As with any kind of data-processing, which is what much of astrophotography is, “garbage in, garbage out”. If you start with poor data, there’s only so much you can do to clean up it into something that looks pretty, which means that good images start with good data. For me, that usually means setting up either in my yard or the observatory at the nearby park (Battle Point Park/Ritchie Obseravtory) and settling in for the night to get as many hours of data on my target of choice as possible.
