[Sticky] Comet Registration in Astro Pixel Processor 1.083-beta1 - video tutorial

Hello, where can i download the beta version with comet application ?

See the right side of the forum, under “Downloads”.

My first attempt with the new comet routine in version 1.083 Beta.
I followed the tutorial and it worked exactly as presented. THANKS!!!!!
126 x 30 second images at 1600iso. Canon 60Da & Canon lens at 75mm focal length
Camera mounted on an iOptron IEQ30. Images captured using BACKYARD EOS.

Shot at Doughton Park Picnic area along the Blue Ridge Parkway in Laurel Springs, North Carolina. About 4,000 feet elevation

@vincent-mod thanks, done

Video is good, but program not do it right... I tried on four of my comets, some went through well, others worse because of the fuzzy core of the comet, I had to confirm the comet’s position several times during registration.

However, I had the most problems with the comet, which I recorded with the tracking method on the comet itself. The program completely failed. I ask the author not to do registration only on a comet (no stars) or otherwise that it is possible to register only on one star-comet.

I can send you a 16 light+22 darks - recorded with the tracking method on the comet itself.... the star are not dots but small lines for testing.

That might mean your data has an issue as it seems to work on a lot of data now. Can you share a screenshot of 1 light frame?

You don't understand ... tracking a comet just creates that kind of image ! I stak in program ''Fitswork'' only on comet - one star.

 APP does not work on such images... yet ?!

At the moment it needs to be able to register on stars yes, plus this is a beta version where we only need to know if comet stacking works on most data sets. Having star trails won't work (yet).

Seen the tutorial on this process. Pretty Nice. Way to go. Look forward to using it in the future. 

Kip

A new version is close and will have some nice added functionality. 🙂

What processing method/steps would you recommend when bright stars intersect comet's coma or tail?

Ideally it would be nice to separate star field and nebulosity/dust clouds from pixels representing the coma and tail of the comet so they can be stacked separately and recombined later, and having the comet pixels on black background. That will keep pinpoint stars and nebulosity sharp and comet will be sharp too.

I mean removing star trails is nice when you don't have anything else in the background, but often there are dust clouds and galaxies etc in the background and as the result of stacking images registered on comet they all get smeared.

To improve rejection of stars with my slow-moving comet I tried stacking 3 sets of every 3d frame in sequence, but the result seems to be the opposite - brighter star trails... I'm using kappa 8.0-1.1

Yes, that should be possible in the next version actually as far as I understood.

@vincent-mod When is that coming out? beta1 was in July...

Unfortunately it is still not clear when the next version will be made available. Sorry for the delay. 

@mseningmail-com Yes, this one is taking more time. This is also due to Mabula moving to his own office etc. He is very far with it though and I really think it's pretty imminent now. We asked him for an update on it.

Every day I click open the forum looking for the new release like a kid jumping out of bed on Xmas morning, but no, maybe tomorrow 😀 

Yeah we know, we can't push it more than we already do. We asked Mabula about the status and hope to hear back from him very soon, this usually means he's working like crazy on it though. 😉

Hi!

If the version is still released this year, will the function be integrated here in which you can stack comet and stars together? In the video it was mentioned that this should be in the next version, but I wanted to ask for safety again if this is still up to date?

It is yes. Apologies for the delay, Mabula has also been moving etc. so it's been a very busy couple of months for him. I do expect it within weeks.

Hello Mabula & Vinvent,

I used the new comet registration feature a lot and it works fairly well for brighter comets. But I failed to register comet cores if they are dim and a brighter star is within the green square.
This is a pity, I think it would help if the dimensions of the "catching area" could be changed!

Best regards
Helmut

@helmut-dannbauerdrei-at I have passed on your request to Mabula.

Thank you!!!

@helmut-dannbauerdrei-at Mabula told me that the comet registration will work differently in APP 1.083. The green square will resize automatically accordingly to the size of the comet. He is familiar with your use case of a bright star nearby and says that that should be fixed as well.

That sounds good, I crave for the new version!

Worked as advertised! Very nice tool.

I finally have collected some decent data on Leonard... Any update on the combined stars and comet stacking?

@sperho it works great. See my image above.