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.
I was creating some new master flats and chose "Automatic" as the integration method. I loaded 30 subs, yet APP still used median as the integration method when I read the output from the console as it was working. This is in contrast to what I've always read that if you have more than 20 subs you should choose average.
Is this correct behavior?
Yes indeed, that is correct behaviour.
For masterflat creation, the automatic integration will always use median integration. Reason being that it prevents a lot of issues with flatpanels 😉 and/or short exposed flats. Simply said, to get a proper masterflat, in most cases, median integration of your flats is much more robust for good flat-field calibration.
And yes, for bias, darks/darkflats, lights you definitely want to use average over median with more than 20 frames. Reason being that average integration is superior to median integration when it comes to noise reduction, and that fact... is almost never a problem with MasterFlats. The Signal to Noise Ratio is already very good of single flats, let alone of a MasterFlat.
So the rule does not apply really for flats. If you have good stable flats, then by all means integrate with average if you wish, but it will very likely not affect the noise levels in your final light frame integrations significantly.
Kind regards,
Mabula
Excellent. Thank you so much for that quick reply.
