Hi Tim, actually what I did was just very slow stretching, manually, and then a very small and highly diffuse mask, just enough to compensate the stretching, so the core could get something like 20% stretch and the outer part the 100%, it was the only way I imagine to create a sort of distribution of intensity in the strength of the stretching, to say it in a way.
Thanks Nick, the cluster is quite luminous, so I am planning a longer exposure, in total, but stacking exposures of no more than 10 to15 seconds each. I have some friends that actually mix, short with long exposures.
Very cool capture!
I now and then do some experimenting with it too but then in the realms of lucky imaging with <1 second exposures with of course the big disadvantage of very long stacking times :p
Menno
Meade LX200 8" f/10 ACF OTA / Ioptron CEM25EC / Zwo ASI071MC Pro / Zwo ASI482MC