Sh2-101 the tulip nebula (Tom Gray)

Sh2-101 the tulip nebula

Revision title: Processed as Ha-OIII in APP

My last clear night coincided with a long journey North the next day. Fortunately, I am sufficiently comfortable leaving my portable rig to its own devices, and hopping into bed for a few hours. I collected over four hours data, using 5min RA guided subs on my little Star Adventurer 2i mount. There was some declination drift and a few jumps, which resulted in the loss of some frames, slight elongation of the stars, and smearing of the fine detail. Conditions were clear but not particularly steady with FWHM between 2.7-5.5. Data were captured using my Altair 183C hypercam and Optolong L-eNhance filter, mounted on my Zenithstar 80IIED semi-APO refractor.

I decided to download a trial version of APP to try this out for calibration and processing, and was surprised by the results. I did not follow any instructions but just followed the suggested sequence of operations, using the defaults - resulting in a fairly smooth RGB image but with much more colour saturation in the surrounding hydrogen than I could achieve in Nebulosity 4 (mouseover), and better star colours and shape. Judging by the histogram, it may be that the red channel has been pushed too far. I'll watch some tutorials and am particularly interested in seeing what happens if I separate the channels and process these before recombining as a true HOO image.

A tulip but without the necessary integration, and perhaps fine guiding, to show up the bow shock around Cygnus X1 - the fist black hole to be discovered in 1964.

Original
B
Final
D

B

Title: Processed in APP

Description: I've downloaded a trial version of APP to see what this is like for image calibration and processing. My first effort without reading any instructions...

Uploaded: ...

D

Title: Processed as Ha-OIII in APP

Description: I reduced he red (Ha) saturation a bit to try and bring out the more subtle OIII. Final star reduction and noise reduction in Nebulosity 4

Uploaded: ...

Altair Astro 183 M/C Hypercams
UK Astro-Imaging
Optolong L-eNhance filter

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Status	Advanced success
Started	...
Astrometry.net job	6201436
PixInsight job	362AUJOGE686JLNTP19Q6V5SGPD6DXYP
PixInsight queue size	n/a
PixInsight stage	TASK_LOG

RA (center)	20h00m03s.42
RA (top/left)	20h05m40s.16
RA (top/right)	19h56m00s.12
RA (bottom/right)	19h54m30s.20
RA (bottom/left)	20h04m01s.65

Dec (center)	+35°25′41″.4
Dec (top/left)	+35°49′50″.5
Dec (top/right)	+36°18′57″.9
Dec (bottom/right)	+35°00′27″.5
Dec (bottom/left)	+34°31′55″.7

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