The Pleiades needs little introduction. Many have taken a run at imaging this open cluster as evidenced by the ~6800+ images here on Astrobin.

For me, the Seven Sisters was one of the first objects I learned in the sky as a kid. As a teen observing from my backyard, I struggled to catch a glimpse of the nebulosity around Merope with my 6-in Criterion Dynascope — unsuccessfully. I tried photography to capture something more, again with little success. This image feels like a win after 55 years!

Many cultures have used the Pleiades as a test of vision, so it’s fitting that technology continues to reward our attempts to see even deeper. Delicate filaments, stellar gems, smokey nebulosity cradled in IFN (Integrated Flux Nebulosity) are all revealed with careful observations, long exposures, and meticulous postprocessing. So my first shared effort here is the Seven Sisters (or at least five of them). 

Getting here has taken some time and there is much in this image  that needs work. Color is my white whale (apologies) at present and I am not crazy about the color casts in this image. I may have stretched it a bit too hard. The brightest stars are blown out and my few efforts to shrink them have been only partially successful. More work is needed. I have another night of excellent data (for my location) and I am looking forward to processing this in. Constructive comments are appreciated.

Putting my arms around the modern tools of amateur Astro-imaging has been no small feat. When I mothballed everything in 2002 to take a job in Arizona, 486s predominated, my CCD was 512x512 pixels with a 50% QE, and 9-pin serial cables were everywhere. After retirement I began to dig out 18 years of dust, old software, and obsolete hardware. It has taken me a couple of summers to get familiar with CMOS, Pixinsight, PHD2, etc. There is light at the end of the telescope, however.

I have also made some bonehead mistakes that have cost me time on the sky, but that price has made the lessons more permanent, I hope.

In the tradition of the more accomplished and seasoned observers on these pages, I will share a few lessons learned along the way:

1. Don’t start accumulating data thinking that you’ll do the post processing later. Sit right down, look at the histograms and make sure they look sensible. Check out your flats and darks and manually calibrate some of the data to to convince yourself all is well. If there are artifacts in the data, make sure you can process them out. Then fire away.
2. Spend some time testing your camera to make sure it’s working to spec. Learn how to independently confirm bias, dark current, and gain. My old copy of The Handbook of Astronomical Image Processing by Berry and Burnell helped with testing.
3. Getting started with Pixinsight was greatly aided by first studying The Deep Sky Imaging Primer by Bracken. Having something like Bracken can give you context for entire job of calibration and postprocessing and allow you to pick your way through the minefield of the many choices to be made when starting out. The third edition is out and it's even better. Add to that Adam Block’s Pixinsight Fundamentals course. Adam is an accomplished imager and has tons of experience. Together, Bracken and Block have been my PI bible. The new video series on the rudiments of PI on YouTube is also a very good investment of time .
4. With homework we get better. Spend some serious time in front of the computer with PI. Try things. If it doesn’t work, throw it away and start over. The PI History Explorer streamlines documenting, repeating, and modifying workflows. Practice is everything. Keep careful notes using whatever method you can stick with.

So. This is what I can do right now.  I want to improve. Many thanks to the community of really smart people out there who are helping me do that.