Frame Classification Panel

The applications Starry Landscape Stacker (SLS), Starry Sky Stacker (SSS) and Long Exposure Stacker (LES) automatically classify files that are opened as light frames, dark frames, flat-field frames and (for SLS only) masks. Normally this is fully automatic and the user does not need to get involved, but there are three cases where the user may need to get involved.

• The number of frames of each frame type are not consistent (e.g., too many masks in SLS).

• The application is not certain that the classification is correct (e.g., there is little difference between lights and darks).

• The classification is wrong and the user must manually override. I have seen this happen with dark frames that have so many hot pixels that they look like night sky images.

The last case should be rare, but is the most challenging. If you notice that something just seems wrong with your results, re-open your files (cmd-O or File->Open in the menu bar) and check the box "Display the image classification table after opening" near the bottom of the open panel. The other two cases will present the classification panel automatically. When the panel is open you can check and, if necessary, correct the classification.

The classification panel displays all the files that have been opened, sorted by name. There are radio buttons for each file indicating the current classification and allowing the classification to be changed.

To change the classification of all files, click on the column heading. For example, to make all images light frames, click on the column heading "light".

To change the classification of a group of files, select several rows in the table with cmd-click to add/remove rows and select-extend with shift-click. Then click on one of the radio buttons in one of the selected rows to change the classification of the files on all selected rows.

There is a video tutorial https://youtu.be/WObd8T9iajk.