Mar 28 2026 APP 2.0.0-beta40 will be released in 7 days.
It did take a long time to have the work finished on this and it will have a major performance boost of 30-50% over 2.0.0-beta39 from calibration to integration. We extensively optimized many critical parts of APP. All has been tested to guarantee correct optimizations. Drizzle and image resampling is much faster for instance, those modules have been completely rewritten. Much less memory usage. LNC 2.0 will be released which works much better and faster than LNC in it's current state. And more, all will be added to the release notes in the coming weeks...
Update on the 2.0.0 release & the full manual
We are getting close to the 2.0.0 stable release and the full manual. The manual will soon become available on the website and also in PDF format. Both versions will be identical and once released, will start to follow the APP release cycle and thus will stay up-to-date to the latest APP version.
Once 2.0.0 is released, the price for APP will increase. Owner's license holders will not need to pay an upgrade fee to use 2.0.0, neither do Renter's license holders.
Hello folks, first off let me offer my congratulations on a brilliant product. Kudos to the product creation team!
I am interested in understanding a best practice for integrating prior calibrated photos. (as a newbie to astrophotography I am still in the early stages of drinking from a firehose!) Currently I'm using a Canon Ha modified 60D for taking OSC photos and although I've ordered a light pollution filter...like everything else astro... nothing has arrived yet and the used market is picked clean. My skies are Bortle 8 and I've taken several nights of ISO400/30s shots of M101. Each independent couple hours of so exposures were calibrated and integrated.
Now that I have some photos from separate nights shot at same exposure and ISO (each with lights, flats and a master bias file at that iso) that I've independently calibrated and integrated is it better (from a SNR perspective and overall picture quality) to:
A) Integrate the two completely calibrated pictures together (no further calibration of course)
B) Integrate the two or more separate nights of many many raw files and use the Master calibration files for each session correctly to combine them all? (obviously this will take a very long time and require a LOT of memory...seems not optimum but if that is the best way then so be it.)
C) some other method?
As a part 2, does it matter if I'm using a DSLR versus a OSC or Mono dedicated, cooled astronomy camera? (I ask this as I've recently purchased a mono camera and filters and will eventually run into the same kind of question for this.)
Thanks so much and I a fully expect to continue to be a raving fan of what you've done here! Keep up the great work.
Jerry
Hello folks, first off let me offer my congratulations on a brilliant product. Kudos to the product creation team!
Hi Jerry, thanks for the kind words and thanks for using it!
I'm not jealous at all at your bortle 8 sky. 😉
Now that I have some photos from separate nights shot at same exposure and ISO (each with lights, flats and a master bias file at that iso) that I've independently calibrated and integrated is it better (from a SNR perspective and overall picture quality) to:
A) Integrate the two completely calibrated pictures together (no further calibration of course)
B) Integrate the two or more separate nights of many many raw files and use the Master calibration files for each session correctly to combine them all? (obviously this will take a very long time and require a LOT of memory...seems not optimum but if that is the best way then so be it.)
C) some other method?
It depends on the amount of data, if you have >40-50 frames per night, you can combine the integrated results without too much of a difference with doing it the long way. There is a difference, but with enough data I personally don't notice it and it becomes not worth the extra effort I think. You can always test for yourself once of course.
As a part 2, does it matter if I'm using a DSLR versus a OSC or Mono dedicated, cooled astronomy camera? (I ask this as I've recently purchased a mono camera and filters and will eventually run into the same kind of question for this.)
Yes, that matters a lot. A DSLR is not cooled and thus produces a lot more noise, besides that it usually has less signal to noise. It depends on the cooled camera you bought as well.
Thanks once again and if you have further questions, we're happy to answer them.
Vincent
