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 thought I'd give APP a try and I use a rotator when imaging with my STL-11000 CCD so I have images taken on both sides of the meridian and therefore have east/west master flats. I'm guessing that to calibrate I'll need to separate the two and process individually. Is that correct or can APP tell the two apart and handle all flats and images making the correct match?
@sreilly24590 APP can tell the difference and no flats for either side of the meridian are needed. One set of flats that apply to all images will be sufficient.
I appreciate the reply but am confused. The image train isn't exactly center of the optics so there is a difference in the flats themselves. Can you explain how APP matches the flats to the frame defects please?
@sreilly24590 Sorry, I missed the rotator part. If you use the rotator to give the camera a different orientation before and after the meridian flip, then yes you need different flats. The best way for APP to process the images would be to load the images before the meridian flip in one session and the images after the meridian flip in another session. With images here I mean lights and flats. Darks, dark flats and bias are independent of camera rotation so only one set of those are needed and can be loaded in both sessions.
Again, if you use the rotator only for framing and not to change the camera orientation after the meridian flip then one set of flats will suffice and you can load all images in one session.
Yes, that makes sense as the image train is rotated 180 degrees to maintain the same guide star and object alignment. My imaging process has always been to take many darks and bias frames then create the masters and label as such.The flats are taken, calibrated, and the masters are generated and stored in a library for future use. So with this I would load say all luminance or other filter east side images with it's respective master dark and master flat, then calibrate. Repeat for all west side images and just change the respective master flat. Is that correct?
@sreilly24590 APP support multi-session processing so just load all east side images with their calibration frames in session 1 and all west side images with their calibration frames in session 2 and start processing.
Thanks I'll give it a go. I've been processing images for years so I'm curious how this program works.
