m-5

Comment

Comment by Jeffrey P Nunnari on August 4, 2012 at 1:00am

Ok, Russ - give me a few days, if you will, as I am backed-up on some work and should be able to devote some time to this by the end of the coming week - plus, I need to learn how to do "screen shots" so that I can make like a tutorial using the steps that I take (can't believe I don't know how to do those!) so as to make it all easier to understand as opposed to just written instructions. It really isn't hard, and I think you will like it and may get out more as a result. BTW, I was out tonite and put in an hour each on M-19, M-28 and M-75. Moon was extremely bright and there was a lot of moisture in the air, so not the greatest conditions by any means. Maybe a 3rd-magnitude naked-eye limit; however, I predict the images will turn out just fine. Will post those soon. Just goes to show that you can go out and get stuff under conditions that you would have never considered going out and imaging in before. Stay tuned!

Comment by Russ Ruggles on August 3, 2012 at 3:24pm

Sent a "friend request" so we can do this.

Comment by Jeffrey P Nunnari on August 3, 2012 at 1:10pm

Hey, if I knew how to make an "action" for it I would! It's not very hard at all - give it a try and let me know how it works out, and don't hesitate to e-mail me and I will respond and try to put all the steps in that I take. Not quite an "action," but maybe the next best thing.

Comment by Russ Ruggles on August 3, 2012 at 10:03am

Good point Bob but then we'd be asking for it and Jeff might not want to share :)

Comment by Russ Ruggles on August 3, 2012 at 9:32am

Interesting processing steps Jeff. I'll play around with that and see if I can get similar results.

Thanks for the info.

Comment by Jeffrey P Nunnari on August 3, 2012 at 9:19am

LOL Bob!

Comment by Jeffrey P Nunnari on August 3, 2012 at 9:17am

The latter - I used to avoid going out when the moon was between first quarter and nearing last quarter, mainly because I preferred targeting galaxies and nebulae. Then I thought about all the clear nights I was doing nothing and thinking what can I do? It occurred to me (yes, the 40-watt in the head lit up) that star clusters should be impervious to moonlight because they are, well, stars, luminous in their own right. So I started on open clusters and then mixed in the globs. You can really reduce the moonlight in photoshop - I would say dramatically so - and still preserve the luminosity of the stars with miminal loss. In fact, processing star clusters, especially globs, takes only a few minutes once you pull them into PhotoShop. The first thing I typically do is an adjustment layer of an anti-vignetting type and even up the overall lightness of the image, making it extremely light across the entire image, and then in one or more steps of using duplicate layers (usually only requires one) I reduce the lighting through the "Levels" function to about one-half or less of the total, centralized light pyramid. It is an amazingly easy process, and fun to do.

Comment by Russ Ruggles on August 3, 2012 at 8:48am

OK Jeff - what's your secret with taking these at a full or near full moon? Filters? Photoshop magic?