StarSatGuard [SSG] has been modified quite a lot. I removed access to the SSG Threshold value. This threshold is now permanently set at 65,534. I discovered that SSG can be used in tandem with a custom Multiplier to achieve the equivalent of a large histogram stretch which will protect the stars from saturating. The net result is that faint nebulosity in your astrophotos are much brighter and the color of bright stars is retained. The bloating of bright stars is avoided but their halos are brighter. I posted a write-up…
Tag: LIGHT frame
CaLIGHTs dynamic range compression
CaLIGHTs Version 3.1.9 One thing I have noticed when I am preparing my astrophotos is that whenever I stretch a stacked image to reveal the faint details this also causes the bright stars to bloat and become pure white. I could never get away from this issue. This is because the dynamic range in most DSO astrophotos is huge! Most of this dynamic range is gobbled up by the very bright stars with only a tiny bit of the dynamic range allocated to the faint nebulosity and/or galaxies. Over the…
Optimum Exposure Times
This tends to be a “Holy Grail” kind of topic. I have experienced far too many evenings where I have imaged for hours but the sky glow corrupted the images so badly that the images were not usable. I end up asking myself “would a longer exposure been a better choice?” or “was this just a night to keep the telescope in the house?I decided that I need to research this subject more. I have read lots about “swamping the Read Noise” which sounds like a good scheme. If I…
CaLIGHTs Introductory Videos
Effective April 21st I have released 8 Introductory Videos for my program called CaLIGHTs. The videos give a “Big Picture” overview of what CaLIGHTs is and all of it’s many features. Here is a link to the the CaLIGHTs Introductory Videos Playlist. Peter