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Melotte 15 in SHO Palette, EasyQuest
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Melotte 15 in SHO Palette

Melotte 15 in SHO Palette, EasyQuest
Powered byPixInsight

Melotte 15 in SHO Palette

Equipment

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Acquisition details

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Description

Comments

For this Project, it is one of my biggest project ever and is the most time I put into one area of the sky, Melotte 15 in SHO palette. I started this project in the end of September but did not finished until the beginning of November. I cherry picked the best frames from each channel. The original goal was 18 hours per channel but the extra clear skies and moonless at that, in November, put it about 24 hours per channel with 26 hours on SII. This was by far the cleanest and least noisest image I have ever taken with very little noise reduction. This project helped my understand the 294mm Pro a lot more and how it works. Enjoy the final image~ 

Moon Phase, Location, and Date
  • Moon Phase in September: 94%, 73%, 46%
  • Moon Phase in October: 6%, 21%, 32%, 83%, 90%, 96%, 99%, 100%, 99%, 97%, 93%, 31%
  • Moon Phase in November: 0%, 1%, 4%, 10%, 18%
  • Murfreesboro, TN (Bortle 6)
  • September 23, 26, 29 2021
  • October 8, 10, 11, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 31
  • November 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 2021


Equipment
  • Telescope/Lens: William optics Fluorostar 156 (1228 mm at f/7.8 ) 
  • Flattener/Reducer: William Optics Flattener 68III (1.0x Native focal length)
  • Auto Focuser: ZWO EAF Electronic Automatic Focuser
  • Filter: Chroma 31mm SII 3nm Telescope Filter - Unmounted
  • Filter: Chroma 31mm HA 3nm Telescope Filter - Unmounted
  • Filter: Chroma 31mm OIII 3nm Telescope Filter - Unmounted
  • Filter Wheel: ZWO EFW (8 x 31mm/1.25″)
  • Mount: iOptron CEM120
  • Tri-Pier: iOptron Tri-Pier with 8036-120 Adapter (Stop gap Tri-pier until iOptron Tri-Pier 360 for CEM120 Mount comes in)
  • Off-Axis Guider: ZWO OAG
  • Guider: ZWO ASI120MM-MINI
  • Dew Heater Controller: Pegasus Astro Pocket Powerbox Micro (Clean up Cables)
  • Dew Heater: AstroStrap Dew Heater for 7" Telescopes
  • Camera: ZWO ASI294MM Pro
  • Polar Alignment: QHYCCD Polemaster (Precise polar alignment)
  • Intel NUC (For imaging, dither, auto guiding, plate solve, Pegasus Astro Software Control) (Replaced laptop to clean up cables)


Software
  • PHD2 (For Auto Guiding)
  • QHYCCD PoleMaster Software (Polar Alignment)
  • Astrophotography Tool (APT) (For Dither, plate solve, mount control)
  • EQMOD (Remove Hand Controller and allow pulse guiding)
  • Pegasus Astro Pocket Powerbox (Control the Pocket Powerbox Micro)
  • Deep Sky Stacker (Stacking Frames)
  • Photoshop (Processing)
  • PixInsight (Processing)


Acquisition
  • Temperature: -15°C on all calibration frames as well as light frames
  • Exposure per Filter: 74 hrs
  • SII  - 312 X 300s (26 hrs)
  • HA   - 288 x 300s (24 hrs)
  • OIII - 288 x 300s (24 hrs)
  • Dark Flats for SII, HA, and OIII, 60, 100, and 80 respectively (ZWO ASI 294mm Pro does not like Bias frames)
  • Flats for SII, HA, and OII are 80, 100, and 120 respectively (Flats are super short for better calibration)
  • 30 Darks (Used Master Dark file)
  • Gain: 120 (Unity Gain)
  • Bin: 2x2 (Full resolution if left 1x1 which is the IMX492 sensor.)
  • Offset: Left Default


Processing in Photoshop and PixInsight
  • Stacked in DSS
  • Edited in Photoshop
  • RC-Astro GradientXTerminator
  • RC-Astro StarXTerminator in Photoshop
  • Adjusted levels
  • Adjusted Curves
  • Selective Curves Adjustment
  • Color Correction
  • Blacks Correction
  • Saturation Balance
  • Very little Noise Reduction
  • Cropped
  • Morphological Transformation in PixInsight for Star reduction
  • Linear Dodge to add stars back on
  • Star color correction

Comments

Sky plot

Sky plot

Histogram

Melotte 15 in SHO Palette, EasyQuest