Astrophotography
Welcome to !astrophotography!
We are Lemmy's dedicated astrophotography community!
If you want to see or post pictures of space taken by amateurs using amateur level equipment, this is the place for you!
If you want to learn more about taking astro photos, check out our wiki or our discord!
Please read the rules before you post! It is your responsibility to be aware of current rules. Failure to be aware of current rules may result in your post being removed without warning at moderator discretion.
Rules
- I | Real space images only.
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Astrophotography refers to images of astronomical objects or phenomena exclusively.
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~~Images that show objects or people below the Kármán Line (100km) will be removed.~~ We won't be enforcing this rule for now, but as the community grows eventually we will split and have a separate space for just landscape astro.
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Images must be an accurate representation of a real astronomical object.
- II | Original and Amateur Content Only
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Image posts can only be images that you have captured and processed yourself, or discussion about capturing and/or processing your own images.
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Images acquired from public sources, professional observatories, or other professional services are not allowed.
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If you have done a drastic alteration or reprocessing of a prior submission, you may repost your edit - but only after a minimum of one week has passed.
- III | Post Types
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Image posts are to link directly to the image, not to landing pages, personal galleries, blogs, or professional sites. Link to these in the comments. (AstroBin and Imgur, are allowed)
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Questions are welcome here for the time being.
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Links to blogs, articles or external websites should be interesting and promote discussion about amateur astrophotography.
- IV | Titles
- All image posts should just include include the name of the object being photographed. Extra info such as equipment, it being your first image, or other information should go in a comment along with your acquisition info. Please see this page for more details.
If your post is removed, try reposting with a different title. Don't hesitate to message the mods if you still have questions!
- V | Acquisition and Processing Information
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All submitted images must include acquisition and processing details as a top-level comment. All posts without this information may be given a warning, and if not updated will be removed.
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This includes the telescope, mount, camera, accessories, and any other pieces of equipment you used to capture the image.
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You must also include processing details, i.e. the programs you used and a general rundown of the workflow/processes you used within those programs. “Processed in Photoshop” is not enough.
The noise reduction on this is spot on, nice!
Thanks!
VdB 152 is technically just one part at the end of the dark nebula, and there are a number of other cataloged structures in this image. Captured from August 16-25, 2023. Broadband data from a Bortle 3 zone (Deerlick astronomy village), Ha from Bortle 9.
Places where I host my other images:
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TPO 6" F/4 Imaging Newtonian
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Orion Sirius EQ-G
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ZWO ASI1600MM-Pro
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Skywatcher Quattro Coma Corrector
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ZWO EFW 8x1.25"/31mm
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Astronomik LRGB+CLS Filters- 31mm
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Astrodon 31mm Ha 5nm, Oiii 3nm, Sii 5nm
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Agena 50mm Deluxe Straight-Through Guide Scope
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ZWO ASI-290mc for guiding
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Moonlite Autofocuser
Acquisition: 30 hours 15 minutes (Camera at -15°C)
BB exposures at half unity gain (76/15), Ha at unity gain (139/21)
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Ha - 102x600"
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L - 200x120"
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R - 70x120"
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G - 70x120"
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B - 68x120"
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Darks- 30
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Flats- 30 per filter
Capture Software:
- Captured using N.I.N.A. and PHD2 for guiding and dithering.
PixInsight Preprocessing:
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BatchPreProcessing
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StarAlignment
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ImageIntegration per channel per panel
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DrizzleIntegration (2x, Var β=1.5)
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Dynamic Crop
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DynamicBackgroundExtraction
Luminance Linear:
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BlurXterminator
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NoiseXterminator
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ArcsinhStretch + HistogramTransformation to stretch to nonlinear
Ha Linear:
These steps largely follow the ones in NightPhoton's advanced narrowband combination guide.
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Combine Ha with Red channel (HRR palette)
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BackgroundNeutralization
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ColorCalibration
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StarXterminator to completely remove stars
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PixelMath to subtract red continuum spectrum, leaving just Ha signal
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HistogramTransformation to stretch nonlinear
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NoiseXterminator + a little concolution
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CurvesTransformation to adjust black point/contrast
differing from the guide above, the background was a dark gray rather than clipped to black since this is more faint structure addition than bright structure
RGB Linear:
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SpectrophotometricColorCalibration
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Slight SCNR Green
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HSV repair
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ArcsinhStretch + HistogramTransformation to stretch to nonlinear
duplicate stars only was made and stretched to nonlinear using a less aggressive arcsin+HT for star addition later
Nonlinear Processing:
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Various curve adjustments for lightness, contrast, hue, saturation, etc (with varying lum/star masks)
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LRGBCombination using stretched L as luminance
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DeepSNR
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More curves
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PixelMath to add stretched Ha per the advanced narrowband guide above
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BlurXterminator for star reduction
Next few steps kinda follow along with this independent starless processing tutorial for manually combining stars via re-linearization
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StarXterminator
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HistogramTransformation to unstretch (also applied to duplicate stars early image from earlier)
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PixelMath to combine starless + stars only images
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HT to stretch everything back to nonlinear
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MultiscaleLinearTransform for chrominance noise reduction
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LocalHistogramEqualization (2 rounds of this at scales 68 and 384 with lum masks)
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ColorSaturation to selectively saturate reds
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Even more curves
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Resample to 70%
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Annotation