course this may change in future ...

Best regards, Dietmar.

[Mike in Rancho]

Cool target, Martin. Nice job!

I like the orientation here too. I think I'm used to seeing this more counterclockwise 90 degrees?

I imagine the star colors are appropriate to acquisition (duoband) and your throttling. Is this target perhaps OIII heavy and throttled in the B/G? The fact that, other than one obvious star, the entire field runs towards the red (when we know stars are usually weak in Ha) makes me think perhaps so.

Thus, altering the emission throttling for a more "balanced" star field color may take the actual target too much towards blue/OIII.

I guess if found to be aesthetically disturbing, bleaching or dulling the stars (perhaps via highlight repair, or options in Shrink even if you don't want to actually shrink) could be a solution. RGB stars another, although sometimes tricky to pull off.

[Startrek]

Hi Martin,

such a fascinating object! Too bad that it isn't really visible from Europe.

Good to hear you found an opportunity to use your large rig. And obviously everything works fine, a nice image, well done I too have no problems with white stars in duoband images. At least for now, of course this may change in future ...

Best regards, Dietmar.

Thanks Dietmar
An enjoyable target which is quite unique
Martin

[Startrek]

Cool target, Martin. Nice job!

I like the orientation here too. I think I'm used to seeing this more counterclockwise 90 degrees?

I imagine the star colors are appropriate to acquisition (duoband) and your throttling. Is this target perhaps OIII heavy and throttled in the B/G? The fact that, other than one obvious star, the entire field runs towards the red (when we know stars are usually weak in Ha) makes me think perhaps so.

Thus, altering the emission throttling for a more "balanced" star field color may take the actual target too much towards blue/OIII.

I guess if found to be aesthetically disturbing, bleaching or dulling the stars (perhaps via highlight repair, or options in Shrink even if you don't want to actually shrink) could be a solution. RGB stars another, although sometimes tricky to pull off.

Thanks Mike
Yes I suppose I could have used to Shrink to tidy those rings of Color around the stars as it works well, maybe next time or a re process
Sky time is precious so I probably wouldn’t do another night just for RGB stars , some folk would
Yeh I like the orientation too, I didn’t knowingly capture it that way , it’s just how it came out
I’m just amazed at how much signal this big scope can pull in , a real light bucket

Clear Skies
Martin

[Startrek]

Due to ongoing cloudy weather I decided to reprocess NGC 2359 Thors Helmet and tidy up the Stars. I wasn’t really happy with Star colour as narrowband filters using a OSC bi colour mapping leaves your medium to larger stars with odd color and or coloured rings.

Used an inverted Star Mask
Completed Color on main Object
Inverted Mask
Completed Color on Stars to taste
Used Shrink , Halo extend and Color Tame to rectify Color rings

Revised image Star field is a vast improvement, not exactly RGB, but much better

Astrobin link at full resolution

https://www.astrobin.com/p4tw0j/0/

Thanks for looking
Comments welcome