M17 Omega (Swan) Nebula under Full Moon

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Startrek
Posts: 407
Joined: Mon Dec 30, 2019 3:49 am

M17 Omega (Swan) Nebula under Full Moon

Post by Startrek »

It’s been quite a few months since I last imaged ( my Wife and I eventually travelled abroad to UK and Malta after COVID put a stop to our plans in 2019 )
Dusted off the rig and imaged M17 under a near full moon with less than ideal conditions ( guiding was atrocious) Heavy dew arrived early into the evening.

Bortle 8 City suburban skies
95% waxing moon
8”f5 Klaus Helmerich Carbon fibre Newt
EQ6-R pro mount
2600MC cooled to -10C , Gain 101
95 x 3 min dithered subs
40 x Flats
60 x Bias
EQMOD and Ascom Stellarium
APT
PHD2 Multistar guiding ( 0.75 to 1.0 arc sec total )
Stacked in DSS
Startools V1.8 Compose OSC Bi Color
Used the 4th SHO mapping in color matrix

Gradients were quite severe which restricted exposing more detail (post Wipe) during final AutoDev

Applied a default ( 10x iterations ) SV Decon with 16 Samples to deblur main structure with resultant white point stars.

Link to Astrobin below …..

https://www.astrobin.com/isvec1/

Attached SHO image and also a Synthetic Luminance version for finer detail

Thanks for looking

Comments welcome

Thanks
Attachments
M17 Swan Nebula Synthetic Luminance rev 4.jpeg
M17 Swan Nebula Synthetic Luminance rev 4.jpeg (380.17 KiB) Viewed 1581 times
M17 Swan Nebula SHO Colour rev 2.jpeg
M17 Swan Nebula SHO Colour rev 2.jpeg (368.01 KiB) Viewed 1590 times
Mike in Rancho
Posts: 1166
Joined: Sun Jun 20, 2021 10:05 pm
Location: Alta Loma, CA

Re: M17 Omega (Swan) Nebula under Full Moon

Post by Mike in Rancho »

Not bad at all Martin, one can't even notice all the difficult conditions you mentioned.

Also, nice little dome photo there in your astrobin. :D
Startrek
Posts: 407
Joined: Mon Dec 30, 2019 3:49 am

Re: M17 Omega (Swan) Nebula under Full Moon

Post by Startrek »

Thanks Mike
Much appreciated

Startools can make ordinary data look good ( well within reason )
Here’s a reprocess with less stretching and a different SHO Color map in the matrix

I kinda like this repro more than the original ( less noise / nebulosity smear around the main body of the object. I sacrificed some finer detail but to me it looks better
Always subjective !

Astrobin link below …..

https://www.astrobin.com/isvec1/B/

Clear skies
Martin
Attachments
M17 Swan Nebula Synthetic Luminance Final.jpeg
M17 Swan Nebula Synthetic Luminance Final.jpeg (365.14 KiB) Viewed 1551 times
M17 Swan Nebula SHO Colour rev 3.jpeg
M17 Swan Nebula SHO Colour rev 3.jpeg (367.11 KiB) Viewed 1551 times
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