NGC-6888 - The Crescent Nebula

[JimFox]

I have been crazy busy with having recently photographed a wedding, and top that off with the normal June Gloom, the heavily polluted night sky is only clear for 3 to 4 hours max before the marine layer creeps in. I had thought about setting up my regular astro rig on the patio in the backyard, but with my main focus having to be sorting through 10,000 photos from the wedding and with the limited window to shoot, I decided this is where the Seestar comes into play. It literally takes 10 minutes to setup and maybe 1 minute to tear down. It's quality isn't as good as my normal astro rig, but in Bortle 9 skies with an almost full moon, quality wasn't my highest concern. Scratching my astro itch was.

So the data on NGC-6888, the Crescent Nebula was taken on 3 different nights. I did 2 nights in a row, then it was cloudy the 3rd night, but it was clear again the 4th night. Because of the field rotation of the Seestar I was limited to about 2 hours max each night. So for a total integration I had 5.3 hours. Which isn't enough, but it was good enough.

Overall, I am pretty happy with this. I tried not to darken the background too much, there is a faint layer of Ha (red) floating around this nebula, so I was trying to retain that.

638 - Lights @ 30 secs
Darks - The Seestar Automatically combines them into each Light frame.
Processed in Pixinsight and Photoshop
Processed as SHO

All comments are welcome,

Jim

 

[AlanLichty]

Sounds like an easy way to scratch your itch. Nice result for the easy efforts.

 

[Jameel Hyder]

I can't see a crescent here - more like a giant asteroid shaped nebula. Nice result.

 

[JimFox]

Sounds like an easy way to scratch your itch. Nice result for the easy efforts.

Thanks Alan. It certainly has helped that!

 

[JimFox]

I can't see a crescent here - more like a giant asteroid shaped nebula. Nice result.

Thanks Jameel. I actually think it looks more like a brain.

 

[BlackRockArt]

I have been crazy busy with having recently photographed a wedding, and top that off with the normal June Gloom, the heavily polluted night sky is only clear for 3 to 4 hours max before the marine layer creeps in. I had thought about setting up my regular astro rig on the patio in the backyard, but with my main focus having to be sorting through 10,000 photos from the wedding and with the limited window to shoot, I decided this is where the Seestar comes into play. It literally takes 10 minutes to setup and maybe 1 minute to tear down. It's quality isn't as good as my normal astro rig, but in Bortle 9 skies with an almost full moon, quality wasn't my highest concern. Scratching my astro itch was.

So the data on NGC-6888, the Crescent Nebula was taken on 3 different nights. I did 2 nights in a row, then it was cloudy the 3rd night, but it was clear again the 4th night. Because of the field rotation of the Seestar I was limited to about 2 hours max each night. So for a total integration I had 5.3 hours. Which isn't enough, but it was good enough.

Overall, I am pretty happy with this. I tried not to darken the background too much, there is a faint layer of Ha (red) floating around this nebula, so I was trying to retain that.

638 - Lights @ 30 secs
Darks - The Seestar Automatically combines them into each Light frame.
Processed in Pixinsight and Photoshop
Processed as SHO

All comments are welcome,

Jim

View attachment 73812

10,000 photos for a wedding ? Did you have 5 cameras firing at the same time ? That's crazy amount of shots ! Anyway, love the deep space shot, I am impressed by the little seestar.

Oliver

 

[JimFox]

10,000 photos for a wedding ? Did you have 5 cameras firing at the same time ? That's crazy amount of shots ! Anyway, love the deep space shot, I am impressed by the little seestar.

Oliver

Thanks Oliver,

Yeah, the Seestar S50 is an easy intro into Astro and for the price it produces some really nice results.

As for the 10,000 photos. 5,000 were with the Nikon Z8 and the other 5,000 was split between 2 Nikon Z6II's. There is so much going on at a wedding, and things happen so fast. Smiles and especially closed eyes for blinks, happen in the blink of an eye. And if you don't take that many, you end up with a great photo but with someone's eyes closed. It's a pain to sort through that many, but I think a necessary evil.

 

[Mike Lewis]

Jim,

This is quite good given all your constraints. I think you have learned how to really optimize the results from the SeeStar. It would seem that imaging such as to minimize cumulative image rotation is key - even if it does limnit your total time on target.

ML

 

[BlackRockArt]

Thanks Oliver,

................e. And if you don't take that many, you end up with a great photo but with someone's eyes closed. It's a pain to sort through that many, but I think a necessary evil.

Jim, have you tried Generative Fill in the Photoshop yet ? It's a great tool for fixing this kind of problems.

Oliver

 

[JimFox]

Jim, have you tried Generative Fill in the Photoshop yet ? It's a great tool for fixing this kind of problems.

Oliver

Hey Oliver, I have been using Generative Fill a lot on those wedding photos. I am going to post a couple of examples of using it in @Douglas Sherman thread later on. But for all of the uses, I haven't used it on eyes yet. With shooting so many images I have been able to find versions with the eyes open.

And while I don't mind using it to remove objects from an image, I am not so sure I want to replace someone's eyes with it. There is a difference for me at least with removing compared to adding things in (adding new eyes).

 

[JimFox]

Jim,

This is quite good given all your constraints. I think you have learned how to really optimize the results from the SeeStar. It would seem that imaging such as to minimize cumulative image rotation is key - even if it does limnit your total time on target.

ML

Thanks Mike. It's not perfect, but it certainly helps to feed the hunger for Astro when the main Astro rig can't be used.

 

[Bob Israel]

Very nice Jim. You're making want to get a Seestar! Apparently, I'm not getting the Celestron Origin in the first batch as B&H has not notified me of shipment.

 

[JimFox]

Very nice Jim. You're making want to get a Seestar! Apparently, I'm not getting the Celestron Origin in the first batch as B&H has not notified me of shipment.

Thanks Bob!

I can't wait until you do get your Celestron Origin, I am sure your images are going to make me jealous!