Can FITS files store color data for astrophotography?
Asked 11/26/2017
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I'm stacking astrophotography images in Siril on Linux and noticed the output FIT/FITS files seem to look black and white. Does the FITS format actually support color data, or is it only monochrome? If color is supported, how do you preserve or recover the color information when working with stacked images in Siril?
Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
Photography Stack Exchange contributor
8y ago
2 Answers
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Siril has the ability to demosaic the FIT file, there is a checkbox on the file conversion tab. I found it best to de-mosaic the pre-processed / stacked FIT file as a last stage, it speeds the processing up on the intermediate steps as you are working on one layer not 3 (Red Green and Blue).
The siril documentation explains this more fully.
Here's the method that worked for me.
To process a star trail sequence with multiple dark frames in siril.
CREATE MASTER DARKFRAME.
In File Copnversion tab click change dir and add a working directory eg "siril working dir". Add raw darkframes in file conversion source and then enter sequence name eg darkframes, press convert button. We now have darkframes_seq loaded. In Stacking tab select Stacking Methods > Median Stacking and Normalisation > No normalisation. Then click Start Stacking to create darkframes_stacked.fit
CREATE FIT from RAW.
In File Conversion tab clear source with remove all files from list button then add raws to be processed in file conversion source and enter new sequence name eg P6174240-53, press convert. FIT image files are created and sequence P6174240_53_.seq is automatically selected.
PRE-PROCESS SEQUENCE WITH DARKFRAME.
In pre-processing click use dark and browse to darkframe_stacked.fit then click Start pre-processing. Pre-processed FIT files prefixed "pp_" created and image sequence pp_P6174240_53_.seq is automatically selected.
STACKING SEQUENCE.
In Stacking select Stacking Methods > Pixel Maximum Stacking and click Start Stacking to create the ingle stacked image pp_P6174240-53_stacked.fit.
DE-MOSAICING AND IMAGE PROCESSING.
Check Demosaicing then use Siril Control Center File > Open > pp_P6174240-53_stacked.fit. to carry on in the same window.
In Control Center click Image Processing > Histogram and apply autostretch or alter sliders. Control Center > Image Processing > Remove Green Noise > apply. Control Center > File > Save As > Tiff. Enter file name eg debayered_pp_P6174240-53_stacked.tif and save. Open in Gimp (ideally 2.9x other editors are available) and adjust as necessary (curves / saturation / cloneing) then export.
see https://free-astro.org/index.php/Siril:Manual and https://free-astro.org/siril_doc-en/#Reference_documentation_1
Originally by user60903. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user60903
8y ago
0
Generated from our catalog & community — verify before relying on it.
Yes — FITS can store color image data; it is not limited to black and white. In astrophotography workflows, FIT/FITS files may initially appear monochrome because the raw sensor data has not yet been demosaiced (debayered). In Siril, you can demosaic during conversion or later in the workflow. One community suggestion was to demosaic the preprocessed/stacked FIT file as a final step, which can speed up earlier processing because you are working with one layer instead of three color channels.
So if your FIT files look grayscale, that usually reflects the stage of processing rather than a limitation of the FITS format itself. Also note that some image viewers/editors may not display FITS files or their color channels properly, so opening them in software with solid FITS support can help.
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