Starlog March 3rd, 2018, 08:20 p.m. local time
After I took my first true pictures of Orion early last week, while I was pleased with the results, I felt the images were still lacking, particularly in background star detail. On Saturday, I took to shooting Orion again, with my same new lens. This time, I bumped the focal stop all the way down to f/2.8 and the ISO to 400. I then stacked 30 25-second images in DeepSkyStacker. For the next several days, I played around with the resulting image mightily in PaintShop Pro. Subtracting light pollution, adjusting levels and curves, experimenting with colors, and trying to accentuate the brightest stars.
I have realized within the last 48 hours that there are infinite routes to take when editing astrophotography in post processing, particularly wide field views. Imagination and artistry combined. I feel this image provides more detail than my last Orion. Likely, I will continue to experiment.
