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.
Hello,
I run my PC with Linux Mint 21.1/Cinnamon. After a fatal hardware-crash I had to reinstall everything and I took the opportunity to upgrade to APP 2.0.0-beta19.
Now, my stacking-results look strange - here is an example of M20.
I must state that the stack does not contain any calibration-frames as the recording is done with a Stellina Smart-Telescope. If I try to integrate frames from my C11 (and include darks, flats, darkflats and BIAS), the result looks a little better.
In the APP-forum, I have found this post but the solution (check the "hot pixel kappa" box) did not work for me.
Finally, I have downgraded back to 1.083.2 again and everything looks good as before:
So - where is the problem? In my opinion, it shouldn't be a matter of star recognition (currently set to 500) as the area around M20 contains a lot of stars (see picture 2) and - as mentioned - it works with the old version.
My general integration settings are (and always were):
integrate: average
weights: quality
local normalization rejection: adaptive rejection with kappa high = 2.8
local normalization correction: 2nd degree LNC / 3 iterations
Does anyone have any ideas?
CS, Jochen
Did you try the option: cosmic ray / noise reducer in the analyse stars tab? This is likely what will fix this as we had some changes here that make most data registration more robust, but without calibration files you likely need this option.
Hi Vincent,
I do not want to mess up my working 1.083.2 version - so I have installed an additional 2.0.0-beta19 inside a Windows VM for testing purpose.
I get the same blurry result and it makes no difference whether the "cosmic ray / noise reducer" in the "analyse stars"-tab is checked or not.
So - I can clearly say, that it is not a Linux problem as for the Windows-Version the problem is the same!
Regards, Jochen
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I have also tried to reduce the #stars target to 60 - still, the result is the same...
Ok, that is interesting, I wonder if APP is registering on the hot pixels, which is why that reducer is there. If that still doesn't work it may very well be due to the lack of dark frames. Are you able to upload your dataset for me to try?
Hi Vincent!
Thank you for your effort! I have now uploaded the two sessions into different folders which I had combined to one stack.
Regards, Jochen
PS: no hurry - 1.083.2 works fine for me for the moment!
Looking at the result now, are you able to go for more than 10s per sub? I think that will be beneficial to increase the signal to noise ratio. The noise is definitely the problem. I integrated each session separately.
Session 1 settings:
- Tab 2; hot pixel kappa to 2.0
- Tab 3; cosmic reducer set to 10
Session 2 settings:
- Tab 2; hot pixel kappa to 2.0
- Tab 3; cosmic reducer to 17
Due to the high noise this has to be set quite high and we changed this as it is more robust for other tricky datasets.
The result of session 2, I think session 1 isn't contributing much due to lack of signal (right click the image to open it in a new tab):
I played a bit with the stretch, calibrated as much light pollution as possible and cropped off the difficult parts, color corrected the stars, upped saturation and added contrast. Is the stellina able to dither? The noise that looks like diagonal stripes is walking noise, which can be removed by dithering during the data collection.
Hi Vincent,
Thank you - but hmm... I am not yet convinced with the result. The Stellina-Roboscope is basically an APO on an Alt/AZ mount with a field rotator. Therefore, unfortunately settings are very limited. For example, there is no way to create flats (due to the field rotator), there is no way to dither and the maximum exposure time is 20s. The M20 was taken from Stellinas pre-defined catalogue of targets and the preset exposure for this object is 10s.
Still, with the 1.083.2 I can archive reasonably good results without having to set hot pixel kappa or cosmic reducer.
For example - this is the result of 4 sessions (it includes the 2 sessions I have uploaded). It has been stacked with 1.083.2 with the settings mentioned in post #1 and it is post-processed with PI and PS. Exposure is 612x10s = 1,7 hrs
So - IMHO something severe must have changed between the versions of APP - but what?
Regards, Jochen
Sorry, missed your reply! So, I only used 2 sessions and did not external processing, the issue I'm seeing is walking noise for sure. With more data, and postprocessing you can stretch that into the background (which is why you have a darker backround). Do you have a screenshot without postprocessing from APP between 1.083 and 2.0?
Hi Vincent - don't worry - as I said it is not an urgent matter as 1.083 is working fine.
I did some more testing and I have attached some stacking-results without any post-processing (except auto-stretch in PI and turn/flip the picture).
This is the (raw) picture as it comes out of 1.083 (91% Integration (=161x10s) | integrate=average, weights=quality | adaptive rejection on with kappa high=2.8 | LNC 2nd deg./ 3 iterations):
1.083 stack:
Then, I have tried the same in 2.0.0-beta with the same settings as in 1.083 - still without setting the hot-pixel kappa and cosmic reducer. This does the "bad result":
2.0.0-beta19 stack without hot-pixel kappa and cosmic reducer:
Then, I did the same in 2.0.0-beta with the additional settings you have recommended AND I have stacked both sessions separately with the hot pixel kappa settings you had recommended:
Session1: hot pixel kappa=2.0 | cosmic reducer=10Â Session 2: hot pixel kappa=2.0 | cosmic reducer=17
I have then combined the stacks of Session 1 and 2 into one and I must say, that the result seems to be even a little better than the 1.083 result. The background has less walking noise and seems to bee a little smoother and cleaner.
2.0.0-beta19 stack with hot-pixel kappa and reducer:
I will try to play with my settings. Apart from Stellina... with my other telescopes, I do not have these kind of problems as I can use calibration-frames and dithering.
Thank you so far!
Regards, Jochen
