Can we talk about how I was framing astro photos completely wrong?

I used to always crank the saturation way up on Orion Nebula shots thinking it made them pop. Then I saw a side-by-side comparison from a guy on AstroBin who kept processing natural and the detail in the dust lanes was actually better without all that color noise. Has anyone else backed off on processing after seeing a cleaner version?

2 comments

2 Comments

palmer.jana9d ago

wait is that not the way to do it?? i feel like i been going too hard on saturation for years now. i saw a side by side too where someone kept the colors super subtle and the whole thing looked way more 3D like you could see the gas layers better. honestly it made me rethink all my old edits. i think i was just trying to make up for bad data by cranking knobs. now i'm slowly backing off and it's scary but the results do look cleaner even if they feel less dramatic at first.

wright.jesse9d agoMost Upvoted

Read a pro astrophotographer say the real skill is knowing when to stop tweaking.