Celestial hemisphere:  Southern  ·  Constellation: Centaurus (Cen)  ·  Contains:  NGC 5139  ·  Omega Centauri
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NGC 5139 Omega Centauri, Martin Dowd
NGC 5139 Omega Centauri
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NGC 5139 Omega Centauri

Revision title: NGC 5139 Omega Centauri Re Processed

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NGC 5139 Omega Centauri, Martin Dowd
NGC 5139 Omega Centauri
Powered byPixInsight

NGC 5139 Omega Centauri

Revision title: NGC 5139 Omega Centauri Re Processed

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Description

I’ve captured NGC 5139 Omega Centauri “the big daddy”  of globular clusters many times before over the years with my old DSLR and more recently OSC 2600MC, However this is the first time using my 2600MM in LRGB 
As my skies are B8 with a 30% waxing moon descending in the north and north west  , I decided to stick to 30 sec subs on low gain as Luminance goes off the richter scale with this camera under heavy sky glow. 
Quite pleased how this image turned out with respect to contrast and control of brightness across the huge main core region.
I tried not to oversaturate the colour too much to avoid the stars looking like M&M’s 

30% Waxing Moon
B8 City suburban Skies 
Seeing average to poor ( early heavy dew set in ) 
8” f5 Klaus Helmerich carbon fibre Newtonian 
Skywatcher EQ6-R pro mount 
ZWO 2600MM cooled to -10C , Gain 0
Antlia LRGB filters 
Integration approx 2 hours 
Lum 75 x 30 sec 
Red 50 x 30 sec 
Green 50 x 30 sec 
Blue 55 x 30 sec
Dithered every 3rd sub
Bias from Library 
Darks from Library 
Flats for LRGB 
Tracking and Goto EQMOD and Stellarium
Aquisition APT 
PHD2 Multistar guiding ( 0.48 to 0.55 arc sec total ) 
Data Analysed , Calibrated, Stacked and Aligned in ASTAP 
Post processed in Startools V1.8 via Compose L + Synthetic L , RGB 

Comments Welcome 

Thanks for looking 

Martin

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Revisions

  • NGC 5139 Omega Centauri, Martin Dowd
    Original
  • Final
    NGC 5139 Omega Centauri, Martin Dowd
    B

B

Title: NGC 5139 Omega Centauri Re Processed

Description: Sometimes you see certain elements of your original posted image that doesn't look quite right or needs some subtle changes or minor attention.
Therefore I reprocessed the image in Startools V1.8 with the following actions -
Wipe Module - increase gradient reduction to provide a more uniform field ( the upper left side of the original image had some residual gradients or bias )
AutoDev Module - Increased the autostretch only slightly and used ignore fine detail at 2 pixels
HDR Module - Tame preset , increased Tame to 1.17 which provided more even contrast and brightness across the huge core region
Color Module - Increased overall saturation slightly and backed off on Highlight Repair of Stars
Increased Blue Bias slightly and reduced Green Bias
Shrink Module - Reduced Color Taming to only 4 pixels ( original was set at 8 pixels )
De Noise Module - increased noise reduction to 5 pixels

I think the above changes have improved the overall image ( if only marginal )

Thanks for Looking

Comments Welcome

Clear Skies
Martin

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NGC 5139 Omega Centauri, Martin Dowd