Here’s an SHO image from telescope live. This dataset had a pretty interesting quirk, which was that some of the given astronometric solutions from telescope live were formatted incorrectly, which broke WBPP and forced me to do some shady coding. Anyway, I’ve been working on a new method of SHO processing using MMT and GHS to even the midtones of each channel, which give the final image a lot more color. It also helps that this region has such a big diversity of gas emission.
To some, it looks like a giant chicken running across the sky. To others, it looks like a gaseous nebula where star formation takes place. Cataloged as IC 2944, the Running Chicken Nebula spans about 100 light years and lies about 6,000 light years away toward the constellation of the Centaur (Centaurus). The featured image, shown in scientifically assigned colors, was captured recently in a 16-hour exposure over three nights. The star cluster Collinder 249 is visible embedded in the nebula’s glowing gas. Although difficult to discern here, several dark molecular clouds with distinct shapes can be found inside the nebula.
Image:
Full-quality PNG here: https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52814805690_335cacf43c_o.png
Closeups:
A cosmic pillar of dust and gas. The pillar’s convoluted outlines are shaped by the winds and radiation of young, hot, massive stars. But the interior of the cosmic pillar itself is home to stars in the process of formation. In fact, a penetrating infrared view shows the pillar is dominated by two, narrow, energetic jets blasting outward from a still hidden infant star.
Bok globules hanging in front of ionized oxygen. Bok globules are isolated and relatively small dark nebulae, containing dense cosmic dust and gas from which star formation may take place.
A beautiful mountain-like structure visible in ionized hydrogen and nitrogen, with dark threads of dust overlaid. Structures like this can be found in many emission nebulae, like the rosette nebula and monkey head nebula.
Details:
Telescope: Planewave CDK24
Camera: FLI PL 9000
Filters: Astrodon Ha, Sii, Oiii
Location: El Sauce Observatory, Río Hurtado, Coquimbo Region, Chile
Date of Observations: 3/24/2021, 4/22/2021, 4/29/2021, 5/24/2021, 5/26/2021, 8/6/2021. 2/19/2022. 2/24/2022, 2/25/2022, 3/22/2022, 3/25/2022, 4/17/2022, 5/18/2022, 6/15/2022
Sii: 32 x 600s (5h 20min)
Ha: 31 x 600s (5h 10min)
Oiii: 29 x 600s (4h 50min)
Processing: Pixinsight
Credits: Data: Telescope Live; Processing: William OstlingProcessing:
- Some subframes were fixed for astronometric solution
- Images were cosmetic corrected for hot pixels
- The subframes were weighted, registered, normalized, integrated, and drizzled in WBPP
Preparation of all frames:
- Stacking artifacts were cropped
- SHO were combined to create an RGB image
- RGB image was plate solved
- Starless DBE was applied to RGB as follows:
- Starnet 2 was applied to a clone of the target image, creating an image with stars and an image without stars
- DBE was applied on the starless image to create a background model
- The background model was subtracted from the stars image
Deconvolution of the RGB
- a PSF was created using the dynamic PSF process
- Linear starnet was applied to create a starless image and a star mask
- the linear image was duplicated, stretched, clipped, and convoluted to create a mask
- The starless image was deconvoluted using the RVC algorithm
- the stars were added back in
- DeepSNR noise reduction was applied to RGB
Non-linear Adjustments
- Initial GHS stretch
- Targeted GHS + MMT division for color balance
- Curves transformation
- Background level set
- HDR
- LHE
- Curves transformation