Hi guys,
Here's the bubble nebula. The data was acquired last week but hadn't have time to process it until now. The color scheme for this one was Hα for red, O-III for blue and a combination of both for a synthetic green channel. The luminance as usual comes from the Hα data.

Hope you like it, Pablo.

Very nice! Doesn't seem like there's much data in the O III channel this time - of course, combining red in Ha and luminance channels could kind of upset the color balance a bit, I would think.

Seeing your images makes me wish I could get a good EQ mount for that WO 110 of mine so I can start doing some of this as well. I'm going to have to wait at least until spring, I think.

Hi Dave,
Thank you. I had the chance to get some SII frames and mapping them LRGB = Hα, Hα, SII, OIII i got the following:

And here is what I consider the final version. It maps LRGB = Hα, Hα, OIII, SII.
Hope you like it,
Pablo

Great image Pablo! I do like the last one the best as it has the most detail, but without being too "edgy". The first image is more contrasty but it looks like some of the detail is lost.

So you're saying that you capture the SII frames on a different evening than the OII and Ha frames? Did you move the scope between sessions? If so, what stacking software do you use to get everything from subsequent nights in registration?

Thanks again Dave, in fact each filter was taken in different nights, having to setup the equipment each time
What is kind of permanent is the camera on the scope, so I don't need to rotate it each time. I try to keep it always as aligned as possible to the RA/Dec orientation: either when you move in right ascension the stars move horizontally, or vertically, depending on the object in question.

To get most of the frame from previous sessions aligned with the ones to capture, I use Envisage (the capturing software from Meade). It has a very nice feature: you can open previous images in a tab that overlaps exactly with the tab of the "live" session. Along with Envisage, there is a very simple, yet useful, application called "JAC Virtual CrossHair" that I overlay on a star from an image of the previous session to align the present one.

Then to stack all the subframes I use DeepSkyStacker. It allows you to choose a reference frame even when you don't use it for the actual stacking. For example, for this picture I stack the Hα frames and use one of them as reference for stacking both the OIII and SII frames.

Thanks for that info Pablo. That is something I've wondered about. I'll have to go about acquiring these software packages while I save up for my mount and camera.

Dave, except for PhotoShop, every other piece of software I use is freeware. It would only make sense to use Envisage if your camera is a Meade DSI, else you will have to use whatever software comes with the camera you are to use.

If you are interested in getting familiar with DeepSkyStacker and post-processing, I can share with you some frames, darks and flats, so that you can run a session of DSS to register them and then PhotoShop to post-process them. If you don't have PhotoShop you might be rather interested in acquiring PixInsight, which I have read is way more powerful for astrophotography than PS.

Pablo