Spot the difference: Sun in White Light, 7th September

[JamesF]

I've been sitting on this image from 7th September for a few days because I wanted to work out why I couldn't stack the TIFF files produced from the RAW files from my 450D, and I've had a few niggles with PIPP along the way that thanks to Chris I now have a workaround for.

So, I have four images here, all from the same imaging run of 120 frames, stacked with Registax v5, v6 and AS!2. AS!2 did its own thing, but in Registax I stacked 54 frames. Other than that the processing is as identical as I could make it, both in wavelets (which I also used after AS!2) and Photoshop. I'll list which is which in a reply so you can play "which is best?" if you'd like to. Each image is a link to a larger 1024x1024 version.

James

[JamesF]

And the images are:

1. JPEG files from the camera, processing in Registax v5. v6 didn't want to play with them.

2. RAW files, processed with PIPP and Registax v5.

3. RAW files, processed with PIPP and Registax v6.

4. RAW files, processed with AS!2, wavelets in Registax v5.

James

[Cath]

No 3 I like the best as it appears to have slightly more details.

All nice though (well, the last 3

[JamesF]

Thank you

For me I think it's a tough call between the last two. Having stacked the JPEG files up to this point because that's all I could get to work (and, to be fair, having been fairly happy with the outcome at the time) I was quite shocked when I saw the difference between those and the others. AS!2 does seem a bit moody sometimes, but the others are not without their own foibles either.

James

[cgarry]

Excellent comparison James, I have been meaning to do something similar myself. Firstly I am surprised at just how bad the jpeg version is compared to the others. I always thoughts the results from stacking the jpeg images was quite good, but being side by side with the tiff versions does show it up.

For me it is between image 3 and image 4, with 3 just winning because 4 has a small purple spot on it near the top sun spot. If it was not for that spot I would have gone for 4.

Cheers,

Chris

[JamesF]

The JPEG does look very "soft", doesn't it? I think I'll try the same thing next time I manage to get out and see what the results are like just to make sure it isn't a one-off. I've transferred all my image data off my Windows machine now to make space for other images otherwise I'd try images from a few other days.

James

[cgarry]

Repeating the experiment is well worth doing, just to prove it was now a fluke! The surface detail in the Reg6 and AS!2 versions seems to be way better than the others, I guess that shows the power of the multi-point alignment.

Chris

[Montana]

I definitely like 3 or 4 the best

Alexandra