First light with RAW mod - Saturn

[Parallax]

I wasn't going to process this until tomorrow the morning but curiosity got the better of me.

I'm not sure what to make of it really. Yes, there appears to more detail than the 'standard' webcam but it seems very 'grainy'.

It could be that I need to get the settings sorted out. Maybe it's more critical now?

SW Explorer, 3x Tal, c400 frames of 500

[Trevor]

Try putting the Avi back through registax but this time click additional options and tick Bias Subtract top right, then carry on stacking the Avi.

See if it makes any difference.

[themos]

Are you sure you kept the capture at 5 fps? I've also found that the lowest wavelet numbers produce grainy images. The lowest numbers are, confusingly enough, nearer the top of the screen in the control panel. I am trying to stack about 4000 frames and I've found that the lowest numbers are only useful when you have a lot of frames. I assume you figured out the debayer controls in Registax.

As an aside, what quality estimator works best on Saturn, anybody know?

[legion48]

...Debayer Controls???....Bias Subtract???

What version of Registrax are these on? I've got 3 and 4 and I can't find them.

[centroid]

Very difficult to compare Steve, unless you had taken two images during the same session, one with camera handling the rudimentary processing, and another in RAW mode.

Its certainly looks to have some good detail, and I think a light 'Median' filter world 'smooth' out the grainy noise.

Dave

[Parallax]

Thanks everyone.

I had another go at it today (see new image) and I must have done something wrong stupid last night (it was late and my pillow was beckoning).

Trevor - I tried Bias Subtract but couldn't see what difference it was making

Thermos - Yes, 5fps

L48 - Version 4. Additional Options on the first screen

Dave - Now you've mentioned it I did intend to do a comparison between RAW and normal but forgot.

[Trevor]

Try opening the image in registax and moving the second slider to -5

[Cloudwatcher]

Try a bit of lighten,brighten and blur.

Cheers

CW

(click as usual)

[Tim]

Out of interest, did you go for full RAW mode, or just colour RAW mode?

TJ

[themos]

...Debayer Controls???....Bias Subtract???

What version of Registrax are these on? I've got 3 and 4 and I can't find them.

Relax! It's on version 4, click on the Align tab and then on Additional options sub-tab.

[legion48]

...Debayer Controls???....Bias Subtract???

What version of Registrax are these on? I've got 3 and 4 and I can't find them.

Relax! It's on version 4, click on the Align tab and then on Additional options sub-tab.

Ah, found 'em. No idea what they do though.

[Parallax]

TJ

After what you said regarding the colour optimised vs RAW mods I went for the full RAW mod.

It took me some time and a lot of head scratching to work out why, when I debayered, the colours came out wrong and the image zoomed in about 5x. Turns out it was the compression type - one of them doesn't work.

Steve

[Tim]

Ok good.

Yeh the debayering is a wiered science. From what i understand, it would be possible, it is certainly possible in K3CCD to extract the R G & B elements as well as the Luminance, and process them seperately. Then I guess you would have to restack them in PS or something?

When I find out how to do that, i'm gonna give it a go. It seems to me that on lunar images, just taking the RED element of the avi gives a whole lot more contrasty result.

TJ

[themos]

I feel like I'm missing something! If you have a colour CCD then you can only do the "colour Raw" and not the full Raw, isn't that right?

[Tim]

no themos, you ARE missing something!!

The full RAW mod, as long as you capture at 5fps, takes a proper RAW image. The colour Mod just sharpens the normal image up a bit.

[Sam]

How do you debayer? Does registax do this or do you have to run it through something else first then process the R,G and B avi seperately - then combine in PS or something?

[themos]

The full RAW mod that you describe is the one that makes the camera produce greyscale frames, right? If so, that's the one I've been using!

Registax has an option to debayer a greyscale frame. But you can also use AviRaw to turn the greyscale avi into a whole bunch of things.

[Tim]

Both K3 and Reggie can handle the RAW files, but I think K3 does a better job, at least, it doesnt crash on me like reggie does.

Aviraw can turn a raw file into a normal colour avi, or into colour seperated files. I am not sure how to work with those files yet.

TJ

[themos]

My tool chain was wxAstroCapture (-> raw .avi), AviRaw (-> colour .bmp), ninox (-> colour .bmp cropped and centered) , manual inspection (reject awful ones), Registax 4 (quality ranking + stacking + enhancing + what not).