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, I shoot with two DSLRs mounted on a single tracker. One has a dual-narrowband Ha-Oiii filter and the other just a regular light pollution filter. As the cameras are never super perfectly aligned and also have slightly different sensors (one is Nikon D810A, the other D850), I intend to use the powerful multi-session capability of APP. But then ther does not seem to be an option to select the Demosaic PER SESSION. I would like to do Ha-Oii for one and AiryDisc for the other. Is this possible? If not, what is the suggested workaround? My understanding is the Demosaic is a global setting (affects all sessions).
Appreciate any hints.
--Simon
@headworx Hi Szymon, your understanding is correct. This is not possible with the current version of APP but Mabula has it on his todo and this will come in a future version of APP. Until then you will need to process the data of the two filters separately and then register the integration results against each other to be able to continue processing them together.
Thanks for confirming Wouter!
I have tried the two separate sessions approach, but then when I loaded the resulting FITS as lights, the APP threw an exception during the integration step (which I have not captured). Will attempt to retry this again tonight and will post the results (or the error details).
Thanks!
-S
OK it worked this time. Thanks for the suggestions and looking forward to the streamlined workflow in the upcoming version.
I really do like the results (probably even too much by oversaturating the image 😀 ). This is **only** about 1h worth of data, two DSLR cameras, one with a dual narrowband Ha-Oiii, the other with a broadband light pollution filter, Bortle 5 zone. And I was late - half of Orion was already below the horizon.
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-S
looking forward to the streamlined workflow in the upcoming version.
Note that I wrote "a future version" and not "the next version". I am not sure if this will be in the next version, which is why I wrote it like that.
Yeah yeah. No worries 🙂 I'm in the software business myself. I know how it works 🙂
-S
