Hi Troy,
Can I save myself a step by just doing CC?
If you don't need to neutralize the background of your image, or if the background is already neutral, then yes. CC uses a background reference precisely to remove the uncertainty in deciding whether a given pixel pertains to the background or to the white reference, so it can achieve a good white balance even if your background is not neutral. However, CC cannot remove a background color cast. BN and CC are two separate, related but independent tasks.
A neutral sky background is, in my opinion, absolutely necessary in a deep sky image. You cannot represent the sky background with a color cast unless you can justify it physically with your equipment. For this reason we always consider BN as a necessary previous step to CC, or as an alternative, the neutralization that DBE does as a result of subtracting a background model. Even after DBE, I usually apply BN for the sake of accuracy (but I am a bit neurotic...)
