Finally got a proper photo of the Veil Nebula after 4 tries and I'm still shook

I kept seeing folks on here post these crisp narrowband shots of the Veil and figured they were stacking like 20 hours of data or something fancy. My setup is just a modded DSLR and a small refractor, nothing special. Last week I gave it another go with a dual narrowband filter I was skeptical about, only 90 minutes of integration. The detail in those wispy filaments came out way cleaner than I expected, and now I'm kicking myself for not trying this filter sooner. Did you guys notice a big jump in your images when you switched from broadband to narrowband filters?

3 comments

3 Comments

angela_harris1mo ago

Honestly, the first time I slapped a dual narrowband on my 80mm, I spent the whole night shooting the North America Nebula and got so excited that I forgot to take flats. The next morning my images looked like someone smeared peanut butter on the sensor. But once I re-did everything with dark frames, the difference was night and day. That Cygnus Wall just popped right out at me. Now I barely bother with broadband unless I'm shooting star clusters or something.

vera_johnson91mo ago

Knew a buddy who forgot his dew shield one humid night and spent hours scrubbing foggy subs in Photoshop instead.

avery2191mo ago

Yeah I used to be the same way, thought I could just breeze through without flats and it'd be fine. Then I got a set of subs that were so unevenly lit it looked like someone forgot to take the lens cap off half the frame. Dark frames alone just couldn't fix that mess, so now I'm super strict about taking them every single session.