CraigFair Loc: Santa Maria, CA.

I got 15 out of 20 Lights to stack.
This is my first use of my Celestron 9.25" SCT and my Converted Nikon D600.
The lights and Darks where shot at 60 sec, ISO 400 and f/10
The Bias where shot at 1/4000 sec.
There are some flaws, a light refraction on the right and I blew out
the center on purpose to get as much Nebulosity as possible.
Stacked in DSS (Deep Sky Stacker) with some modification in the program.
More processing in Lightroom to help the highlights and color.
Tonight I'll spend some time Collimating the 9.25" Scope.
I just got the Bob's Knobs installed.
Craig

Processed in DSS

(Download)

Processed in Lightroom

(Download)

rgrenaderphoto Loc: Hollywood, CA

What is a Bob's Knob?

CraigFair Loc: Santa Maria, CA.

They replace the 3 standard Philips head screws with thumbscrews on the Secondary Mirror to adjust the Collimation.

JimH123 Loc: Morgan Hill, CA

Craig,

I think this looks a bit overcooked. The top one seems more natural. Also looks like you still have a collimation error. The stars are a bit out of focus and I can see that the collimation is still off center.

Albuqshutterbug Loc: Albuquerque NM

Nice finger adjustable screws that replace the small Allen head screws used to align your secondary mirror on an SCT.

http://www.amazon.com/Bobs-Knobs-Celestron-Collimation-Secondary/dp/B0078G89KW#immersive-view_1455299400682

They are really nice to work with. No tools needed.

CraigFair Loc: Santa Maria, CA.

Thanks for looking in and as I said I overcooked the second shot to bring out all the Nebulosity I could and I still needed to fine tune the Collimation.
Craig

SonnyE Loc: Communist California, USA

I was afraid to ask... :shock:

Now if it was Roberta's knobs.... :twisted:

Glad to see you are on your way now Craig.
Farm out!
Or would that be:
Pharm out? :mrgreen:

CraigFair Loc: Santa Maria, CA.

Unfortunately at our age it has become Pharm out.
Craig

SonnyE Loc: Communist California, USA

Definitely for me.
A fist full in the morning, and a fist full at night.
Better living through chemicals! :roll: :hunf:

Oknoder Loc: Western North Dakota

This was definitely my moto in college, maybe I can ween myself of by the time I'm 45. Lol, never been much of a quiter. What you could try, Craig, and I don't recall what software you are using to do the majority of your PP, but you could try to e tract just the Lum from your image.

If using Photo shop go to edit/mode/LAB color conversion. Or something like that then go into your layers and select the color channels and you should have three layers, A and B are the color and L is your Lum. Copy and past this in a new page and play around. When you want to see the effects it will have open your regular RGB image and give it a good dose of the Gaussian blur effect. This will blur all the color detail, it sounds wrong but if done correctly it can be astounding. Once you have your blurry color and your sharpened Lum, place them in a stack with the Lum being the top most layer. Then select Luminance as your blending mode. If it's too strong just take away some of the opacity from the Lum layer.

I Prolly forgot a couple steps in the process, but it's a starting point. Lol great shots by the way. Make sure you keep those Bias files handy, they are good for quite some time, only the flats need to be shot fairly often.
Matthew

CraigFair Loc: Santa Maria, CA.

Thank you Matthew I have only been using Lightroom but I need to get some training in PS.
I wonder if I can do the same thing in LR by stacking different processed frames??? No it doesn't work.
Craig
PS: Here is an HDR in Photo Merge under the Menu Photo.

(Download)

JimH123 Loc: Morgan Hill, CA

Not in Lightroom, it doesn't stack.

CraigFair Loc: Santa Maria, CA.

You can stack under Photo but it just stacks a group not an overlay.

Oknoder Loc: Western North Dakota

Is the shortest exposure the D600 shoots 1/4000, or is this just what you shot? I thought almost all the Nikon's had 1/8000 exposures.

Edit: I just checked the D5100 is only 1/4000. D7K has 1/8000 though.

SonnyE Loc: Communist California, USA

My lowly D3300 is a max of 1/4000s.