Hi All,

Here is a shot I took last weekend with an 10" Tak Epsilon, ST8 CCD, LRGB,
40 Minute exp. Maxim, Adobe PS.

This was a Non-antiblooming camera...so I had to deal with some blooms due to the bright field stars, using Maxim to debloom, but that was the easy part, it was cleaning up the artifacts left over after the de-blooming that was time consuming.

Someone has to come up with a better/cleaner way to de-bloom!
Maxim leaves too many artifacts.
Adobe PS cloning, smudging, and healing tools all can be very time consuming as well.

No less I managed to get it done for this image.

Attached Images

NGC6946_Chumackweb.jpg (133.9 KB, 53 views)

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Best Regards,
John Chumack
The Chumack Observatories
MPC 838 Dayton Research Station
MPC H66 Yellow Springs Research Station
www.galacticimages.com

Very nice John!!

Wow, a 250mm Tak Epsilon! That's an expensive, and very high quality scope!

About the blooms: I have tried Maxim, Starizona plugin, Wodanski plugin, and CCDStack. I now use CCDStack. It seems to work the easiest and best -- at least for me.

Best,
Tom

Hi Tom,

Thanks,

The Epsilon is an Awesome scope, unfortunately I don't own it, just rented time on it via RAS-Observatory.org, fortunately they will be putting the original Anti-blooming ST8 back on the scope soon, as it has just been repaired by SBIG.

I have owned the Epsilion 160 for years and it is still my best Photographic instrument, still very expensive for a small scope. Takahashi is excellent quality, which is reflected in their prices. The old saying holds true, "you get what you pay for."

I'll try to give CCDstack a go at it..... Thanks Again!

__________________
Best Regards,
John Chumack
The Chumack Observatories
MPC 838 Dayton Research Station
MPC H66 Yellow Springs Research Station
www.galacticimages.com

BTW John, make sure that you dither your guiding by about 2 or 2.5 pixels between exposures. That way after the blooms are cleaned up any residual artifacts will be neutralized upon combining.

Best,
Tom

A very nice job on this one lots of effort but with fine results. simply beautiful. Clear Skies

Nice! Another target that I should try for next clear night. Magnitude 8.5 should be well within the reach of my light polluted observatory. :-)

Tom
www.eastsideastro.org/observatory

Sweet!

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Everything I need to know I learned through Googling.