Beginner PixInsight Mono LRGB Galaxy Image Processing Tutorial - Astrophotography

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Here is a basic tutorial I've put together after a subscriber commented that he'd like to see how the astrophotography images are processed - I hope it helps show you some methods of use for a few of the basic tools available in PixInsight.
This tutorial covers a "first steps" approach into PixInsight with nothing too complex to follow, I use some older data I captured that I thought was suitable to process as it has quite a few flaws that we try to process out.
Unfortunately these days I usually spend a couple of hours tinkering with images with many different processes, but I do not think that would make for a good video format!
Of course much much more can be done in the program, this is just scratching the surface!
The data was captured with:
Celestron EdgeHD 8 SCT telescope (my previous scope)
qhy163m mono camera
Baader LRGB filters
NEQ6 pro mount
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[@AB-ft2lb]

Thanks so much for your tutorial. I followed your instructions from start to finish and was able to get my best version of M31 to date!

[@lukomatico]

Superb!! - That's great to hear :-) Thank you for watching and commenting my friend!

[@katieakemann]

This is the most straightforward tutorial I've come across yet. I've finally been able to process an image successfully!

[@lukomatico]

Glad it helped! Thanks to much for watching and sharing a kind comment 👍👍

[@Lasserubinskov]

For me this was the best introduction to PixInsight and LRGB I've found so far. Thank you!

[@lukomatico]

Thank you!! That's really kind of you to say, I'm so glad you found it useful :-)

[@kaistendal7625]

Like others before - Get Startet with my Mono Camera and Pixinsight. That helped a lot to understand the workflow of a Picture and to navigate in Pixinsight! Thanks a Lot for that great lesson!

[@lukomatico]

Glad it helped you Kai! - Thank you for watching my friend! :-)

[@davidleejenkins]

Thank you for this tutorial. I followed along and processed my first image (the Andromeda Galaxy) using PixInsight. Up until now, I’ve been using PhotoShop. I think it turned out really well. I’ll definitely be using Pix Insight to process more of my mono images.

[@lukomatico]

Hey there David! - That's really wonderful to hear, I am so happy it's helped you! :-) PixInsight has been one of those programs with a really frustrating start for me, but quickly it replaced all my other processing tools and now I couldn't imagine processing without it! Best wishes and clear skies! Luke

[@markben05]

Fantastic Luke, Thanks for sharing buddy...........Now all i need is the clear night sky

[@lukomatico]

Hope you found it informative Mark :) thanks again for the idea! I might do another at some point using free software instead as that's what I used up until just a few months ago. Thanks for watching!

[@astrojourneyuk]

Nice little tutorial and demo of your workflow. Thanks for sharing this. I like the part around selecting colours to boost certain saturation. I'll be using that in future. :)

[@lukomatico]

Hey mate I'm glad you liked it! - there's so many potential tools to use when processing that it was hard to decide on what to include and what to leave out for a beginner tutorial - I do like the selective saturation too, it works great for certain images! Thanks for stopping by mate :)

[@revolting887]

Great tutorial and explanation - keep this stuff coming!

[@lukomatico]

I'm glad you like it, thank you! :)

[@MrAndromeda78]

Keep up the great work. I’m just starting to shoot in mono, so this has helped a lot with my workflow,. Appreciated.

[@lukomatico]

That's great to hear Dan! - Thanks for letting me know it was useful to you :-) Clear skies!

[@simonworger]

Great tutorial. Thanks for doing this.

[@lukomatico]

You are most welcome Simon! - thank you for watching :-)

[@AstrocandyTV]

Cheers Luke. Good vid.

[@lukomatico]

Glad you enjoyed it mate, thank you for watching!

[@beatsntoons]

Just bought a mono camera and this was a great video to watch to get me started. Thanks, Luke. You're a great teacher. Would love if you did more advanced editing videos as well one day

[@lukomatico]

Congratulations mate I hope you get plenty of clear skies now to test it all out with!! - and thank you, I will do that! :-)

[@rbmcmurt]

You just helped me process my very first ever LRGB image. Thank you!!! I also captured Ha data, so now I need to figure out how to integrate that too. Back to the Google I go.

[@lukomatico]

That's awesome to hear Benjamin! - thank you so much for your feedback and kind words :-) Re: adding HA to lrgb - you might want to try the NB rgb script as a starting point 👍👍 hope that helps!

[@kevhaworth5313]

Bloody Brilliant! Helped a complete Newbie achieve summat decent. Best from t'other side o't 'nines, subbed.

[@lukomatico]

Awesome, thank you! Clear skies 👍👍

[@brandonrunyon]

Just got a mono camera and really needed the primer, never done it before.

[@lukomatico]

Awesome to hear Brandon! - I hope you enjoy that mono camera buddy :-) Clear skies!

[@georgedicker9789]

Hi thabks for the video, yet another amazing walk through in language beginners can understand. Do you have one for m82 and m81? I recently took some images of this and when I edit it I seem to loose all the colour by the end

[@lukomatico]

Thanks George! Unfortunately I don't have any tutorials with m81/82 specifically mate, some of my newer tutorials could be useful/applicable though! Good luck 👍

[@ronaldg7522]

As I started with astrophography I shot the whirlpool galaxy with a 135 mm photolens and no tracker. 440 x 2 sec exposures. Quite insane, but You could recognize it.

[@lukomatico]

Hey Rob Ron! - that's a nice story, and quite similar to my own first astro photo - the orion nebula with my DSLR and tripod, and bunch of 2 second exposures just like you! 👍 Thank you for stopping by

[@anata5127]

Insane? It is actually correct approach. If someone shoot in area with 7-9 bortle, then there is no reason for exposure for >15 sec. Exceptions are when narrow band filters are used.

[@montygiavelli8125]

Very good tutorial with lots of useful info. I'm new to monochrome imaging. One question - with OSC images it seems that most people denoise before they stretch the image. You waited until after the stretch to denoise, is there a reason you do it that way ??? thanks, Monty

[@lukomatico]

Hey there Monty! - Sorry about the late reply mate :-) Welcome to Mono! I'm glad you liked the tutorial, this particular video is something I'd like to revisit/remake I think as while the information is still valid it could perhaps be condensed/reformatted into a more digestible format for a more streamlined tutorial! As to why denoise after stretching, It's likely I am doing it a sub-optimal way for most people during the tutorial - the data itself wasn't too noisy to begin with so I could get away with allowing the noise to 'develop' and show it's structure during a stretch, to then be dealt with reactively using MMT scales, rather than proactively reducing the noise before the stretch. In future tutorials, I will probably change this approach as normally now in my workflow I like to do a linear noise reduction, then a few weak passes in the nonlinear phase near the end of processing. I hope that helps explain my reasoning somewhat! :-) All the best, and clear skies!

[@montygiavelli8125]

@@lukomatico Thanks for your reply - what you say makes a lot of sense. Monty

[@HogarthsAstrophotography]

Top stuff

[@lukomatico]

Thanks for the support mate! Glad you liked it 👍

[@tommy8644]

very good tutorial ;) how can you make processes presets like your? i can't figure out how to put them with short names like you did :| thanks a lot

[@lukomatico]

I'll have to add that to the list of things I need to record mate, good idea 👍👍

[@lukomatico]

In the meantime though, you should be able to drag any icons you need directly onto the pix desktop, rename identifiers if needed, then select them all and save them out to be loaded in all as one next time 👍

[@tommy8644]

@@lukomatico in the meantime, I found the way to make my own workflow icons 😉

[@tommy8644]

@@lukomatico exactlt what I did yesterday night eheh

[@anata5127]

This is top notch video. I haven’t done mono. Why do you need L channel? Can Pixinsight do combining only RGB? Can it combine RGB and some other. Let’s say H-alpha? Thanks

[@lukomatico]

Hey there Ana! - you'd usually use a L channel to bolster the signal of the overall image over simply shooting rgb frames alone and stacking those 👍 pure RGB is still totally viable though! Pixinsight can do simple rgb stacking and also adding narrowband channels like you mentioned, eg HaRGB combinations etc 👍 Hope that helps, and thanks for watching!

[@anata5127]

@@lukomatico Great! Thanks. I will try RGB vs LRGB to see difference. I just wonder why is mono better than color camera? It will take 3-4 times longer imaging.

[@lukomatico]

@@anata5127 Hey Ana! - theres a few key differences that are worth discussion, but one of the main reasons mono is a little better is due to the fact that a colour cam uses a bayer matrix of filters to capture the colour, often in a grid of RGGB over the top of the pixels - this makes them a little less sensitive overall than a monochromatic sensor without these filters, using separate filters and capturing using all pixels at once on a per-colour basis. The gap between OSC and Mono is very close these days though in many cases, my own favourite method of capture is actually OSC :-)

[@anata5127]

@@lukomatico What about representation of different colors? Mono photos always have vivid colors, but this is only on nebulas. What about resolution? Do you see difference? Thanks

[@lukomatico]

Hey there! Mono does have better colour reproduction naturally, but the colours represented in the final image tend to be more a result of the person doing the processing and their tastes & skill at processing each type of data. Re: resolution, there's an inherent resolution advantage to mono due to the fact no interpolation is required to form the image, but on the other hand interpolation algorithms for OSC debayering are extremely advanced these days, making that resolution disadvantage vanish in practice, in my experience anyway! (further options are available to osc users too, you can bayer-drizzle rather than interpolate, totally restoring any lost spatial resolution) Hope that helps!

[@mikemccann8822]

Soooo, a year later, what steps are you using in your LRGB processing, what new skills should we learn

[@lukomatico]

Oh man, that's a whole can of worms Mike!! :-D I'll definitely have to make a new video at some point as things have very much moved on in my workflow, thanks for the reminder! Clear skies!

[@rickcrume739]

can you turn the volume up

[@lukomatico]

Sorry Rick! This is a really old video of mine, thankfully things have improved now haha Clear skies!

[@dazza1639]

great tutorial! can I share it on twitter? I would like to tag you in but I don't know if you are on twitter.

[@lukomatico]

Sure Dazza no problem! I don't have a twitter but don't worry about it, Thank you for watching, I'm really glad you liked it :)