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 imaged Orion last night using my Canon 1200d with EF 50mm STM lens.
The calibrated images look ok individually but I ended up with this final image. I have never come across this before. Anyone know what is going on here?
Peter
Just to add that I put all the calibrated images in DSS and it resulted in a rectangular integrated image. So, something is going on in APP.
Peter
Looks like the stars are registered correctly, so to me it looks more like it did a distortion correction (which would make some sense given you use a normal lens). Not sure though this looks good then, could you post a crop without the edges to see if the image actually looks ok? Did you have "dynamic distortion correction" on?
Looks like the stars are registered correctly, so to me it looks more like it did a distortion correction (which would make some sense given you use a normal lens). Not sure though this looks good then, could you post a crop without the edges to see if the image actually looks ok? Did you have "dynamic distortion correction" on?
Thanks Vincent. Yes DDC was on. I processed this exactly as I normally process an image through a scope.
Peter
Hi Peter @petercpc and Vincent @vincent-mod,
Indeed the weird shape is the result of having distortion correction enabled on data where it is not needed. It's a bug and I have been working to get this fixed in the next release 😉
In the next version, APP will be able to automatically decide if distortion correction is needed.
Technically, optical distortion correction is the correction of the geometry difference of the data compared to a perfect rectilinear projection. Something normal objectives and all amateur telescopes will try to do, i.e. try to project the data rectilinear.
APP can calculate accurate correction models if the images have a large translation, rotation or scale difference between them. In this case where the bug happens, these differences are too small and when distortion correction is enabled in that case, we get a mathematical problem that distorts the result.
The bug should be gone in APP 1.072 😉
Kind regards,
Mabula
Thanks Mabula. Good to know.
Peter
Vincent, i gt the exact same thing happen to me on M45 . it looked like a 1960 TV , rounded bottom/top.
whats going on here ? Ok Mabula is working on it on the next release! Koool.
Hi @rcfmitch,
Indeed the weird shape is the result of having distortion correction enabled on data where it is not needed. It's a bug and I have been working to get this fixed in the next release
Simply disable distortion correction in 4) and all should be fine 😉 , it should not happen again in APP 1.072 !
Mabula
