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This is my January full Moon shot, an image of the famous nebula designed to emphasize the inner core detail and color. The challenge with this object is to apply a DDP curve in such a way as to not make the extremely bright core too flat looking, and rob it of its fine internal dark nebula details. A few special processing tricks were used to achieve this appearance. M43 can be surrounding the solitary bright star to the lower right.

Instrument:  12.5" f/5 Home made Newtonian
Platform:  Astrophysics 1200 QMD
CCD Camera:  SBIG ST8i NABG
Guider: SBIG ST4
Exposure:  RGB = 5:5:10
RGB Combine Ratio:  1: .8: 1.2
Filters:  RGB Tricolor
Location:  Payson, Arizona
Elevation:  5150 ft.
Sky:  Seeing FWHM = 3.5 arcsec , Transparency 8/10
Outside Temperature:  2 C
CCD Temperature:  -20 C
Processing Tools:  Maxim DL, RG Sigma, Photoshop, AIP4WIN, RW Debloomer.

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