This originally started as a project to run during the February Lunar cycle, but morphed into several experiments at the same time. The first experiment was use of flats where the average brightness of the flats was selected to match average brightness of the light frames, according to suggestion of other users of the GSENSE 4040 chip. This experiment proved a way to reduce, but not totally eliminate fixed pattern noise (FPM) carried into the image by the flats. Given I took so much data I was able to bring out faint wisps of SII and Ha in the background, but the FPN was of a similar level as these very low level features. In processing I was able to retain a faint wisp while hiding the very small, but still visible FPM at that stage. Fortunately the OIII halo was much brighter than the residual FPN, and I was able to retain this feature in processing.

The second experiment was operation of my observatory remotely while on a ski vacation. I decided to just keep gathering data for M97 instead of switching targets since I had a well tested ACP plan. The remote operation of the observatory worked well and I only had to ask my wife to confirm the observatory was open and ready (and not the scarier task of closing the observatory should some glitch occur!). All went well but I'll likely not try unattended operation anytime soon.

Deconvolution was applied to a linear starless image and this seemed to really show some nice detail in the nebula. My modified color palette began with a Hubble image with the narrowband masters linear with to the Ha to firm the initial color image. Then, Pixelmath was used to adjust rations for Red to 70:30 SH, Green 25:75 HO, and Blue 85:15 OH. After stretching, a slight hue shift to bring the brownish tones toward red was applied. RGB Stars were added after stretching and I can't say enough good about Starnet2 in helping with the overall processing of the final image.

Personally I love the number of distant galaxies captured in the image. All of this detail comes from the 25+ hrs of narrowband data.