Stacking method in ImagesPlus?

[iceman (Mike)]

What's the best stacking method in ImagesPlus for wide-ish field deep-space images?

At the moment, i'm stacking it using AVG, Adaptive-Add and Median - and then trying to compare the results and pick the best.

What's the best method and why?

[[1ponders] (Paul)]

I think its pretty much a preferential thing Mike. Pure summing is best for noise reduction, but quickly exceeds the tonal range, average is next best for noise but if you have a satellite or meteor in one shot you will have to exclude that shot or you will still have the streak. Median is best in that scenario but the noise reduction isn't as good as the other two.

[JohnH]

The best compromise seems to be min/max excluded average assuming you have a decent number of light subs....there are some reasons to use other methods for the combination of darks when median will deal with warm pixels best and flats where I think best choice is average.

I am also beginning to multiple stacking techniques and then use layers to allow independant developement of faint and bright regions in a frame while preserving star colours...but I have finished experimenting with this yet.