Autostakkert and Sharpcap

[Oberon510]

I have an odd situation processing Jupiter today with Autostakkert and Sharpcap SER files. This seems to have occurred recently as my previous work with these has been fine.

What I am getting is something like a phase shift of the captured image from the SC SER file and the output PNG file has two images blurred together. The odd thing is that this occurred on 6 ser files today but one was OK - only difference was a GAIN change from 137 to 300.

When I just play (serplayer) the SER files that are affected there is a grey border around the image which equates to the image shift I see in ASI3 but the Jupiter image is relatively stable in the player. That grey border is not there in the good ser file which processes OK in ASI3.

Any thoughts on this?

Thanks,
Ken

[turfpit]

Ken

Can you post example images and camera settings files.

Dave

[Oberon510]

See attached.

Ken

[Oberon510]

Here is a frame from the SER file with the edge frame showing.

Could this be related to Planetary Image Stabilization option in SC?

Ken

[turfpit]

Ken

You could try centring & cropping the SER file using PIPP, see https://sites.google.com/site/astropipp ... /example1B, prior to stacking.

Could this be related to Planetary Image Stabilization option in SC?

I have no experience with this (always used PIPP if needed) and am unable to comment.

Has this started to happen since applying a version upgrade to SC?


Dave

[admin]

Hi,

you've used the 'planetary stabilization' feature in SharpCap which moves the image digitally to keep the planet steady. This puts a dark grey border onto the parts of the image that are 'missing' - ie were beyond the edge of the image before the image was moved. This is a deliberate feature to make sure you can see when you are running out of scope for stabilization to work if the planet is drifting (if I left this missing region black then you would not know anything until suddenly the edge of the planet started to vanish).

As Dave says, you could do a crop in PIPP, or (I suspect) you could make sure that no alignment points are selected in the grey area when stacking in AutoStakkert, although I have not tested the latter.

thanks,

Robin

[Oberon510]

Thanks Dave - the cropping in Pipp worked and then processed in ASI3.

Robin - not sure you can stack without alignment points in ASI3 - looked but couldn't see one. Thanks anyway. I may just disable Planetary stabilization for my processing software and because my tracking is pretty tight on my mount to not really need it anyway.

Ken

[admin]

Hi Ken,

my idea was to avoid alignment points in the outer area of the image where the border might be - make sure they are confined to the inner area where the planet is. For instance, if you let Autostakert place the alignment points automatically, you can then remove any near the borders usign the right mouse button.

cheers,

Robin

[turfpit]

Ken

Glad you managed to get sorted. That technique of centring and cropping is very useful when the atmosphere is very unsteady (as it often is for me).

I have found a little drift with planetary capture helps avoid needing flats when I use my 2x Barlow lens.

Dave

[Oberon510]

Thanks Robin, Dave

Robin - tried to clear and just select some inner alignment points but the stacked image output was still phase shifted/blurred liked the image I posted. I will do some more tests on the SER captures to see if there is anything else that resolves this for me with planet stabilization enabled.

For now I have a way forward.

Regards