2026-10-09 APP 2.0.0-beta48 has been released !
This is mainly a bug fix release for the reported bugs in beta47. In addition it has a significant User Interface performance improvement noticable when you need to process 1000s of images in APP.
2026-10-03 APP 2.0.0-beta47 has been released !
This is a very big release... many code optimizations/rewrites, many parts of APP are much faster and more precise, especially star analysis and registration are much faster ! Big mosaics will go much faster 🙂
And we introduce a new preview filter, which includes the new Adaptive Deep Sky Stretch and a General Levels Stretch, this has been long over due. The old preview filter (the panel on the right side to stretch and preview your data) has not been updated for a couple of years and it is a critical part of any APP session.
Adaptive Deep Sky Stretch or ADSS is a much more intuitive stretch algorithm. It is also color preserving (which is a great new addition in itself ! ) which means that the highlights are no longer bleached, color is maintained from the linear data while stretching. You can simply stretch your data using the sky background level and signal width sliders which work much easier and more intuitive. You no longer need to fiddle with the old complicated sliders with zoom buttons. All the zoom buttons for the sliders are made redundant. And you can enter slider values in the slider value fields yourself. I will make a youtube video in the coming days to explain and fully introduce ADSS. Once the video is ready, it will be highlighted on the forum.
RGB Combine upgrade !. The RGB Combine Tool has been rewritten mostly. The tool is faster and easier to use and most importantly, the Luminance slider to inject a luminance channel or channels into the RGB composite is now working correctly. It no longer bleaches the RGB colors. Combined with the new ADSS preview, you will get much better and easier great composites with great color! I will also explain this in a new youtube video.
Hi all,
Getting a reproducible hard crash in beta41 on my Sony A7 IV .ARW files. JVM aborts and the window just disappears. Wanted to flag it here in addition to the email I sent to support (with the .ips files attached).
Setup: macOS 26.4.1, Apple Silicon (MacBook Pro 18,3), APP 2.0.0-beta41 on GraalVM 24.0.1+9.1. Shot on Sony A7 IV, 14-bit ARW, ISO 8000, 4 s subs. 51 lights / 15 darks / 16 flats of comet C/2025 R3 (PanSTARRS).
What I've tried:
- Full set (lights + darks + flats), defaults on 2) CALIBRATE → "create Masters & assign to Lights" → crash every time, 5-10 s in.
- Lights-only (no darks/flats). Got past master generation / assign a couple of times, but then crashed at 3) ANALYSE STARS instead. Same signature.
- RAM slider at default (512 MB) and at max — same crash either way, so it doesn't look memory-related.
- Cmd+Q and relaunch between attempts.
Crash signature (from the .ips):
- Exception Type: EXC_BAD_ACCESS (SIGABRT)
- Exception Subtype: KERN_INVALID_ADDRESS at 0x0000000000008188
- Triggered by Thread 75 (Java: pool-91-thread-1)
- Crashing frame:
arm_libRawConverter.jnilib Java_com_ariesproductions_rawConversion_LibRawConverter_getRawData + 344
The crash is in the native raw decoder (getRawData), and the fact that it also crashes at analyse-stars with lights-only lines up — star analysis re-reads each light through the same decoder. Looks like a null-pointer deref at a small struct offset (0x8188), which feels like a header/metadata parsing issue specific to these ARWs.
Anyone else seeing this? Happy to send sample .ARWs if it helps repro.
Thanks, Gwen
Hi Gwen @gwencruise,
Thank you very much for sharing the issue with us.
The camera model Sony A7 IV with ARW files was fully tested in APP some time ago already. Today, I have tested all of our ARW test files from this model on my Apple M4 macbook Pro and all was fine, no crashes.
Can you check if perhaps some of the frames are corrupt somehow? Did you see in the Console Panel on which frame it crashes? Your description seems to indicate that the files are recognized fine and initially a couple will load after which a crash occurs on a particular arw file.
Please upload a small batch of ARW files that will produce the error so I can test it and find the issue and also avoid APP crashing on this in the future.
https://upload.astropixelprocessor.com/
username: uploadData
password: uploadTestData
Please make a folder with your name and issue like : Gwen-SonyARW-issue
And upload the files there and please let me know once done, i will look at it as soon as possible.
Thanks,
Mabula
