Here are the three images that were combined to give the false-colour image on the previous page. They were all taken with the same exposure, and were processed identically. All the pictures here were taken with the MX716 camera and were enhanced using a function in its capture software which acts like a positive gamma function and increases the contrast in the faint areas of the picture and brings out the faint details of the nebula. After combining five exposures for each of the H, O, and S images, a further increase of gamma to 1.5 emphasised the nebula even more and a stretch of the histogram (12-160) cut out the remaining sky glow and made the brighter stars saturate. The luminance image was made from ten images taken through a CLS filter to block most of the local light pollution and enhanced the same way except that a mild wavelet enhancement (W 1-2 = 5) was applied and the histogram was only clipped at the bottom end (16-255).
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Light from Hydrogen (Hα) |
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Light from Oxygen (OIII) |
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Light from Sulphur (SII) |
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Broadband light. The picture was taken through an Astronomik CLS filter which blocks a range of wavelengths most common in light pollution. |
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