DSS No Colour, low brightness when take to Photoshop

[johneta]

I have been using DSS for a couple of years now and have never really been happy with it.
I do the stack and end up with the mostly monochrome image that seems normal for DSS.
Also the auto brightness settings on the stacked image are usually way over stretched.

Both these issues are easily fixed with the controls in DSS. (for the preview image)
I have been saving the image with these settings embedded, and opening it in photoshop.
I can get OK-ish results but DSS seems to have lots of artifacts and is quite noisy.

People on the net say not to use the saturation or level controls in DSS but to do all that editing in Photshop (or similar). Just save the the unstretched, un-saturated image, and use that.
Sounds like a good idea, but I have never been able to get that to work.
The image is very dark, and any amount of stretching required is huge, and gets very noisy and horrible looking.
Also the image looks monochrome to me, and when I try to saturate the image all I really get is an overall colour hue to the image. No individual colours in different parts of the nebula as are actually there in the original subs.
People who recommend taking the unstretched/un-saturated DSS image into photoshop seem to have no problems getting good results.
Am I missing something very simple?
Sorry for long winded question. Thanks for any help.
I am shooting with a Canon DSLR 1200D(Rebel T5)

[Alien 13]

I always use the controls in DSS rather than PS etc, the results are much much much better for me and never understood why anyone would do it differently, always save the original 32 bit tiff though. 

Alan

[johneta]

Thanks Alan. Same for me, but I still feel results aren't that good and I was hoping for better the other way.

I also recently tried Trial versions of APP and Pixinsight and was able to get significantly better results quite quickly (not withstanding  steep learning curve)

Cant afford that at the moment though. 

Also note, I can get better results by stacking manually in Photoshop. I get very smooth noise free background with virtually no noise and no odd artifacts.

John

[johneta]

Another update Alan. I found a "set the black point to zero" tick box in DSS 'RAW/FITS DDP settings' was ticked.

If you have this ticked and dont take care adjusting histogram in DSS it can create a very dark image that no amount of stretching will fix.

I think it should always be unticked. I also went back and re stacked an image over and over with different settings and taking it to Photoshop with or without embedded adjustments, and I agree with you it is always better to embed the adjustments -- being careful to do them subtely in DSS first.

Thanks again