The Trifid Nebula is quite easy to find by hopping the Telrad from nearby stars. Even though it is not easy to see the nebula itself with 2 sec exposures, the asterisms give it away. I have intermittent high clouds tonight and it is quite warm. I'm running the chiller at 2.5 A, which produces a sensor temperature of about 19 °C. Guiding is only so-so. I had wanted to try the PHD 2 alpha release for guiding tonight, but had issues with window placement and control, so I used 1.14.2 instead. Since I'm using the UHC-S filter, I need longer exposures, so I went to 600 sec subframes, which I rarely do. The so-so guiding and the long exposures mean this image will likely come out a bit soft.
Date: 2 Jul 2013
Subject: M20, Trifid Nebula
Scope: AT8IN + HPS Coma Corrector
Filter: None
Mount: CG-5 (Synta motors)
Guiding: 9x50 Finder/Guider + DSI Ic + PHD 1.14.2
Camera: DSI IIc (chiller at ~2.5 A, T = 19-20 °C)
Acquisition: Nebulosity 3.1.6, no dither
Exposure: 21x600 s
Stacking: Neb 3, bad pixel map, bias included, normalize first, trans+rot align, 1.5 SD stack.
Processing: StarTools 1.3 Crop; Wipe:Color & Brightness; Develop 95.97%; Contrast; HDR
ptimize; Sharpen; Deconvolute: 2.4 pix; Track; Color:Bottom 2.0, Top Full, Sat 400%; Magic:Shrink 2; Magic:Tighten 1; Life:Moderate. Processed another layer identically, except I used HDR:Reveal with noise reduction enabled. CS6+Astronomy Tools Increase star color; deep space noise reduction; space noise reduction; Gaussian blurred (4 pix) high pass filter; blended in the core reveal layer at 50% transparency; less crunchy more fuzzy; AstroFrame.
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