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.
Here's my first-ever mosaic, a 2 x 2 of NCG7000. got my coordinates from Telescopius, imported them, and created a Plan in my ASIAir. Set the overlap (in Telescopius) to 15% and processed the images (15 300-second exposures per panel) using Astro Pixel Processor. Any idea what went wrong? What would you all need to know to help me fix the problem? I selected "mosaic" under the register tab and scale stop of 10. In the integrate tab, I used LNC with 1st degree option and default iterations (3). I also enables multiband blending (10%). Yikes!
Mmm, did you also switch on distortion correction and advanced normalization, star amount to about 2000? If so, I suspect you're missing some overlap in the middle where there might simply not be data. Can you tell maybe by looking at the panels separately, if they have a bit of overlap?
@fentonm Looks like you're using an ASI533 camera with a square sensor. I am afraid you simply didn't plan the mosaic correctly. Would you by chance have screenshots of images of the individual panes?
@wvreeven - here's the panels I used from Telescopius coordinates and what the actually images were using Astronomy.net.
@wvreeven - and yes, I'm using an ASI533MC pro. Here's the panels I wanted to use per Telescopius... I imported the CSV data into the ASIAir.
@vincent-mod - dynamic distortion correction, yes, but not advanced normalization.
@fentonm It looks like Telescopius or ASIAir didn't get something right. The whole in the middle isn't caused by APP. There are no data there.
@fentonm I have had another look at your mosaic plan and at your images. The camera was rotated at about 40° which introduced the gap in the center. Please make sure that the camera is rotated with the sensor sides straight up. You can do this by looking at the USB ports on the back of the camera. Those are (more or less) aligned with the sensor and will help you find the right rotation. If your telescope doesn't allow for rotating the camera then you can tell Telescopius the rotation angle for your camera and it will take it into account when creating your mosaics. Either of the two will prevent gaps in the future.
For now you can shoot images centered on the gap so your mosaic still is usable.
@fentonm Does that mean that that indeed was the problem and you managed to solve it?
@wvreeven - I did measure the rotation angle in advance this time and tried again using that rotation value when getting my location data from Telescopius. The 4 panels weren't perfectly aligned in the end, but I didn't have to crop too much. My concern now is that there are areas in the mosaic that looked stretched,with egg-shaped stars, but other areas look fine (see attached photo). I integrated and looked at each of the 4 panels separately and they all look perfect (no stretching). Thoughts as to what's going on? Thanks!
You can try again, but without turning on dynamic distortion correction. Sometimes, when it's not needed, it can cause artefacts.
@vincent-mod - that fixed the problem! Thanks so much!
