NGC 2626 Nebular DiversityOTA: PlaneWave 17" f/6.8
Camera: FLI ML16803
Observatory: Deep Sky West, Chile
EXPOSURES:
R: 18 x 600 seconds
G: 17 x 600
B: 17 x 600
H: 14 x 1800
L: (available but not helpful)
Total exposure 15 hours
Image Width: 40.5 arc-minutes
Processed by Alex Woronow (2022) using PixInsight, Topaz, 3DLut, SWT, NbA, AC_Restar
Astrobin Link:
https://astrob.in/cmi1tb/0/NGC 2626 (the blue reflection nebula) seldom reaches the "target of the image" status on Astrobin. Fewer than half of these Astrobin search results focus closely on NGC 2626:
https://www.astrobin.com/search/?q=ngc+2626&d=i&subject=ngc+2626&telescope=&camera=&date_published_min=2011-11-09&date_published_max=2023-04-03&sort= . But it really deserves more attention than it gets. This region has some attractive features besides the structures in the reflection nebula. Its surroundings sport a reddish emission nebula that's not too excited beyond the immediate vicinity of NGC 2626 but clearly present. The dark nebula at about 9:00 from NGC 2626 has some faint brown nebulae in the foreground. The virtually black regions have varying abundances of stars between them and us, undoubtedly correlated with their distance from us.=MsoNormalSometimes I produce a result that just stinks...I put it aside and forget it for a month or so, then dig it up and start over, or nearly so. This image is one of those. My original was a little patch of blue and red and a whole butt-load of black, and I think this version is more interesting.
It is also an excellent image to test the various star-replacement methods. Of course, to do star replacement, you have to remove the stars in the first place. I use StarNet2 to do that...it consistently gets more stars than StarXTerminator on my images (which I denoise with NoiseXTerminator just before removing the stars). After processing the starless image, some people take the stars provided as a "star mask" (or equivalent) provided by the removal process and just paste those into the final image. Others use an unscreen/screen method. Both of those methods distort the star colors! Still, others use a mask and transfer the stars, which gets the colors correct but usually hacks up the star outlines. I developed a method that uses "alpha-compositing" and suffers from neither of those problems...correct colors...correct star shapes. Yes, imperfections can creep in if you're not careful, but overall, it's far better than the alternatives!
If you are in a club and want to learn more about the trials, tribulations, and successes in star transfer, tell your club's imagers section to request a talk. The talk will include access to my PixInsight restarring script. In fact, even if your club has no interest in the method, let me know if you would like a copy of the script for $0.00.
Comments are always welcomed...
Alex Woronow
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