I am working on my latest image of the Iris Nebula. As you know the central star is the brightest object in the image and is surrounded by gas. When I create a mask as I usually do using the star mask process I get results that do not include the central star. If I increase the scale and lower the noise threshold I start to get the star but a good deal more. Then I did some more reading, I've been working on this for a few days and going over the videos I have and reading the other websites that address this, and haven't gotten very far. In this reading I can upon making a structure detect mask, something I really haven't seen done or referred to.
What will be my best choice to create this mask? My initial task for this mask is HDRW but will also likely use in for LHE and possibly some other processes. The master luminance is a LinearFit combined image of 29 -15 minute exposures that I also did a Masked Stretch to. At this point I'm looking to increase the detail in the core around that bright central star. I did try the Structure Mask and it did a good job of finding the stars but I didn't see any way of increasing the size over the stars and it seemed to only fine the star centers. It really did a poor job with HDRW.
Thanks for any thoughts on this. I can post an image if necessary.
-Steve
