ALTAI 294C No buttons to adjust white balance in SharpCap

Discussion of features and issues relating to Altair Astro Cameras
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Corto46
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Joined: Fri Aug 19, 2022 1:55 pm

ALTAI 294C No buttons to adjust white balance in SharpCap

#1

Post by Corto46 »

Hello ,I contact you from south of France , sorry for my English.

I use an Altair 294C camera with SharpCap and I am surprise by the fact that there are no buttons to adjust colour balance in RVB format in SharpCap image control window while these buttons are available in AltairCapture. What is the reason ?

I know that in RAW and FITS format it is not a problem , I use for colors balance adjustment software like SIRIL. But to see for exemple the moon in live view having the possibility to adjust colors will be usefull.

I tried the Adjust button but the result is a moon picture in black and white. What is the exact function of this button ?

Thank for you support
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Re: ALTAI 294C No buttons to adjust white balance in SharpCap

#2

Post by admin »

Hi,

thanks for your post. I will need to investigate whether the colour balance controls can be added to SharpCap. I have looked at the SDK and it seems there are some ways that I could set the white balance, but I have never tested using them. I am away at the moment, but will investigate this when I return.

thanks,

Robin
Corto46
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Re: ALTAI 294C No buttons to adjust white balance in SharpCap

#3

Post by Corto46 »

Thank you very much Robin.
I discover progressively all the SharpCap functionnalities and I am really impresived.
No emergency for color balance buttons, it will be nice to have it if it is possible.

Best Regards
Christian
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Re: ALTAI 294C No buttons to adjust white balance in SharpCap

#4

Post by admin »

Hi,

I just investigated this and there is an option for Altair cameras to set the R/G/B white balance, but it has two drawbacks...

1) It only works in RGB mode, not in RAW mode, so useless for the majority of imagers
2) Like almost all white balance adjustments it is a post-processing step applied to the digital image data, so increasing the red level (for instance) multiplies all red pixel values by say 1.75 - this leads to data loss due to gappy histograms and possibly increased saturation.

I think it's probably best not to worry about this one and fix the colour balance in post-processing.

cheers,

Robin
Corto46
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Re: ALTAI 294C No buttons to adjust white balance in SharpCap

#5

Post by Corto46 »

Hello,
Sorry for my late response. I understand the technical constraints. So I would have the same constraints in Live Stacking, no possibility to adjust the white balance ?

Best Regards

Christian
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Re: ALTAI 294C No buttons to adjust white balance in SharpCap

#6

Post by admin »

Hi Christian,

live stacking has a colour adjustment control to the right of the main histogram, which lets you tweak the red/green/blue levels. These tweaks are applied to the stacked image as displayed on screen, and the image when saved 'as seen'. That means that you can change the adjustments as much as you like without affecting the underlying stacked data.

See https://docs.sharpcap.co.uk/4.0/#Histogram%20Tab for more info.

thanks,

Robin
Corto46
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Re: ALTAI 294C No buttons to adjust white balance in SharpCap

#7

Post by Corto46 »

Merci Robin for your answser and you clear explanation
Have a nice day
Christian
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