I took this at 1940h UT on 18.11.04 using a Nikon Coolpix 5700 with settings 41.14sec (cable release), fl=71.2mm, f/4.2, ISO 200. The image quality setting was RAW so that I maximised the data within the image which I could work with.

The camera was piggy-backed to my scope and used a motorised drive to prevent star-trailing.

I also took a 50 second"darkframe" image and subtracted it from the original using Adobe Photoshop CS to remove any brightly coloured "hot pixels" and the "amp-in" area of the CCD. The darkframe corrected image was further processed using Adobe Photoshop CS and the stars and their colours have come out well. I have posted the darkframe corrected image here for comparison to let you see what this powerful bit of imaging software can do.

The Double Cluster in Perseus consists of NGC 869 (upper cluster) and NGC 884 (lower cluster) in the centre-left of this image.

Cheers from a very cold Bonnie Scotland.

Eric

great shot!

Indeed, it is. Following the chain of stars extending from the left of NGC 869 leads to the open cluster Stock 2, which (in your image) forms an upright stick figure with flexed arms that is responsible for its nickname of the Muscleman Cluster.

Dave Mitsky

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Agreed! nice piece of work. Shows that even if you think that your images are weak they can be turned into masterpieces with a little bit of manipulation. I've tried (mostly unsuccessfully) to do a bit of astrophotography but without a mount and with a lower end telescope I haven't had much luck. however, a fair few images I've taken have come out looking like the darker image. Not quite as good, but ball park. and they were corrected. Still .. fun trying though.

Not a lot of replies in the astro threads apart from the "well done" and "great job" but I know I, at least, love looking into this forum and marvelling at the photographs you guys manage to get. Keep on posting!!

i myself have seen such a clustre but with less variety in the magnitude of the stars in it,

Thanks for the info. Dave. I didn't know about Stock 2, the Muscleman cluster. I zoomed in on it on the 28Mb .tif file I have on my PC and all the clusters look good.

I have made a .jpg image for the web and attached it here.

Cheers

Eric

right on!

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I regard that as being pretty impressive.

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wonderful picture !!