Starry Landscape Stacker Mac

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I hope we can all agree when I say

“One of the most delightful experiences is to look into the sky through a Telescope!”

Sequator is one of the free astrophotography software that is present over the internet. Star Stacking Resources: Starry Landscape Stacker app (Mac) used by Royce & Manish Mamtani Fitswork (Windows) app use by Ralf Rohner Photoshop tutorial for stacking Sequator is a new PC software (not mentioned in the video) that compares very favorably with Starry Landscape Stacker Star Trackers: Sky-Watcher Star Adventure used by Eric Benedetti.

To add the cherry on the top, would not it be wonderful to capture such ravishing moments? Through the use of astrophotography, we can take pictures of the astounding celestial objects, observed through the lens of a telescope. If you are looking for telescopes, here are some Best telescopes under $300!

However, the obtained images are still in need of further processing to reduce unnecessary noise that diminishes the image quality. This is done by Stacking, which adds layers of similar images and averages them to form one resultant image. Stacking of Astrophotographs can be done with the help of Stacking Softwares that are widely available. Some are available for free while others do come at a cost.

Considering which Stacking Software to go for? Worry no more, for in this comprehensive guide we have listed down the best astrophotography stacking softwares. Go through the article to know which one suits you the most!

Best Stacking Softwares for Astrophotography in 2021

The table below has a compiled list of some of the Astrophotography Stacking Softwares that are considered the best out there. In the following sections, each one of them is explained in detail.

Astrophotography Stacking Softwares

In the case of learning to stack images, here is an article on How to Stack and Process Astrophotography.

1. Sequator

Sequator is one of the free astrophotography software that is present over the internet. It is used for stacking both – Deep Sky and Starry Landscapes. Not only it is commonly used as a Stacker, but can also be used to create star trails. It is an easy-to-learn and easy-to-use software, a very intuitive one. Moreover, Sequator is a fast system, therefore causing little to no hindrance while processing the images.

However, one major drawback is that it only works with Windows. Unfortunately, it is not an astrophotography stacking software for Mac but may be used on Linux via wine+. Furthermore, it is not as advanced as some of the other software mentioned in the article. Nonetheless, it possesses the ability to reduce noise, remove light pollution, and perform other simple tasks on the stacked images. It can also calibrate light frames with dark and flat calibration frames. For a free astrophotography stacking software, it surely does provide enough!

2. Starry Landscape Stacker

Completely opposite to Sequator in the operating system support, Starry Landscape Stacker is an astrophotography stacking software for Mac OS X. It is not a free astrophotography software but a commercial software at $39.99. However, it is also somewhat similar to the Sequator for it is also a fast and easy-to-use stacking software for astrophotography.

Starry Landscape Stacker allows you to produce Landscape photographs captured at night time. It combines several images taken in rapid succession and shifts the sky to align the stars, in order to produce Landscape images. However, there is only one downside to it that it can not process your RAW format images. Hence, the images must first be converted to the more heavy TIFF format.

The disadvantage is can be overcome by the fact that Starry Landscape Stacker gives you a good quality image and the option to save the sky only for further editing in other software. In case you are genuinely interested in Starry Landscapes then this is the one for you!

3. Adobe Photoshop

No doubt, Adobe Photoshop always ends up in the list of the best astrophotography stacking software at present. It not only works as an astrophotography stacking software only but as a Complete Image Editor. It is compatible with Windows and Mac OS X. However, it is not a free astrophotography software. It is a commercial one and is available at a subscription of $9.99/month.

Compared to many, Photoshop provides much more extra features when it comes to editing the astrophotographs. It consists of many light-adjusting and noise reduction tools. Even though it has these extra features, you will have to download some extra Plugins first. Moreover, it also comes in a bundle with Adobe Lightroom CC, Camera Raw, Bridge, and Web Space. There is only the issue that Photoshop lacks the ability to calibrate light frames and in order to do so, some other software will be required.

4. Deep Sky Stacker

Deep Sky Stacker is considered the best stacking software for astrophotography. It is widely used to stack and calibrate images. The preprocessing steps are made easier with this software mainly due to the ability to stack all the images in one high-resolution file. The greatest part about DSS is the full calibration of images with Darks, Flats, Dark Flats, and Bias calibration frames to obtain the most suitable result possible.

It is to be noted that the DSS is believed to be the best free astrophotography stacking software. Even though it lacks some noise reduction capabilities, it still has many more advanced stacking features. It is also a fast system making the user experience all the more enjoyable with its various features.

However, there are some limitations to the DSS. It is only Windows supported and therefore, not an astrophotography stacking software for Mac. Moreover, if you are looking specifically for Starry Landscapes or Planetary Astrophotography, DSS is not the right astrophotography stacking software.

5. Starry Sky Stacker

For Deep sky stacking on a Mac, Starry Sky Stacker is a good choice. It is a very basic and intuitive system to work with. The easy-to-use features and the fast processing of the system make it an ideal choice. It is a variant of the Starry Landscape Stacker for the purpose of deep-sky imaging.

The basic nature coupled with the absence of the ability to process RAW format images does not make it popular for high image editing. If you have one of the Best Mounts for Astrophotography your experience will be quite better.

6. Autostakkert!

If you are wondering about the best astrophotography stacking software especially for planetary motion, Autosatkkert! is the go-to option. It is an easy-to-use, free software, supported only by Windows. It is mostly used for Planetary, Lunar, Solar images, and for stacking full planetary disk and lunar surface close-ups.

The software is a little confusing to navigate through for a beginner, but it is relatively easy to go with the stacking steps. Although it lacks some of the features for planetary astrophotogra[hy, it is quite suitable for stacking planetary images.

7. Astro Pixel Processor

If you are in search of the best astrophotography stacking software without considering the cost of it, APP is the one!

At a subscription of $60/year on rent and $150 for an Owner’s License, it is one of the best Deep Sky Astrophotography Editors present nowadays. However, there is an added benefit of a free 30-day trial period for you to get yourself acquainted with it. Not only does it possess plenty of advanced features, but it also has compatibility with the three most commonly used operating systems – Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux. Moreover, it is rather easy to use.

Some of the advancements are in calibration, stacking, and post-processing of the deep-sky images. It is, however, held back with the fact that it is only suitable for deep sky astrophotography.

8. Lynkeos

Lynkeos is the astrophotography stacking software for Mac. It is mainly for planetary stacking and is free of cost! Most importantly it is the only free planetary stacking software for Mac. Image stacking software for astrophotography for Mac users are in lesser amounts and those that are there are usually costly.

The software is quite an intuitive one but it becomes a little less easy while performing different functions. However, it has deconvolution and wavelet sharpening technology, which are necessary for Planetary Stacking.

9. PixInsight

PixInsight can be considered to be the best astronomy software. It is an all-rounder Astrophotography editor and a commercial one available for $273.88. Although it is expensive software, it provides you a lot to make it worth the price. It is inarguably the greatest stacking software for Astrophotography!

To start off, it provides a 45 days trial period to let you make yourself comfortable with it. It comes with various tutorials and information. With all those great things, it has a steep learning curve. Moreover, the user experience is a tricky one. Not only this, it requires to be run on a recent and powerful system.

10. SiriL

SiriL can be considered to be the best free astrophotography stacking software. Not only it has many features but it is also cross-platform. It can run on three operating systems – Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux. It is not as easy or intuitive as some of the other free software already mentioned, but it is worth the try for it has extra added features.

It helps you to develop deep sky images, calibrate, and stack astrophotography images. This image stacking software for astrophotography has the ability to produce good quality images due to the presence of many options. It also has the ability for image post-processing.

Exposure Stacking Software

Exposure Stacking Astrophotography is the term used to mean the same thing as Star Stacking. Star Stacking is simply a method of overlaying multiple night-sky exposures and then averaging them up to get an image with reduced noise.

Video

Conclusion

In this article, we have compiled the list of the best image stacking software for astrophotography. The list is quite diverse in nature for it provides you with from a range of amazing astronomy softwares, to specific Planetary stacking, or Deep-Sky image stacking astrophotography software. Out of all those mentioned, no doubt PixInsight is the best stacking software for Astrophotography!

Stacking software for astrophotography exists many at present but not all of them fulfill the requirements completely. Most importantly, Astrophotography software for Mac are less, especially free ones, but those are worth the money and effort and mentioned in detail. Astrophotography stacking software Mac is mostly nature specific like Starry Landscape Stacker or Starry Sky Stacker.

Photo stacking astrophotography is an art in itself, and to know about more of the stacking programs for astrophotography, here is another article for your convenience.

To capture astrophotography images, you will need a Telescope, of course! To learn how to make your own telescope, do read How To Make a Telescope With Two Convex Lenses. Moreover, you can also check out our reviews on different telescopes!

  • 5 Best 8-Inch Dobsonian Telescope in 2021 - May 11, 2021
  • 5 Best 8×42 Binoculars in 2021 [For Birding & Hunting] - May 11, 2021
  • 6 Best 10×50 Binoculars in 2021 - May 11, 2021

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Astrophotography is closer to science than art, and there is no such thing as “getting it right in camera.” This means you cannot simply point the camera at the sky and snap away.

In astrophotography you cannot avoid post processing your images, so stacking and editing your images serves three main purposes:

  1. Reduce noise and deal with light gradients and vignetting.
  2. Improve signal to noise ratio.
  3. Reveal the faint details in the image.

Image stacking is the technique used to improve the signal to noise ratio, and it is the only noise reduction method that will boost the image details rather than smear them out.

In this article, we will discuss some of the most popular software available for astrophotography image stacking.

Note: Don’t miss the detailed video at the end of this article, It was created to help show you how to quickly start using some of the stacking software mentioned in this article.
Click here to skip to our Image Stacking Demo Video.

What Does Stacking Photos Mean?

The concept behind image stacking is simple, but to appreciate how it works, there are a couple of things we have to consider:

  1. A stack can be visualized as a pile of images all stacked one on top of the other;
  2. Each digital image is formed by a set of pixels, all having a certain value: dark pixels will have a lower value than the bright ones;

In the simplest form of image stacking, the pixels values for all images in the stack are averaged to produce a single image.

What is the purpose of stacking photos?

The result is a single image with improved signal to noise ratio, i.e., with better details and lower (random) digital noise and better details.

The scheme below illustrates the concept.

If the considered digital noise affects the pixel values randomly across the stack, then the result of averaging the stack is that the random component of the noise to the pixel value is significantly reduced.

ISO noise and Luminance noise and Chrominancenoise are examples of digital noises that are random.

The image below shows a real-life example from stacking 30 images from my Sony RX10 bridge camera taken at ISO 6400. As you can see, the original images showed a greater deal of noise (grain) than the stacked one.

The More Images You Stack, The Better

The more images you stack, the cleaner the resulting images are, as shown in the comparison below.

While Image stacking creates a cleaner image, it often softens the image: digital sharpening techniques are then used to recover sharp looking details.

Finally, bear in mind that the progression of image quality is not linear.

If stacking 4 images improves the image quality of 50% respect what you got by stacking only 2 images, to improve a further 50% the image quality from stacking 50 images, you may need to stack 300 images or more.

Image Stacking And Movement

If nothing moves between shots, like in the previous real life example, implementing image stacking is very simple: just group the images and average them to smooth out the noise.

With a moving subject, grouping and averaging the images will not only smooth out the noise, but also the subject itself.

This is the same principle for which long exposures of passing traffic and crowd result in a street image without cars nor people.

This effect is amplified with the number of images used, and the moving subject could simply disappear from the stacked image.

To resolve the issue, you have to align the images based on their content before stacking.

Due to image alignment, you may have to trim the edges of the stacked image to get rid of artifacts, but your target will not be lost.

Note that while in theory you can stack images of a static scene taken with the camera on a tripod, in reality, those images will probably differ at the pixel scale due to micro-movements. It is always beneficial to align the images before stacking.

How To Shoot For Exposure Stacking Your Images

Image stacking can be done with any camera and even camera phones and with images in both RAW and JPEG format.

Nonetheless, some things can be done to improve the final result:

  1. Lock the focus, so that the camera will not hunt for it between images. This will also help to keep the focus consistent through the shooting sequence.
  2. Keep the same settings, in particular shutter speed, aperture, and focal length: you don’t want to change the camera field of view during the sequence, nor the brightness of the images or the depth of field.
  3. If you are shooting on a tripod, disable image stabilization. If you want to shoot handheld, do so only for short sequences at very high shutter speed.

Image Stacking In Astrophotography

Related:Astrophotography Software & Tools Resource List

As said previously, image stacking is a standard technique implemented in any astrophotography editing workflow for,

  1. A star field from a fixed tripod.
  2. A deep sky object from a tracking mount.
  3. The Moon handheld.
  4. A starry landscape from a fixed tripod or tracking mount.

Every astronomy image will benefit from image stacking.

List Of Photo Stacking Software For Astrophotography

Here is a list of software used in astrophotography for image stacking.

Adobe Photoshop

Complete Image Editor | Commercial – Subscription Plan Photography Bundle $9.99 / Month | Mac OS X, Windows

Pro

  • Versatile
  • Available for Mac and Windows
  • In bundle with Adobe Lightroom CC, Bridge, Camera Raw, and web space
  • Many action packs and plugins available for astrophotography

Cons

  • Subscription Plan only
  • Can’t be used to calibrate light frames
  • Stacking capabilities are somehow limited

If you are interested in photography, chances are you know Adobe Photoshop is the standard in the industry and does not need introductions.

With Adobe implementing a subscription plan for their applications, if you are using Lightroom CC for your everyday photography, your plan subscription will also include Photoshop CC and Bridge CC.

And for astrophotography, Photoshop is what you need. Lightroom cannot stack your images nor perform the histogram stretching, two crucial steps in the editing workflow for astrophotography.

In this article, we have already covered in detail how to stack astrophotography images with Photoshop.

Sequator

Deep Sky And Starry Landscape Stacker | Freeware | Windows

Pro

  • Free
  • Easy to use
  • Fast
  • Suitable for both Starry Landscapes and Deep Sky images
  • Can create Star Trails

Cons

  • Windows only
  • Limited set of options
  • Not suitable for Planetary astrophotography

Sequator is an easy-to-use and intuitive astrophotography software for stacking both starry landscape and deep-sky images. It can also be used to create star trails.

While not as advanced as other stackers, it nonetheless allows you to calibrate your light frames with dark and flat calibration frames. It also allows you to remove light pollution, reduce noise, and perform other simple tasks on the stacked image.

Starry Landscape Stacker

Starry Landscape Stacker | Commercial, $39.99 | Mac OS X

Pro

  • Fast
  • Easy to use

Cons

  • Mac Os X only
  • Does not read RAW files

If you are into starry landscapes and you are a Mac user, Starry Landscape Stacker is a must-have.

Easy to use, it allows you to stack and align the sky and the foreground independently by letting you easily mask the sky.

Unfortunately, the software lacks the support for RAW formats, thus forcing you to convert your RAW images in the more heavy TIFF format.

Aside from that, it works very fast and the final image is of good quality. You can also save the sky only, which is useful to further edit the shot in Photoshop or similar editors.

Starry Sky Stacker

Deep Sky Stacker | Commercial, $24.99 | Mac OS X

Pro

  • Fast
  • Easy to use

Cons

  • Mac Os X only
  • Does not read RAW files
  • Basic

Starry Sky Stacker is Starry Landscape Stacker brother and it has been created to stack deep sky astrophotography images.

As Starry Landscape Stacker, Starry Sky Stacker is very easy to use and intuitive, although very basic.

If you are a casual star shooter and a Mac user, this could be a good choice for you.

Deep Sky Stacker

Starry Landscape Stacker Mac

Deep Sky Stacker | Freeware | Windows

Pro

  • Free
  • Easy to use
  • Fast
  • Full light frames calibration
  • Features Comet stack modes
  • Can Drizzle
  • Many advanced stack options and methods available

Starry Landscape Stacker Mac Review

Cons

  • Windows only
  • Post-processing is quite limited
  • Not suitable for Starry Landscapes nor for Planetary astrophotography

Deep Sky Stacker, better known as DSS, is arguably one of the most widely used software to calibrate and stack astrophotography images.

With DSS, you can fully calibrate your images with Darks, Flats, Dark Flats, and Bias calibration frames for the best results possible. Light frames are analyzed and scored by quality so that you can decide which percentage of best images you can stack (Best 75% by default).

A very interesting feature is that with DSS, you can easily combine images taken during different imaging sessions, to produce images of higher quality.

Autostakkert!

Planetary Stacker | Freeware | Windows

Pro

  • Free
  • Easy to use
  • Suitable for Planetary, Lunar and Solar images
  • Stack full planetary disk and lunar surface close-ups

Cons

  • Interface a bit confused
  • It does not offer wavelet sharpening
  • Windows only

Autostakkert!, also known as AS!, is a very popular free software among the solar system astrophotographers. With AS! it is easy to stack both images showing the full Planetary (or Lunar or Solar) disc and images showing lunar surface close-ups.

The interface is a bit confusing, particularly in the beginning, but it is easy to navigate through the different steps for the stacking.

Landscape

Unfortunately, AS! does not offer wavelet sharpening, which is a widely used technique in planetary and lunar astrophotography. For this, you can load your stacked image in Registax, another freeware software for Windows only that, sadly, is now “abandoned-ware.”

Lynkeos

Planetary Stacker | Freeware | Mac OS X

Pro

  • Free
  • Has deconvolution and wavelet sharpening
  • It is probably the only freeware planetary stacker for Mac OS X

Cons

  • Not very intuitive
  • Somewhat slower than Autostakkert!

Lynkeos is perhaps the only freeware planetary stacker software for Mac OS X, sparing you from turning to Windows for using Autostakkert!.

The interface is quite intuitive to navigate, but not when it comes to performing the different tasks.

On the other hand, it offers a deconvolution method and wavelet sharpening, a must-have for a planetary stacker. Definitely worth having a look at it if you are a Mac user.

SiriL

Deep Sky Astrophotography Editor | Freeware | Mac OS X, Windows, Linux

Pro

  • Free
  • Cross-Platform
  • Active development

Cons

  • A bit convoluted and not as intuitive as other stackers

SiriL is a freeware, cross-platform, astrophotography package that will let you calibrate, stack, and develop deep sky astrophotography images.

While not as easy and intuitive as Sequator or DSS, it offers a lot of options and produces good results. There is an active community, and it is under constant development.

Astro Pixel Processor

Deep Sky Astrophotography Editor | Commercial $60/Yr Renter License Or $150 Owner License | Mac OS X, Windows, Linux

Pro

Starry Landscape Stacker Mac How To Use

  • Full-grown astrophotography package
  • Fairly easy to use
  • Mosaics are created with ease and are of great quality
  • Active and constant development
  • Cross-Platform
  • 30-days Trial period
  • Affordable yearly subscription

Cons

  • Only for deep sky astrophotography
  • No Comet stacking mode

With Astro Pixel Processor (APP), you step in the realm of full-grown astrophotography packages, with many advanced options and methods to calibrate, stack, and post-process your deep-sky images.

Compared to PixInsight (PI), the software benchmark for the category, APP is cheaper and way easier to use, which makes it one of the best PI alternatives.

If you decide to buy it, you can choose between the renter’s license for $60/yr, to always get the latest version of APP, or the owner’s license for $150, but you will have to purchase the license again for major update releases.

Starry Landscape Stacker Mac Download

PixInsight

Astrophotography Editor | Commercial – €230+VAT | Mac OS X, Windows, Linux

Starry Landscape Stacker Alternative Mac

Pro

  • It has all you need for astrophotography
  • 45 days trial period
  • A lot of tutorials and information available

Cons

Starry Landscape Stacker Mac Free Trial

  • Expensive and without subscription plan
  • Extremely steep learning curve
  • Long and convoluted process
  • Needs a powerful computer

When it comes to astrophotography, PixInsight is the software of reference against which all others are measured. It offers everything you may possibly need to produce pro graded images, and it is objectively the best software in the field.

But user experience can be frustrating, as the learning curve is very steep, the editing is long and convoluted, and your computer must be quite recent and powerful to make it run smoothly.

The €230 + VAT price tag is also quite steep: sure it is worth every penny, but this makes PI be even more the software of choice for professional and keen amateur astrophotographers.

A Comprehensive Demo About Image Stacking

In this video, I show you how easy it is to wet our feet with image stacking.

Starry Landscape Stacker Mac

This is particularly true if you use Starry Landscape Stacker, Sequator, Deep Sky Stacker and Autostakkert!, as I showed in the video below.

Starry Landscape Stacker Mac Crack

Conclusion

Image stacking is one of the crucial steps in the astrophotography editing workflow.

You’ll need the appropriate stacker for each type of astrophotography: starry landscapes, star trails, or deep-sky and planetary images.

In this article, we have covered the most popular astrophotography stackers available on the market, both freeware and commercial.

And while Windows users have the more extensive choice, some notable stackers are available for Mac and even Linux users.