M51
M51
L: 40 x 120s
R: 80 x 120s
G: 69 x 120s
B: 81 x 120s
23-24 April 2023
Comments
Hi Nik, amazing rendition. I see you have used a combination of software. I only use Affinity Photo (my bad). I was wondering if you could perhaps say a little about how much work you do in each package and how much contribution the BlurX/StarX/NoiseX scripts make to the final image? I'll be working on my own version of the same data set once it finishes downloading...
Thanks Mike.
Affinity Photo is a great program which I use on all my images.
Initially, I use Astro Pixel Processor to calibrate and stack the raw data and then combine those files in PixInsight. APP's colour combination tools work well too but I prefer PixInsight for this.
I apply Blur Xterminator to the luminance or H-alpha master frames and then to the combined RGB FITS files. I then scale these and save as 16-bit TIFF files and switch to Affinity.
First I run Star Xterminator and then apply Noise Xterminator to the starless layer. The latter is applied by creating a small selection, copying it and then creating a new image from the selection. I then apply 'Layer>Rasterise and Trim' (to bypass Affinity's annoying non-destructive editing predilection!) and apply NoiseX to the smaller file to speed up the choice of parameters and get the best result. Once that's decided, I delete the test image and apply NoiseX to the main starless layer.
This sounds like a lot of faffing about but it does speed up the process significantly!
Then I use Affinity's tools to create a pleasing colour rendition. This will be with Selective Colour if working on narrowband data.
Hope this helps. Looking forward to seeing your results.
Cheers,
Nik