M45, The Pleiades with Diffraction Spikes

Click image for larger version.

Playing around with an artificial spider I made to create diffraction spikes on brighter stars as a warm up for the main event of the evening which was the Horsehead Nebula.  The spider obviously works well.  I like diffraction spikes especially on wide field constellation shots where the spikes really point out the main stars of the constellation among the swarms.

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Date:  12/30/2005

Location:  American Horse Lake

Telescope:  Orion 80ED (with artificial spider)

Camera:  Canon 20D

Exposure Count:  12 images @ 4 minutes, 48 minutes total exposure

Guiding:  LX200, ST-402

Post Processing: ImagesPlus - Align, combine, digital development.

Neat Image - Noise reduction.

Photoshop - Levels, cropping.

Previous Attempts

10/7/2005

10/12/2004