What am I doing wrong? | Astrobiscuit | Page 1

halcyon raptor Jan 15, 2024, 10:36 PM

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Exactly 1 year ago I took an image of the rosette nebula. Tonight I wanted to see the difference that a lot of equipment upgrades, knowledge and processing experience has gotten me. However, when I looked at the image that came out of my camera today, it was worse than last year!

What am I doing wrong?

Each image had a quick process done - colour calibration, background extraction and an autostretch I would usually process further but I even like this I should get a huge uplift in image quality... right?

Image 1 - 183C and 71/348 telescope at f/4.9 800x10s gain 5000 at 15°C

Image 2 - 26C(imx 571) and hyperstar at f/1.9 with astronomic CLS CCD filter
60x180s gain 100(HCG ultra mode) at -10°C
Offset was 500, not sure for image 1

For some reason image 2 seems to be more noisy even though it was taken with a much better, newer sensor, it was cooled, it has a 6x faster focal ratio, I used a light pollution filter and I also had a bit more integration time.

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Image 1

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Image 2

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I can send stacked files if needed

iron tendon Jan 15, 2024, 10:37 PM

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Hmm how was the weather like when you took the second image?

halcyon raptor Jan 15, 2024, 10:38 PM

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It's perfectly clear tonight

iron tendon Jan 15, 2024, 10:38 PM

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are you using adative or mean stacking?

halcyon raptor Jan 15, 2024, 10:38 PM

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Same seeing but a lower temp outside (-1°C)

halcyon raptor Jan 15, 2024, 10:39 PM

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iron tendon are you using adative or mean stacking?

Both were adaptive

iron tendon Jan 15, 2024, 10:40 PM

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Try using mean and take out the picture with the satellite as well 🙂

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Can I have a go at them both?

halcyon raptor Jan 15, 2024, 10:40 PM

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Sure I'll create a WeTransfer

iron tendon Jan 15, 2024, 10:41 PM

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Great, can i get the raw unstacked pictures?

halcyon raptor Jan 15, 2024, 10:51 PM

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iron tendon Great, can i get the raw unstacked pictures?

How would you like them, each folder is too large for WeTransfer and Google drive?

iron tendon Jan 15, 2024, 10:52 PM

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I could give you access to my google drive

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how large are the files?

halcyon raptor Jan 15, 2024, 10:54 PM

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Each folder is 17GB

iron tendon Jan 15, 2024, 10:54 PM

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Ye thats a bit to large

halcyon raptor Jan 15, 2024, 10:55 PM

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Here are the stacks for now I'll see if I can get anything worked out for the rest

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https://we.tl/t-QCskp0mBMu

What's wrong?

2 files sent via WeTransfer, the simplest way to send your files around the world

iron tendon Jan 15, 2024, 10:55 PM

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Ill have a look at them

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Could i get a single image from each?

halcyon raptor Jan 15, 2024, 11:01 PM

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iron tendon Could i get a single image from each?

I'm creating 2 email addresses just so I can upload everything into 2 separate drives, it's going to take a while though

iron tendon Jan 15, 2024, 11:03 PM

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haha, if it works it works

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Can I get back to you sometime tomorrow?

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in roughly 12 hours?

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I can private message you after I am done stacking the files

rare stream Jan 15, 2024, 11:32 PM

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Hi, not sure what its the issue, but from an editing perspective, from your data I can work around the 2023 picture without issues. the 2024 I m not able to stretch at all. Have you tried to re stack it again maybe, Are you using darks, flats / bias whatever suits best those cameras. I got an 183 and its an awesome camera

halcyon raptor Jan 16, 2024, 10:15 AM

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iron tendon Can I get back to you sometime tomorrow?

Here is the link to the 2024 data

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https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1_J9A7yJZtCfRRud2AItjJLsqfmFiQFcN?usp=drive_link

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I made a mistake and the 2023 data is actually spread across multiple folders so it's 39GB so unfortunately I'm not able to send that but I can restack it if you want me to do it in a specific way

halcyon raptor Jan 16, 2024, 10:26 AM

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rare stream Hi, not sure what its the issue, but from an editing perspective, from your data...

That's exactly what I get before doing the background extraction. After that, the rosette becomes visible in image 2

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I still don't understand why it's much more noisy though

rare stream Jan 16, 2024, 10:57 AM

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can you try and send only the stacked file ?

iron tendon Jan 16, 2024, 11:18 AM

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I think i found the problem

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a bunch of the pictures are just noise

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you need to go through the pictures before stacking them

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or reject a bunch of them automatically

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I could also not find any darks/flats/biases

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I would also skip the pictures that do not have any definition like the right one

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will probably not do any good

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and use mean stacking

halcyon raptor Jan 16, 2024, 12:40 PM

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iron tendon you need to go through the pictures before stacking them

Those were probably the centering images, I'll have another look. I thought DSS would not stack them though since they got a low score and I set it to stack the best 70% so those should have been rejected.

iron tendon Jan 16, 2024, 12:41 PM

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those were around a hundred pictures in

halcyon raptor Jan 16, 2024, 12:42 PM

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Also I have found a few problems myself, in the later images I had some dew on the telescope, that would explain the low definition photos you pointed out also I think I have some focus drift that I'll need to sort out

rare stream Jan 16, 2024, 12:42 PM

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Hello,wht are you setting the ofset so high in your pictures =?

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first day you have 250 and second day 500

halcyon raptor Jan 16, 2024, 12:43 PM

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rare stream Hello,wht are you setting the ofset so high in your pictures =?

I used the histogram in sharpcap and that is when the peak detached from the left side

rare stream Jan 16, 2024, 12:43 PM

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i tried to see any values on some foruns, and most say 100 and 101

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for that sensor

halcyon raptor Jan 16, 2024, 12:43 PM

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When I first plugged the camera in, it defaulted to 256

halcyon raptor Jan 16, 2024, 12:44 PM

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rare stream i tried to see any values on some foruns, and most say 100 and 101

Yeah that's why I'm a bit confused

rare stream Jan 16, 2024, 12:46 PM

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I dont know much about sharcap, so can't help you there, but for 3 min exposures

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your subs have really low data there at that fast f

iron tendon Jan 16, 2024, 12:46 PM

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i would try to use apt

rare stream Jan 16, 2024, 12:48 PM

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for comparison purposes i stack 1 hour of your data

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and the othe one is 1 hour on my f4.9 RC

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you should had way more info there

halcyon raptor Jan 16, 2024, 12:49 PM

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What's weirder is that I have very little data in a single 15min image with my F5 refractor too

rare stream Jan 16, 2024, 12:49 PM

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you have an altair rc right?

halcyon raptor Jan 16, 2024, 12:51 PM

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No, I have a William optics star 71 and a celestron C8 with the hyperstar lens on it currently

rare stream Jan 16, 2024, 12:51 PM

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iron tendon i would try to use apt

or even Nina, its pretty simple, though I love APT 🙂

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the camera

halcyon raptor Jan 16, 2024, 12:51 PM

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Oh yeah it the Altair 26C tec

rare stream Jan 16, 2024, 12:51 PM

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its a good camera

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try to use it without the hyperstar maybe

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and like Goldfish mention maybe try apt or nina?

halcyon raptor Jan 16, 2024, 12:53 PM

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I have Nina but I find it difficult to align the mount without a live view feature

rare stream Jan 16, 2024, 12:53 PM

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just trying to help, dont take me wrong please

iron tendon Jan 16, 2024, 12:53 PM

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yeah I find it is much more easy to get the right exposure with apt

rare stream Jan 16, 2024, 12:54 PM

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witch mount?

halcyon raptor Jan 16, 2024, 12:54 PM

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Hmmm I have a long 12 hour night on Thursday I'll experiment until then

halcyon raptor Jan 16, 2024, 12:54 PM

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rare stream witch mount?

Eq5-pro

iron tendon Jan 16, 2024, 12:54 PM

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use ninas three star polar alignment

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it is amazing

halcyon raptor Jan 16, 2024, 12:55 PM

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My normal routine is to roughly polar align, then 3 star align using synscan and then electronically polar align again using synscan, this is pretty effective for me

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Anyway, I'll try apt, what settings do you think I should use?

iron tendon Jan 16, 2024, 12:56 PM

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hm try and find a quick guide

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there are a lot of settings

rare stream Jan 16, 2024, 12:57 PM

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its over stretched

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but this is from the 1 hour stack

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EQ you could check the polar align camera, got 1 of those

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its really easy, 5 min and I am done

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PoleMaster QHY polar finder com adaptador

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its just easy to use

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but nina also works really well

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i got an eq6 and changed my quality of life

halcyon raptor Jan 16, 2024, 1:00 PM

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Also I am having so much trouble with phd2 at the moment. It doesn't connect via eqmod, so I have to connect it wirelessly to do pulse guiding, whenever I calibrate it it's always terrible

halcyon raptor Jan 16, 2024, 1:01 PM

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rare stream i got an eq6 and changed my quality of life

I'm planning on getting a bigger mount but first I have to sell my little frac

rare stream Jan 16, 2024, 1:01 PM

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was talking about the polar align camera

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Polemaster

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not sure if works well wiht your mount

halcyon raptor Jan 16, 2024, 1:03 PM

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rare stream and the othe one is 1 hour on my f4.9 RC

What gain did you use, maybe that's the answer?

rare stream Jan 16, 2024, 1:09 PM

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on my cameras I am running 100

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but its whats generally said

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got the 183 and 1600 mono ZWO

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do some testing, that generlly helos

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helps

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take 1 sub 180 secs at 100

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the same at 0

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and 200

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and see the difrences

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some targets I can go up to 200

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but its rare

halcyon raptor Jan 17, 2024, 9:57 AM

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@rare stream @iron tendon I did another test last night, ~3 hours on the heart nebula and ~40mins on Orion. I changed the offset to 200 and I removed the LP filter, can you give the processing a go?

iron tendon Jan 17, 2024, 9:57 AM

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sure

halcyon raptor Jan 17, 2024, 9:57 AM

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https://we.tl/t-hgjWxjjJ8h

heart and orion test

2 files sent via WeTransfer, the simplest way to send your files around the world

iron tendon Jan 17, 2024, 9:58 AM

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have you checked all the images?

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and are you using flats?

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this was the best i could do with the heart nebula

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I had to crop a lot and use background extraction a few times because there was quite a lot of light and dark areas

halcyon raptor Jan 17, 2024, 10:21 AM

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iron tendon I had to crop a lot and use background extraction a few times because there was ...

Could that be light leaks?

iron tendon Jan 17, 2024, 10:23 AM

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yes, that is probably it

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same here

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was able to pull out some nebulosity but you´ve also got some banding

rare stream Jan 17, 2024, 10:30 AM

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halcyon raptor <@218124022196469760> <@280386510866612228> I did another test last night, ~3 ho...

I will, when back home in a couple of hours 👍

rare stream Jan 17, 2024, 3:04 PM

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trying to make it less dramatic, but the data is tough to work on

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still using sharpcap?

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DBE is not having an easy time to get all that "white"

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this is all linear data right?

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so you have an idea, Orion unstretched should look like this

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can you post us a single sub screen grab of Orion?

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Nikon Z7 120 Secs exposures

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stretched and SoC , with any HsT transformation

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without anything done, just an open image

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and a auto stretch

halcyon raptor Jan 20, 2024, 10:20 AM

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@rare stream @iron tendon well I spent 17 hours outside last night, I went to stack the photos but I used the wrong flats. When I tried to restack, DSS corrupted everything.

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This is the red channel, it's fine

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This is RGB, it's not fine

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and this is the corrupted photo

iron tendon Jan 20, 2024, 10:53 AM

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That’s really sad

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Im sorry for you

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Next time try using Siril

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Much better and will not corrupt your files

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Use the osc script in siril and it will do everything for you

rare stream Jan 20, 2024, 2:03 PM

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halcyon raptor and this is the corrupted photo

It’s corrupted, or just not debayerd. I will check when back home.
It’s the first time I hear about DSS corrupting files. Usually it’s the drives / usb sticks or card that fail.

halcyon raptor Jan 20, 2024, 2:17 PM

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rare stream It’s corrupted, or just not debayerd. I will check when back home. It’s the firs...

It's corrupted, this is each fits file before having any processing done to it. Unfortunately it's also corrupted all the images I have ever taken going back to 2022

halcyon raptor Jan 20, 2024, 2:18 PM

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iron tendon Next time try using Siril

Yeah, definitely, I'm just not sure why it's happened now

rare stream Jan 20, 2024, 2:24 PM

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Seems an HDD issue, or card reader if your using one

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You don’t have backups?

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My workflow starts at the backups

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Copy the files to an local hdd

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Copy the files to a storage system

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Copy the files to a local fast nvme drive

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To start stacking

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It’s never to much to have several copies

#What am I doing wrong?