The Soul Nebula. AKA LBN 667. AKA SH2-199. An emission nebula to be around 7500 light years away.

 For some reason it took me 4 tries processing this image. The first attempt I over adjusted on the curves. Everything that followed after the over curve adjustments resulted in a flushed, cloudy mess. I just wasn’t satisfied with the results I was getting on my second and third attempt processing.

On the fourth attempt I adjusted the curves for red, green, and blue individually. That really helped in keeping all 3 colors under control. The red is still a bit dominate using the L-Enhance but it’s not as bad as my first attempt which I will keep un-posted and maybe trash.

Another change in my current process is I minimized stars before I did some adjustments using Camera Raw Filter. In Camera Raw Filter I do some noise reduction and slight curve adjustments. I like the slight touches and results when doing changes in that filter.

Processing Steps in Photoshop:

• Color Balance
• Individual red, green, blue curve adjustments
• Gradient correction using GradientXTerminator
• Saturation Boost
• Vibrance Boost
• Noise Reduction using Astronomy tool – Space Noise Reduction action
• Noise Reduction using Astronomy tool – Deep Space Noise Reduction action
• Sharpening
• Minimized stars in Photoshop, 2 rounds
• Minimized stars using Astronomy tool – Make Stars Smaller action
• Noise reduction and curve adjustment in Camera Raw Filter
• Astronomy tool – Enhanced DSO and Reduce Stars action
• Astronomy tool – Less Crunchy More Fuzzy
• Smart Sharpen filter
• Luminosity overlay