Scope: C8 f/3.3, Location: Dos Picos Park, Ramona CA, 20 Apr. 2004 Camera: ToUcam SC3
Exposure: 16 x 30 sec and 10 x 72 sec Luminance exposures with IR block, 12 x 40 sec RGB exposures.
Processing: Images were captured in K3CCDTools. Aligned/stacked in Registax and saved as FITS. minimal wavelet processing on the 72 sec Luminance exposure. Luminance and Color channels were scaled and rough color balanced in Astroart. Channels were co-registered in Astroart. Three Luminance channels (30 sec, 72 sec and 72 sec wavelet) were combined in Photoshop. Luminance and Color FITS were combined in Photoshop with Luminance Layering. Color balancing and final touches in Photoshop. SGBNR was used to smooth background noise on the Luminance channel and the final result.
This image is one of the few galaxies taken with the C8 and Meade 3.3 focal reducer combination. The image was guided for all exposures. This image replaces an earlier image that can be seen in the Archives here. Horizontal FOV is 26'