Articles
The Doc's technical guides on astrophotography: acquisition, processing, gear, theory.
Astrophotography guiding: tuning PHD2 and correcting tracking
Stars trailed, kidney-beaned, or S-shaped? Tune PHD2, polar alignment, and balance for clean tracking. Diagnose your guiding signature with the Doc.
13 Jul 2026#guiding #acquisition
Halos and reflections in astrophotography: causes and solutions
Red ring, ghost spot, or purple fringe? Tell apart filter halos, internal reflections, and chromatic aberration, then fix them. Identify the artifact with the Doc.
22 Jun 2026#optics #processing
Calibration Frames in Astrophotography: Darks, Offsets, and Flats Explained
Calibration frames in astrophotography: what defects darks, offsets, and flats actually fix, and the mistakes to avoid. Diagnose your image in under a minute.
05 Jun 2026#acquisition #processing
Walking Noise & FPN Banding: Understanding and Eliminating Them
Walking noise, FPN, and banding: why they appear after stacking and how to eliminate them through dithering. Run your diagnosis in 1 minute.
28 May 2026#acquisition #processing
Elongated Stars in Astrophotography: Causes and Solutions
Stars shaped like comets, rods, or arcs? Discover the causes of elongated stars in astrophotography and the method to diagnose and fix them.
21 May 2026#astrophotography #mount
How to Analyze an Astrophoto Light Frame Before Stacking
An 8-point diagnostic method for sorting your astrophoto light frames before DSS or Siril: FWHM, eccentricity, SNR, tracking, optics, sensor noise.
09 May 2026#acquisition #diagnosis
Astigmatism in astrophotography: causes, diagnosis, and solutions
Astigmatism in astrophotography is one of the most common optical aberrations. The good news: in the vast majority of cases it can be corrected.
04 May 2026#acquisition #diagnosis
Astrophotography Problems: Solutions for Successful Images
This article walks you through diagnosing your images, whether the issue is collimation, sensor tilt, autoguiding, or simply poorly taken flats
30 Apr 2026#acquisition #processing