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 have a number of images captured with a Mallincam DS16c (same Panasonic sensor as ZWO1600mc AFAK) that I have previously successfully integrated with PI but have run into issues doing the same thing with APP. If I process it with the master darks and flats I used in PI, I get an integrated image but APP does not see it as OSC. The images all have the fits tag COLORTYP='BGGR' but not BAYERPAT. If I toggle the force BAYER, processing fails as it claims my masters are one channel and the images are three -- when it is trying to normalize my images. Why are these calibration files even an issue at this point? I suppose I could rebuild the darks and flats but the camera is in a box as its been replaced with cooled cameras. Also, the capture applications were rather idiosyncratic when writing the fits headers -- some are tagged 'Light Frame' but a bunch are 'Dark Frame' even though they are lights. One of the reasons I have moved my captures to SGP.
Any thoughts as to what I can do to be able to process these older images?
Thanks,
Greg Latiak
Hi Greg, sorry for the delay.
So first off, you need to recreate calibration masters with APP first. APP uses a different calibration engine and it most likely won't calibrate well if created by another application. You're mentioning a problem with the fits headers which might cause issues as well. So, best thing would be to get some data that you're sure about is correct, with new masters for APP.
Thanks.
I will change my process flow to retain the raw files rather than build a library of masters as I am likely to continue using both APP and PI. Did not realize the differences in correction engines -- might be helpful as a user note in the software. As for the FIT headers -- that seems to be written by the data collection engine -- Mallincam Sky is very different from Sharpcap, Sequence Generator seems to have the most complete and least flaky headers. The DS16c is a nice camera with a big sensor but being uncooled its pretty noisy (same sensor as the ZWO1600mc).
greg
