You’ll have to install AltStore (or Sideloady) on your computer + phone to resign the app each week (this can happen automatically if they’re on the same wifi network). You can make your own personal API key at old.reddit.com/prefs/apps/ (It’s limited to 100 requests per 10 mins, which you wont run into browsing by yourself). Also as long as you moderate a subreddit (I think even if it’s just an empty one you make), NSFW content wont be blocked on the API.
Also while you’re sideloading, I’d highly recommend uYouPlus for a better youtube app
Continuing to reprocess old data since I’ve realized my processing skills were shit back when I originally shot this galaxy in 2019. I’m a lot happier with the more natural colors and better noise reduction on this one. Captured on April 22nd and 23rd, 2019 from a bortle 7 zone.
duplicated each image and removed stars via StarXterminator. Ran DBE with a shitload of points to generate background model. model subtracted from original pic using the following PixelMath (math courtesy of /u/jimmythechicken1)
$T * med(model) / model
Luminance Linear:
BlurXTerminator
ArcsinhStretch + HT to stretch nonlinear
RGB Linear:
ChannelCombination to combine monochrome Red Green and Blue stacks into color RGB image
SpectroPhotometricColorCalibration
BlurXTerminator
DeepSNR
HSV Repair
ArcsinhStretch + HT to stretch nonlinear
NonLinear:
LRGBCombination to add stretched L as a luminance layer to RGB
Several Curve transformations to adjust lightness, contrast, saturation, hues, etc with various masks
DeepSNR again
MLT for large scale chrominance noise reduction
More Curves
Invert > SCNR green > Invert to remove some magentas from stars
M17 is also known as The Swan Nebula (the bright core is swan shaped, esp when viewed visually through a telescope). Also pictured it the M18 star cluster off to the right.
I originally shot this back in 2019 and decided to reprocess it since we have fun new tools and techniques (and I kinda know what I’m doing now with narrowband processing). I decided to keep the palettes similar overall, but with a less agressive stretch and more ‘natural’ look to the nebula. The noise reduction is a lot better when comparing the images at 1:1 (long gone are the days of TGV/MMT noise reduction!). Captured over 2 nights at the in May, 2019 from a Bortle 7 zone.
Acquisition: 8 hours 10 minutes (Camera at Unity Gain, -15°C)
Ha- 42x300"
Oiii- 56x300”
Darks- 30
Flats- 30 per filter
Capture Software:
EQMod mount control. Captured using N.I.N.A. and PHD2 for guiding and dithering.
PixInsight Processing:
BatchPreProcessing
Blink
ImageIntegration
DrizzleIntegration (2X, VarK 1.5)
DynamicCrop
DynamicBackgroundExtraction
duplicated each image and removed stars via StarXterminator. Ran DBE with a shitload of points to generate background model. model subtracted from original pic using the following PixelMath (math courtesy of /u/jimmythechicken1)
$T * med(model) / model
Narrowband Linear:
BlurXTerminator
NoiseXTerminator
STF Applied via HT to stretch nonlinear
Nonlinear:
PixelMath to combine monochrone Ha and Oiii channels into color image (using ForaxX’s bicolor palette):
M17 is also known as The Swan Nebula (the bright core is swan shaped, esp when viewed visually through a telescope). Also pictured it the M18 star cluster off to the right.
I originally shot this back in 2019 and decided to reprocess it since we have fun new tools and techniques (and I kinda know what I’m doing now with narrowband processing). I decided to keep the palettes similar overall, but with a less agressive stretch and more ‘natural’ look to the nebula. The noise reduction is a lot better when comparing the images at 1:1 (long gone are the days of TGV/MMT noise reduction!). Captured over 2 nights at the in May, 2019 from a Bortle 7 zone.
Acquisition: 8 hours 10 minutes (Camera at Unity Gain, -15°C)
Ha- 42x300"
Oiii- 56x300”
Darks- 30
Flats- 30 per filter
Capture Software:
EQMod mount control. Captured using N.I.N.A. and PHD2 for guiding and dithering.
PixInsight Processing:
BatchPreProcessing
Blink
ImageIntegration
DrizzleIntegration (2X, VarK 1.5)
DynamicCrop
DynamicBackgroundExtraction
duplicated each image and removed stars via StarXterminator. Ran DBE with a shitload of points to generate background model. model subtracted from original pic using the following PixelMath (math courtesy of /u/jimmythechicken1)
$T * med(model) / model
Narrowband Linear:
BlurXTerminator
NoiseXTerminator
STF Applied via HT to stretch nonlinear
Nonlinear:
PixelMath to combine monochrone Ha and Oiii channels into color image (using ForaxX’s bicolor palette):
Link to a 16:9 version. These should be good up to 8k resolution.
(Yes I know we’re almost two weeks into 2024.) This may look familiar as I’ve made similar composites for thelastseveralyears. 2023 was incredibly productive for me astrophotography wise, and I ended up getting nearly 600 total hours of long exposure time across all of my pics. Since I have very limited horizons from my balcony, I decided to go deep on some fainter narrowband targets.
. I have links below for those who want to check out the uncropped original photos, as well as their specific acquisition and processing details.
I use an equatorial mount to track the movement of the sky and take long exposures without the stars trailing. I also take several hundred shorter exposures (several minutes each) and stack them together to create one single image that then goes onto post processing.
Are the Colors Real?
about half of these images are in false color, however images 1, 2, 6, 7, and 10 are considered to be true color (our eyeballs alone will never be able to see color in these objects, even through a telescope). I use a black and white camera, and have to take images through filters which are then mapped to RGB channels in order to produce a color image. Using narrowband filters you can isolate specific wavelengths of light emitted by certain gases in space, and map them to make a false color image.
What is your light pollution/How do you deal with it?
Most of these were shot from my horribly light polluted apartment, but I managed to take a couple trips out to some darker skies this year. Images 2, 6 (partially), 7, and 10 were the only ones taken from dark skies (Bortle 3).
In order to deal with the light pollution I use narrowband filters which only let through specific wavelengths of light (the specific wavelength that these nebulae emit) and block out almost all other light. It is possible to get good photos without using any kind of light pollution filters, and adding total exposure time is one way to get around LP.
Is it photoshopped?
Not in the way you think. Nothing is being added in to the photos that come off of the camera. The goal of post processing is to bring out the data that is already there. The raw images are pretty much black, but brightening, sharpening, and running noise reduction helps turn them into nice looking photos.
So the main band going across the sky in the pic is our own galaxy, the Milky Way. It’s made up of a bunch of stars, gas, and dust.
To the naked eye under dark skies you can see some of the large structures in it, but it will just look grey (hence the ‘milky’ name). Our retinas suck at detecting color in low light situations (the color sensing cone cells need a lot of light), so even when looking through large telescopes pretty much every nebula and galaxy just looks gray.
The one exception to this is the Orion Nebula, which is one of the brightest deep sky objects. IMO It’s very slightly green looking (compared to pink in cameras] since of the cone cells in our eyes, green is most sensitive
Figured today is an appropriate day to post this. This nebula is also known as NGC 2264 I’m fairly certain the christmas tree is the entire nebula when the photo is inverted, and not just the cone nebula at the very end of it. Captured on November 17th, 2022, from a Bortle 4 zone.
Figured today is an appropriate day to post this. This nebula is also known as NGC 2264 I’m fairly certain the christmas tree is the entire nebula when the photo is inverted, and not just the cone nebula at the very end of it. Captured on November 17th, 2022, from a Bortle 4 zone.
This target has always been a goal of mine since starting in this hobby. While the Flying Nebula (aka Sh2-129, all the red stuff), the Squid Nebula (aka OU4, the blue stuff) was only discovered in 2011. It’s stupidly faint. Because of this, and my horrible light pollution, I had to get a ton of exposure time to bring it out, and ended up getting 110 hours total time on it. This is a combination of images taken through hydrogen-alpha and oxygen-iii filters for the nebulosity, plus RGB filters for true-color stars (the nebulosity is kinda close to true color). I have no clue why the Ha region is called ‘the flying bat’, but the Oiii structure sure looks like a squid alright.
Captured over a shitload of nights from September to December, 2023. Broadband data from a Bortle 9 zone.
duplicated each image and removed stars via StarXterminator. Ran DBE with a shitload of points to generate background model. model subtracted from original pic using the following PixelMath (math courtesy of /u/jimmythechicken1)
$T * med(model) / model
**Narrowband Linear:
Honestly just StarXterminator and EZ soft stretch to bring them nonlinear.
Duplicated the Oiii before stretching to be used for advanced narrowband combination:
This target has always been a goal of mine since starting in this hobby. While the Flying Nebula (aka Sh2-129, all the red stuff), the Squid Nebula (aka OU4, the blue stuff) was only discovered in 2011. It’s stupidly faint. Because of this, and my horrible light pollution, I had to get a ton of exposure time to bring it out, and ended up getting 110 hours total time on it. This is a combination of images taken through hydrogen-alpha and oxygen-iii filters for the nebulosity, plus RGB filters for true-color stars (the nebulosity is kinda close to true color). I have no clue why the Ha region is called ‘the flying bat’, but the Oiii structure sure looks like a squid alright.
Captured over a shitload of nights from September to December, 2023. Broadband data from a Bortle 9 zone.
duplicated each image and removed stars via StarXterminator. Ran DBE with a shitload of points to generate background model. model subtracted from original pic using the following PixelMath (math courtesy of /u/jimmythechicken1)
$T * med(model) / model
**Narrowband Linear:
Honestly just StarXterminator and EZ soft stretch to bring them nonlinear.
Duplicated the Oiii before stretching to be used for advanced narrowband combination:
Exploring Reddit’s third-party app environment 7 months after the APIcalypse (arstechnica.com)
Triangulum (M33) Untracked (lemmy.ml)
This is 1158 * 0.8" exposures along with 50 dark and 50 flat frames stacked with Siril. Shot with my Sony A7Cii and a Hasselblad 350mm f/5.6.
braincheeks
After Three Years on Mars, NASA’s Ingenuity Helicopter Mission Ends (www.jpl.nasa.gov)
M83 - The Southern Pinwheel Galaxy (reprocessed) (live.staticflickr.com)
M17 - The Omega Nebula [OC] (live.staticflickr.com)
2023 Astrophotography (live.staticflickr.com)
Andromeda M31 (lemmy.world)
This is my second try at the Andromeda galaxy. Still very noisy but happy with the result nonetheless, except the star shape and coma....
African Night [3840x2160] (lemmy.ca)
Photographer: peeweekid...
Six months after the initial reddit surge (graphs)
Hi folks, out of pure curiosity, I was poking some graphs....
What hobby do you have that no one else in your family shares?
The Christmas Tree Cluster and Cone Nebula [OC] (live.staticflickr.com)
The Flying Bat and Squid Nebulae [OC] (live.staticflickr.com)