Orpington Astronomical Society

Astronomy => Technical => Topic started by: mickw on Jul 13, 2010, 18:59:42

Title: Iris Instructions
Post by: mickw on Jul 13, 2010, 18:59:42
Anybody got any instructions/tutorial for Iris in ENGLISH please.

I managed to get M13 at Rother Valley, and everything I've tried to process it with either turns it green or B & W.

I've just installed Iris but even the menus are leaving me cold at the moment  :oops:
Title: Re: Iris Instructions
Post by: Rocket Pooch on Jul 13, 2010, 20:34:18
Ask Mark, Carol does!

Oops thats the red wine speaking!!!
Title: Re: Iris Instructions
Post by: MarkS on Jul 13, 2010, 21:31:17

Mick,

Try this for starters: http://www.markshelley.co.uk/webdisk/IRIS_Cribsheet.doc (http://www.markshelley.co.uk/webdisk/IRIS_Cribsheet.doc)

If you don't understand my own cryptic notes then try some of the useful links at the end of my doc.

Mark
Title: Re: Iris Instructions
Post by: RobertM on Jul 13, 2010, 21:41:01
Mick, do you want to borrow my Bablefish ?
Title: Re: Iris Instructions
Post by: MarkS on Jul 13, 2010, 21:43:05

The instructions made sense when combined with my presentation - honest!
Title: Re: Iris Instructions
Post by: The Thing on Jul 13, 2010, 22:00:27
I use Marks crib sheet for Iris and it's excellent. Use the Stellar Registration menu item as suggested as it is really good.
Title: Re: Iris Instructions
Post by: mickw on Jul 14, 2010, 00:04:26
MMmmm Fish  :)

Sorry, thanks for that, I'll have a proper look once tonight's beer wears off.

First thoughts are that Iris works with RAW files but no mention of FITS - Hopefully all will be revealed tomorrow

Anyway, thanks guys
Title: Re: Iris Instructions
Post by: MarkS on Jul 14, 2010, 07:08:51

IRIS works with FITS but why do you have FITS files?  Are they from your Canon?

Mark
Title: Re: Iris Instructions
Post by: mickw on Jul 14, 2010, 08:09:55
Yep, the Canon on the Burgess.

Also starting to learn about field of view with cameras/scopes  :oops:
Title: Re: Iris Instructions
Post by: MarkS on Jul 14, 2010, 08:35:13
But the Canon creates either RAW files or JPGs - why do you have FITS files?
Title: Re: Iris Instructions
Post by: mickw on Jul 14, 2010, 09:02:53
Sorry, camera controlled by Nebulosity and images saved as fits within the program.

Would saving files as Raw on the card then tfer to PC make life simpler ?
Title: Re: Iris Instructions
Post by: MarkS on Jul 14, 2010, 09:43:11
You let Nebulosity save the images as FITS?  Oh dear!

Did Nebulosity convert them to colour?  If so, it probably irretrievably screwed up the colours.  I've no idea why it does this - maybe a setting somewhere but I've never found it.

If Nebulosity saved them as "raw" FITS files i.e. they appear as B&W then it is just about possible to use the data - I had to do it once and I can tell you what to do - IRIS can rescue them but it is a bit laborious.

I always set Nebulosity to also save RAW data to the camera card and this is the data I later process.

If you find a way to make Nebulosity do it correctly then please let me know!
Title: Re: Iris Instructions
Post by: mickw on Jul 14, 2010, 12:43:08
Yep, all of the above  :(
I can actually get a half decent image in B&W using Nebulosity and DSS - Duncan did it really  :oops:

Have been playing with Iris all morning and managed to create master darks, flats, bias etc using fits, but Iris doesn't like fits trying a full blown stack  :(

Currently got Irfanview doing a batch convert of all the fits to straight raw to see if that works.

That didn't work

Still at least I'm getting the hang of some of the basics
Title: Re: Iris Instructions
Post by: MarkS on Jul 14, 2010, 14:41:13
Quote from: mickw
... but Iris doesn't like fits trying a full blown stack  :(


What happens when you try?
Title: Re: Iris Instructions
Post by: mickw on Jul 14, 2010, 16:55:31
Program stops/crashes and get a message something along the lines of "can't find CFA files"

I have sort of followed your idiot guide crib sheet and ash's tutorial but "selecting" files as fits then working on them rather than the "convert raw" thing.

I'm pretty happy with the processing Duncan did on Sunday morning, but the frustrating thing is that although it's obvious the data is there, I can't duplicate or improve on it - even if it's just B&W

Lost interest now, will give it another go from Nebulosity tomorrow.

I might even resort to reading the Nebulosity instructions  :(
Title: Re: Iris Instructions
Post by: MarkS on Jul 14, 2010, 17:46:45
The root problem is that Nebulosity screwed things up when it wrote each of your image files to disk.  Now neither Nebulosity nor Iris can correctly interpret the image data in the files.  That's why Nebulosity gives you weird colours and why Iris complains with an error message.

In my case I realised that the raw data itself was intact but that Nebulosity had written an incorrect file header.  I had to manually go into each FITS file with a Hex Editor and change some of the header values.  If you can put one of those FITS files somewhere I can pick it up, I *might* be able tell you what you need to do.  But I can't promise ...

Next time save the RAW files to the camera's card!

Mark
Title: Re: Iris Instructions
Post by: mickw on Jul 14, 2010, 18:17:49
Cheers Mark although I can't figure out why this hasn't been sorted in Nebulosity  :-?

If you PM me your email I'll send a couple of fits.

Don't spend too much time on it, this is my first DS image and there will be more so I won't be heartbroken and there will be plenty more opportunities.
I'll also be saving raws to the card.

Thanks
Title: Re: Iris Instructions
Post by: The Thing on Jul 15, 2010, 08:53:36
At least you can get a virtually mono version out of Deep Sky Stacker...
Title: Re: Iris Instructions
Post by: MarkS on Jul 16, 2010, 09:43:45
Mick,

I had a quick look at the FITS files you mailed me - they load OK in IRIS and there's actually nothing wrong with them though they've already been converted to RGB so you can't easily do the pre-processing steps - offsets, flats, darks etc.  Only the background is green and once you set this to black and adjust the threshold slider, M13 becomes quite obvious though a bit noisy because of your short exposures.

You should be able to do stellar registration in IRIS and then stack the resulting files together to produce a half-decent image.

Mark
Title: Re: Iris Instructions
Post by: mickw on Jul 16, 2010, 13:58:10
Thanks Mark, something else for the weekend  :D

I still have the original fits so I might start again.
I did the short exposures because I could see M13 and figured that longer exposure would make it saturated and short would work out OK when stacked.
Must get some "L Plates"
Title: Re: Iris Instructions
Post by: doug on Jul 16, 2010, 15:37:21

     You wanna borrow mine, Mick?  I will need them back, though, to try and sort out how to edit my holiday DVD`s on the laptop.

     Doug.