The guy at the star party in Tucson said 30 seconds was too long for M42, and my first shot proved him wrong
He watched me punch in 30 sec at ISO 800 on my old Canon and just shook his head, but when I stacked those frames at home the core was blown out completely and I ended up dropping to 10 sec and losing all the faint dust, so now I'm stuck wondering if I should chase the faint stuff or the trapezium, what do you all do for Orion?
Stacking 30 sec frames is actually the right call if you want that faint dust, you just gotta mask the core or shoot a second set of short frames and blend them. Dropping to 10 sec and losing the dust means the guy was only half right, short subs fix the core but kill the nebula. Chase both, take your 10 sec set for the trapezium and a 30 sec set for the outer stuff, then stack each and combine them later.