IC 1396 & Elephant's Head Nebula (Mark Germani)

IC 1396 & Elephant's Head Nebula

This is my first project with my newly-modified T3i (600D). I had the LPF2 filter removed, keeping the LPF1 filter intact. I do notice a bit of star bloat (not getting quite the same low FWHM numbers I had before the mod) but I suspect when I upgrade to a light pollution filter with an IR/UV cut built in, that will hopefully compensate satisfactorily.

This is, perhaps, not the best target to really show off the increase H-alpha sensitivity of my camera, as it is very faint in comparison to test shots I took of other nebulae. Nevertheless, it was on my list of objects to capture this season, so I managed to get 2 hours on it.

The last night of imaging, I had such solid tracking that I was able to bring the ISO down from 1600 to 800 and double my exposure time. I have no idea what factors were at play in making the Skyguider Pro track so nicely - I only wish I could be able to recreate those conditions every night!

I used Astro Pixel Processor for stacking and Siril for Photometric Colour Calibration. I ended up going with a 50/50 mix of PCC & original colouration. I used StarNet++ to create a starless version to bring out the nebulosity a bit.

I'm much happier with the processed version than I was after stacking, still, I'd love to see if I can get 2-4 more hours on this to clean up the data a bit. Might be worth waiting for that new light pollution filter.

I did have some issues with reflections from the Garnet star, so I had to do some Photoshop magic to darken the eccentric portion of the resulting halo. I think the Astronomik CLS filter might be to blame - not sure if it's a manufacturing defect (apparently there were some bad batches) or if I just need to get a better one, or if it's just something I'm going to have to deal with using any filter...

Original
Final
B

B

Description: Performed more aggressive stretching & adjusted in Adobe Camera Raw, as per the suggestions of fellow Astrobinner @wsg (thanks!) Mottling a bit distracting, but nebulosity much more luminous.

Uploaded: ...

Light Polluted skies
The refractors!
iOptron Skyguider Pro
Canadian Astrophotography
Pacific Northwest Astrophotographers
Musical Imagers
William Optics ZenithStar Z61/Z81
DSLR/Mirrorless Imagers from the World
DSLR and mirrorless astrophotography

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Emission Nebulae
Index Catalogues Objects

	Distinct awarded users	Total awarded images
Image of the day
Top picks
Top pick nominations

	Image of the day	Top pick	Top pick nominations	Total submitted
Deep sky
Solar system
Extremely wide field
Star trails
Northern lights
Noctilucent clouds
Landscape

	Image of the day	Top pick	Top pick nominations	Total submitted
Backyard
Traveller
Own remote observatory
Amateur hosting facility
Public amaeteur data
Professional, scientific grade data
Mix of multiple sources
Other
Unknown

Submitted The date and time when you submitted this image for IOTD/TP consideration.	...
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Status	Advanced success
Started	...
Astrometry.net job	4988193
PixInsight job	S3JY6L6OKZGFYUZ4MDP7GHH7NYC464VK
PixInsight queue size	n/a
PixInsight stage	TASK_LOG

RA (center)	21h39m22s.60
RA (top/left)	21h46m57s.19
RA (top/right)	21h47m45s.18
RA (bottom/right)	21h31m03s.100
RA (bottom/left)	21h31m40s.89

Dec (center)	+57°29′33″.2
Dec (top/left)	+55°52′00″.9
Dec (top/right)	+59°04′42″.9
Dec (bottom/right)	+59°05′20″.7
Dec (bottom/left)	+55°52′32″.6

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