Update October, 2023: The EZ Processing Suite is no longer available in PixInsight

Update October, 2023: The EZ Processing Suite is no longer available in PixInsight

The EZ Processing Suite is a set of six scripts that make complex tasks in PixInsight much easier. Among the scripts is EZ Soft Stretch, designed to make the process of stretching an image into its nonlinear state easier.

To install the EZ Processing Suite of scripts, refer to this article and refer to the section called ‘Installing EZ Processing Suite’.

EZ Soft Stretch is easy to use yet it performs a number of calculations and measurements as part of its processing. If you are interested in exactly what EZ Soft Stretch does, and you can read JavaScript code, you can review the code in the PixInight\Src\Scripts\EZSoftStretch.js file.

Using EZ Soft Stretch

EZ Soft Stretch is suitable for both color and monochrome images. The background of your image should already be evened out using DBE and ideally, a color image should already be color calibrated before you start this script. Note that your image must be in the linear, or non-stretched, state.

EZ Soft Stretch might not be suitable for some images and as usual, experimentation is key.

Do the following to use the script:

1. Save all of your work in the PixInsight desktop

2. Start EZ Soft Stretch by selecting from the menu Script – EZ Processing Suite – EZ Soft Stretch

3. Accept the warning that pops-up

4. Select your image where it says <No View Selected>

5. Adjust the Target Median until you see your image appear on the right side of the screen

6. Note the output on the process console and watch values like ‘Total Clipped Pixels’

7. Adjust the Agressiveness to taste and note the effect on ‘Total Clipped Pixels’

8. When satisfied, click ‘Run EZ Soft Stretch’ to make your adjustments permanent

Conclusion

In this article, you learned about EZ Soft Stretch and how to use it.

More Articles In This Series

This article is part of a whole series of articles about processing images using PixInsight: