SharpCap Forums

Anyone have any suggestions on what Debayer mosaic pattern to process a Sharpcap LiveStack image from a ToupTek IMX571 colour camera (RAW16) or how to find it out from the stack files? I looked in the stack file text attachment but couldn't see any mention.

I get this with Debayer in Pixinsight if I use mosaic pattern of Auto. RGGB and GBRG seem to work but not sure I am getting the best colour out of it - seems gray most times.

Any help appreciated. Thanks, Ken

Demosaicing of 1 target files.
* Loading target file: M:/PixInsight/2022-05-21/M51/21_34_20/Stack_16bits_30frames_3600s.fits
38 FITS keywords extracted
*** Error: Unable to acquire CFA pattern information: Required image metadata not available.

* Applying error policy: Continue on error.
*** Error: No image could be demosaiced.
<* failed *>

Hi,

shine a red torch into the telescope and look at the image in SharpCap - cycle through the options until you get one that shows red on the image and you have the right pattern for SharpCap. Then take a snapshot and check it looks right in PixInsight too.

cheers,

Robin

Thanks for the tips. Red light shows up under Capture for both RAW16 and RGB24 for captures and livestacks. What other options should I cycle through - tried Debayer preview of all and each shows red - should I set that from On to a specific scheme before Livestacking?

Thanks,
Ken
Lifetime SharpCap licensee

Hi Ken,

odd that everything shows as red - you would expect to see red in one setting, blue in another and a purple effect with checker overlay in the other two. The one that shows red is correct, the blue one is red swapped with blue but green correct and the other two are greens swapped with red/blue.

Can you share a single captured frame in FITS format please - ideally of something with some identifiable colour so it's possible to tell what the colours should be.

Also, remember to check the saving settings page as there is an option for how the bayer pattern info is written to the FITS headers - that's because, for instance, PixInsight and AstroPixelProcess disagree about the right bayer pattern for the same image file!

cheers,

Robin

Ken

Can you post the FITS Image Headers from FITS Liberator (or equivalent) for a frame. Something like



I have just been through this when using a trial version of PixInsight with some older data. I ended up with an image of a land based object - whose colours I could plainly see. You will have to zoom in to read the 'Debayer Preview' dropdown menu.



Pixinsight needs 2 items to debayer correctly - ROWORDER (TOP-DOWN or BOTTOM-UP) and BAYERPAT. If either of these are missing (I have come across that problem) in the FITS header then you will need to work out the values and force both the CFA pattern and the row order.

Dave

Robin - "odd that everything shows as red - you would expect to see red in one setting, blue in another and a purple effect with checker overlay in the other two. The one that shows red is correct, the blue one is red swapped with blue but green correct and the other two are greens swapped with red/blue."

It looks like I didn't reset the Livestack to get the change. Once I changed the Debayer preview to something other than On/RGGB and pressed the Clear button on Livestack it displayed correctly - if I didn't press Clear (initiate new Stack) plus Resume it would show just red like On/RGGB.

My bad (as they say here)

Thanks again.
Ken

Thanks Dave - humming again and appreciate your help.

Regards,
Ken