Steve Bell Photography

03/29/2020

Between the weather and work I haven't had much chance to do any imaging lately, but I had a window last week so I jumped on it! This is the 'Flaming Star' nebula in the constellation Auriga. It is a combination of reflection and emission nebulae.

Tech stuff:
Apertura 60mm APO w/field flattener
Canon 1100Da
Sirius EQ-G mount
Optolong L-eNhance duo-band filter

65 X 120sec exposures, unguided

Post-processing with PixInsight and Photoshop CC

10/30/2019

The Andromeda galaxy, one of our nearest galactic neighbors. It's larger than two full moons and can be seen with the naked eye from a dark location. It is larger and more massive than our Milky way, with one trillion stars.

No telescope for this one, just a 55-250mm f/5.6 telephoto at 250mm, Canon 80D at 3200 ISO. Over 300 30sec exposures tracked with a Sky Watcher Star Adventurer tracker.

Stacked in Deep Sky Stacker, processed with PixInsight and Photoshop.

09/12/2018

I spent some time reprocessing my 'First Light' image of M13. I was surprised at how much more detail was hidden in this short exposure!

The first attempt was put together using a program called 'Sequator' to stack the individual frames resulting in a smoother final image.This approach was fast and easy, but isn't aggressive enough for this image. It is designed for nightscape photography, and does a great job with wide angle scenes containing stars and foreground elements, but isn't powerful enough to bring out the faint stuff.

A better option is a program called 'DeepSky Stacker'. It is designed for astrophotography and has many more options for stacking and combining images. By using tens of thousands of stars for alignment and very sophisticated algorithms for combining individual frames, a much cleaner base image is the result. This base image is then brought into Photoshop and tweaked to bring out all of the fainter stuff.

I also used a Photoshop filter from the Google Nik collection called 'Define' to remove noise and improve the overall appearance.

The second photo shows the drastic difference that the right software, a little time, and attention to detail can make.

09/06/2018

Thank you for Liking my page! I decided to create this page so I can more easily share my photography with those who are genuinely interested. I will be posting more detailed descriptions of the subjects, equipment and techniques involved in my posts than I have in the past on my regular Facebook feed.

I am not professing to be an expert photographer or astrophotographer. I am learning with every image I take and from constructive feedback, from YOU! My hope is for us to make this a place that will be interesting, entertaining and inspiring! Who knows, we might even LEARN something!

If you like what you see here, please Like and Share! If you have questions, please ask in a Comment! I'm looking forward to seeing how this evolves...

This page is for showcasing my astrophotos, but I may add the occasional nature or landscape shot for some variety.