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.
Finally got a good image of m45 from the backyard. For fun I stacked this first in another program and it turned out...poor. APP did a good job on light pollution and background. Being in the city I am reduced to taking 30sec subs, so took 300 of them and am pleased with results. PS was used post for secondary curves and levels. Gear was ES127APO, canon t3i. Auto focus on the way!
Very nice! Throw a t-shirt over the end and point it at a white wall. Apply a flat or two and those dust circles go away like magic as well. I feel your pain on 30s subs. Stack the crap out of them, we must.
Thanks X. I did flats the first night, but accidentally unplugged the camera power and didn't take flats night 2. I'm going to re-process with a few more lights and Photoshop out the dust motes and re-post.
Looks great Greg !
M45 is one of my favorite objects 😉
Auto focus should be very good, I think that looking at the stars, the data could have been just out of focus, on the other hand, bad transparency can also be the cause off course.
Cheers,
Mabula
Yes I think my focuser sags and slips I get it dead on with a bathinov mask and it turns out like that before long. I have a 3 in feather touch on the way also. 🙂
Ok, yes, I thought it was off, very bad weather can cause it to look like this as well though, so it's hard to be certain.
3"FT + motor focus... Great upgrades to look forward to 😉
Mabula
Thanks Mabula, and for your SCC SAT tip. I reprocessed the Pleiades using just 117/400+ subs. SAT then set to 0.40 with SAT Th at 0.1, and .....Star Color! It is all blueish from PS manipulations, but looks like I'm on the right track for good subs.
