Eta Carinae mosaic in the works

[rcj]

Hey all,

Been trying to fulfill an attempt on a colour mosaic of Eta Carinae for a long time, and finally, there was enough clear sky time in summer to do it, albeit from the heart of the city here in Melbourne (mag 4.5 limit). Many months (or years?) back, a mosaic was done through the same scope but only in HA. It would be a continuous attempt to build this colour mosaic as both sky and time permits. Everything is new data since the previous HA data was lost from a HD crash (sigh). Taken with the three-inch refractor, this is a quick and fast look at what the result could be like once the mosaic is done. It was a pain removing gradients plus colour balancing and the need to take flats, consistently. It is currently a three-panel partially done mosaic, and should be completed with the last piece in a night or two. Total hours worth of capture is close to 9 hours including hydrogen alpha components.

[mymoon]

salute.

wow so many stars.

which part of melbourne are you at. stayed at Glen/Mt Waverly for a couple of years;work at Dandenong.

cheers

[rcj]

manage to add in the last panel tonight. have updated the above mosaic image with the new data added in. Altogether it should be 10 hours of captured data from a light polluted site.

mymoon: am staying in the CBD. Oh! Did u try the Puffing Billy in Dandenong? Nice rusty area!

[rcj]

reprocessed the image again...here is a larger version, with a more naturalistic approach...
pardon the slightly ovalish stars, optocoupler not working well... grrr.