Author Topic: M81-M82: Old image in a professional work + new image  (Read 4605 times)

Offline Jordi Gallego

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Nota: para una versión en castellano por favor ver este post en el foro FotografiaAstronómica:
http://fotografiaastronomica.com/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=7642


Hi all,

I must say in first place, as apologize, that work reasons (and also bad weather) keep me away a lot from astrophotography and from forum participation on recent times.

On the other hand, this post may be is a bit off-topic but as at the end it talks about two CCD images and both have been processed with PixInsight, I have included it here anyway.  ;)

I have just updated my website with a news on the publication of an study on "Arp's loop", supported by Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias and coordinated by Dr. David Martínez-Delgado, which uses between other resources , images from three amateur astrophotographers, Ray J. Gabany, Tony Hallas and myself.

Paper has been presented and already accepted for publication at Astronomy & Astrophysics journal and because of this we can talk about it.

To be honest, my contribution to the work has been very modest and mainly means the use of one of my previous M81 - M82 images (the one that was APOD on 2008):

http://astrosurf.com/jordigallego/album/Files_dark_sky_SBIG/slides/M81_M82_with_Integrated_Flux_Nebulae.html

and the fact of this image being used (by the way, in negative and heavily stretched, as is usual on this kind of scientific works) has allowed me to be presented as co-author of the study :D

Although this kind of collaboration with the professional world is not new (and we have great examples here on this forum) it is really new to me and I cannot hide that it is indeed a personal gratification. In first place for having my name on a scientific publication related to my astrophoto work and secondly because my name appears between the names of two world known astrophotographers as Gabany and Hallas are.
It is also relevant to me as I also participated on other works of this kind that did not achieve the objective (although they required a lot of hours of dedication) and I was a bit discouraged.

Well, in any case here is the link:

http://astrosurf.com/jordigallego/what_new.html

If you would like to have more information on the study you can download a complete copy (PDF) here:

http://astrosurf.com/jordigallego/articles.html

Regarding the images, on my web site, first image (the old one taken with FSQ-106N) was mainly processed with PixInsight 1.0 (I did calibration and alignment at that time with other package) and was one of the first where I processed by separated, following Vicent Peris lessons, Large Scale and Small Scales. In any case it is hard to think today on not having, Deconvolution, HDRWavelets, ImageIntegartion, Color Calibration tools...... and many other tools that have been included in PixInsight on these years ::)

I started new image, taken with TOA-150 in February. (At this time I even completely forgot that the paper on Arp’s loop was on its slow way to publication) , and this image is, frankly speaking.......... unfinished :-[
It is unfinished because terrible bad weather (and some mistakes from my side) prevented me to collect enough exposure time. But I could not resist the temptation of show it as is my intention to "finish it" on oncoming weeks, and then I will display at full resolution.
A few comments regarding this new image. It will be again a pure RGB image and this time my target (I am using a smaller image scale) is more to get galaxy detail rather than show up IFN. And this image will be the first that will be processed from the beginning to end, from calibration to resizing for web display in PIxInsight (1.6) :D

Thanks and I apologize for the long post

Jordi
Jordi Gallego
www.astrophoto.es

Offline Carlos Milovic

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Re: M81-M82: Old image in a professional work + new image
« Reply #1 on: 2010 April 17 10:35:44 »
Excelent work, Jodi! Congratulations :)

BTW, wasn't Gabany's image the one with the "phantom" loop we processed a while ago?
Regards,

Carlos Milovic F.
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http://www.pixinsight.com

Offline RBA

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Re: M81-M82: Old image in a professional work + new image
« Reply #2 on: 2010 April 19 01:40:59 »
BTW, wasn't Gabany's image the one with the "phantom" loop we processed a while ago?

Yes it was.

Jordi, I already congratulated you on the Taka group but I'm happy to do it again :-) Congratulations!

Offline Carlos Milovic

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Re: M81-M82: Old image in a professional work + new image
« Reply #3 on: 2010 April 19 04:03:26 »
 ::)
Regards,

Carlos Milovic F.
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http://www.pixinsight.com

Offline Jordi Gallego

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Re: M81-M82: Old image in a professional work + new image
« Reply #4 on: 2010 April 20 11:48:55 »
Thanks for your comments Carlos and Rogelio! :D

Regards
Jordi
Jordi Gallego
www.astrophoto.es