Astrophotography

Love the shot. Thanks for the explanation on the camera work and post processing.

There is also a optical issue with the lens cell which is giving rise to 'spikes' on the brighter stars. I've now determined that this is the oil drying out between the elements.

The contrast issue I think maybe down to an uncalibrated monitor at my end - it looked okay on my desktop when I posted, but now having viewed on my laptop it doesn't look so good saturation wise. Been meaning to get a device to properly calibrate my monitors for a while!

Hi Mario & Franz, many thanks for looking at & commenting on my image.

Image is essentially HST palette, imaged via SIIHaOII filters with a mono camera. No RGB recorded.

As such the star colours tend to be a bit 'odd', so part of my processing involved removing magenta from the star colour.

The combination of sharp & unsharp regions was an intentional 'experiment' I played around with pseudo 'depth' effect using a selective blur over parts of the image.

I appreciate that it is not to everyone's taste, & it is not a 'purist' approach.

I found it an interesting effect to try, just for 'fun'.

I'm happy it made you stop, look, think & question - even if you ultimately dislike the image.