M31 - Andromeda galaxy

tingting44

tingting44

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Name
Martin
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Hi, think ive just about got to the end of this image, its been one of the hardest images to process to date, it was also my 1st time imaging an object over 1 night



I 1st captured night 1 data on the 21'st September 2014 which consisted of 25 subs giving me 4.16 hours on M31

here is what 1 ten min subs looks like with no processing done at all



M31 (single RAW 10min sub - NO PROCESSING) by tingting44, on Flickr



and here are a few versions from night 1 data...(these were processed last year)



M31 - WIP by tingting44, on Flickr





M31 - Negative B&W - WIP by tingting44, on Flickr





M31 (Pixinsight) by tingting44, on Flickr



Then the next chance i got to grab night 2 data was 16'th Jan 2015! due to weather/work......

i managed to grab 19 more 10 min subs giving me another 3.16 hours of data, so in total of night 1 & 2 i now have a total of 7.32 hours on M31



i have been over and over this combined night 1 and 2 stack so many times lol, think im going to now file it away as "finished" for now, till i get more data later on in the year......maybe

Well here is the final image consisting of 7.32 hours of 10 min subs (44 subs), all images have dark/flat/bias calibration frames



M31 - Finished by tingting44, on Flickr





The equipment used...

SW 130-pds
HEQ5
Baader LP filter
SW Coma corrector
Canon 7D

also thought id show a quick process of trying to get a decent mask in Pixinsight to protect the background and stars, it was a right pig, lol

jobs a goodun by tingting44, on Flickr
 
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Wow Martin, what a labour of love!
The Galaxy is stunning and awesome.
In the final composite it looks like something has gone wrong with the centre which seems blown to me.
In all the pictures I've tried to take, I've never obtained the colours of the stars like you have. Is that a function of the large elapsed time?
Once again congratulations on your perseverance.
 
mbscad said:
Wow Martin, what a labour of love!
The Galaxy is stunning and awesome.
In the final composite it looks like something has gone wrong with the centre which seems blown to me.
In all the pictures I've tried to take, I've never obtained the colours of the stars like you have. Is that a function of the large elapsed time?
Once again congratulations on your perseverance.
Click to expand...
Thank you for your kind comment

Yes the core is blown, that's the best I could do with my 10min exposures, when it comes back round later in the year I might do some short exposures to be able to control the core more

Yes colour comes more with the longer subs and the more subs the better you can tease the colour out
 
:eek::eek::eek::eek:
Beautiful images and thankyou for the narration, not that I understand. More importantly wow images really are awesome and your dedication paid off. Well Done
 
Breathtaking indeed! I did some planetary and lunar astrotogging about 10 years ago. This is inspiring work, thanks for sharing it Martin, I've got to have a go at some DSO imaging.(y)
 
Absolutely awesome ting..

Even more incredible the fact it's taken over more than one night. Imagine a lot of the hard work regarding this is done by software?? As in the stacking and aiming part of it all. (Sorry, not that this takes anything away from the skill and knowledge required to actually make it all work - heck I wouldn't even know which direction to start looking... Apart from vaguely in an upwards direction). :)

You've come a massively long way in the past two years mate. Be very proud of yourself. :clap:
 
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Brilliant... love these types of shots and the mystery of how it all works just adds to the interest. (y)
 
Thank you Graham, yes its a lot more challenging imaging over several nights from grabbing the photons to make sure they match up with previous nights photons, to stacking them in processing..... yes my mount is controlled via EQMOD and a notebook which acts as a goto, other wise trying to find these deep space objects would be insane, especially where they are more or less invisible to the naked eye lol. but actually getting the photons is the easy part, its the processing which is a black art lol, its been so hard learning Pixinsight, ive not even scratched the surface yet, too much for my brain to take in lol
thank you very much, i finally feel im getting results im ok with for now with my DSLR, till i can afford a nice juicy, cooled CCD....hmmmmmm lol :D

Thank you also Bryn :)
 
That fact you don't have to be in orbit to get images like this is amazing. Having a brief overview of the work that goes into it (even if I don't understand it all) helps me appreciate it all the more. I am in awe..
 
Brilliant images Martin your skill and patience is amazing, the brief on what was invovled was appreciated.

We are lucky in this forum with some amazing photographers non more so than in the astro photography section.
 
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aww thank you ever so much to all :)

tell me about it Steve, its amazing how far amateur astro photography has come these days, not like my scope is anything special coming in at just over £150 brand new, i all ready had the DSLR so a saving there, just the mount that gets a bit pricy coming in at around £600 for the HEQ5
 
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