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Mick,
I think you may be asking the wrong question....
When you consider astrophotography there are many (I mean MANY!) things to consider....
The combination of telescope (and mounting) and camera...
Before you can process any images you have to acquire the image from your system.
The "best" acquisition software depends on your camera - Webcams/ fast frame imagers, say for planetary, lunar and solar use something like FireCapture whereas for longer DSO exposures with CCD cameras many use packages like AstroArt, Maxim etc. which allow for darks/ flats/ stacking and all the necessary pre (and most of the post) processing. These serious packages can also assist in telescope control and guiding....
Turning the images into "pretty pictures" is a black art and nothing to do with the "science" of astronomy - the usual suspect for this image manipulation and enhancement is PS -why?? Well, because it was one of the first serious photographic programs to offer the features (layers/ histograms etc.) and run 3rd party plug modules to assist the AP guys.
Those days have changed... PaintShopPro now offers a very competitive package which does everything PS does (for the amateur) at a significant cost saving.
I'm committed to spectroscopy so I don't apply any "enhancements" to my raw data, but I can't help but be impressed with the capabilities of PaintShopPro......
Just my 2c
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