Astral Imaging at Dogwood Ridge Observatory

Latitude: 37°48'51.0" N"
Longitude:78°23'41.0"W
Scottsville, Virginia 24590

 

(click on thumbnails to go to that image's page)

 

 

 

 

   

Pix Insight
A New User's Quick Start Experience
Cropping the Combined Image

Now that the images are combined into your master, most likely you'll need to crop the image. Of course the image is still very dark but you can use the "Screen Transfer Function" to do a screen stretch to the data so you can see the image better. The default settings usually do well but you can adjust using the slider. To use, select the open image you want to work on and click on the square icon with the "A" in it. This is automatic mode. Use the square icon to apply (F5) or the triangle icon and drag it onto the image. To rest simply hit the reset icon in the lower right corner of the process box. At this point you should see pretty well if the image needs cropping. At any time while the data is still linear you'll need this screen transfer function to see the data clearly. Just remember that it affects the screen output and not the data. The data is left untouched.

To crop the image use the "Dynamic Crop" tool. Either from the top menu under "Process", "All Processes", "Dynamic Crop" or from the left "Process Explorer" "All Processes" or "Geometry" and "Dynamic Crop". Now I usually use the cursor and go to a corner of the image and drag it diagonally to increase the size of the image view. This allows me to see the image edges a bit better. Now I can drag each border independently to frame my crop. Once happy hit the check icon to execute the command. If you see that you need to crop a bit more, hit the lower right icon, looks like a square standing on one corner with an X through it. That's the "reset" icon. The move your boarders again. When you place the cursor over the boarder the cursor turns into a + sign. If you get a double end arrow you would be expanding or contracting the box if you dragged the cursor. Once happy with your result, again, name it and save. If this was NGC2359-11_avg from before I'd add _c to get NGC2359-11_avg_c. Next, Histogram Stretch using the "Histogram Transformation" process.

See Harry's video for more.

    
  Last Modified :01/23/09 12:40 AM