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Target Details
The Headphones Nebula, more correctly known as Jones-Emberson 1 (PK 164+31.3), is a 14th magnitude planetary nebula at a distance of around 1600 light years from Earth. The 16.8-magnitude central star is a very blue white dwarf.


Capture Details
Data captured 24th, 25th & 28th March, 4th April, 2018.
30x 10 minute exposures with Ha filter.
76x 10 minute exposures with Oiii filter.
Total Exposure 17.7 hours.

Equipment Details
Skywatcher Quattro 200 CF
NEQ6 Pro
Atik 428EX Mono
Skywatcher ST-80
QHY5L-II

Processing Details
This image was processed in Pixinsight & Lightroom.
Calibration and Stacking in Pixinsight using Batch PreProcessing.
Dynamic Crop - To remove black edges & integration artifacts. (Each Channel)
Automatic Background Extraction - To remove gradients. (Each Channel)
Deconvolution - To bring out some fine detail & tighten stars, 25 iterations each channel.
Multiscale Linear Transform - Noise reduction. (Each Channel)
Morphological Transformation - Erosion - To shrink stars in Oiii.
Linear Fit - To balance background in Ha & Oiii.
Pixelmath - To Blend channels to make an HOO image. (Red - Ha, Green - 20% Ha, 80% Oiii, Blue - Oiii
Photometric Colour Calibration - To calibrate colours to make it seem more like an RGB image.
ArcSin Stretch - To slightly stretch image.
Histogram Transformation - To stretch the image.
Histogram Transformation - To clip blue in background, with mask in place to protect stars & nebula.
Histogram Transformation - To clip blacks in background, with mask in place to protect stars & nebula.
Curves Transformation - To boost contrast in nebula, with mask in place to select nebula only.
Curves Transformation - To boost saturation in nebula, with mask in place to select nebula only.
Curves Transformation - To boost gold, with yellow mask in place.
Curves Transformation - To boost contrast for entire image.
TVGDenoise - Noise reduction of background, with mask in place to protect stars & nebula.
TVGDenoise - Noise reduction of nebula, with mask in place to select nebula only.
Morphological Transformation - Erosion - To shrink stars, with starmask in place.
Curves Transformation - To desaturate background, with mask in place to protect stars & nebula.
Curves Transformation - To boost contrast.
TVGDenoise - Further noise reduction of background, with mask in place to protect stars & nebula.
TVGDenoise - Further noise reduction of nebula, with mask in place to select nebula only.
Histogram Transformation - To further clip blacks in background, with mask in place to protect stars & nebula.
Curves Transformation - To further boost contrast in nebula, with mask in place to select nebula only.
Curves Transformation - To further boost saturation in nebula, with mask in place to select nebula only.

Export as JPEG and import into Lightroom.
Contrast Boost (+25)
Vibrance (-20)

Export final JPEG for upload.