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Scope: ZenithStar 66 mm APO @ f/4.4 Location: Blair Valley, Anza Borrego Desert, CA 14 February, 2010 Camera: Artemis285
Exposure: 16 x 8 min IR/UV Block (1x1 bin), 7 x 8 min H-Alpha (1x1 bin), 7 x 3 min RGB Exposures (2x2 bin)
Processing: Images were captured with Artemis Capture (as FITs). Aligned/stacked and dark subtracted in Astroart with Sigma Combine. IR / UV Blocking filter and Color channels were scaled and color balanced in Astroart. Channels were co-registered in Astroart. Luminance construction consisted of the IR/UV blocking filter exposures with a hard light blend of the H-Alpha exposures. Curves and Levels applied in Photoshop to the Luminance construction to optimize object features. H-Alpha exposures were blended with the Red channel (in a lighten blend - 15% opacity). Final LRGB combine was done in Photoshop using Luminance Layering in LAB Color Space. A light background noise reduction was applied to the image in PixInsight LE (SGBNR). Final Image size is approximately 1393 x 1044.
All exposures in this image were guided; North is up in this image. This object is a patch of interstellar dust in the constellations of Orion. The Horizontal FOV is 107'.
Image center is located approximately - Equatorial 2000: RA: 05h 54m 44s Dec: +02°02'09"