I am capturing raw16 images in SER format from a ZWO ASI678 which are in color. I am processing on Ubuntu using Siril 1.2.1. I have a viewer which shows the SER file data in color. In Siril the RAW16 only shows as B&W. I am aligning and stacking the results successfully but the stacked image is also B&W. I have found some procedures on the internet but nothing is working for me. Can anyone help with this?
I think I figured it out. If I store the data as SER (not FITS as I was sometimes using) and then convert the SER file to another SER file using SIRIL - BUT - making sure to select the DeBray option - the result seems to be a proper color rendition. I figured it was probably something simple I was missing.
No need to convert a SER. A SER file can be debayerd on the fly. This is how it works.
Well I guess I am still missing something. I could not find any kind of setting to get Siril to treat my raw16 SER data as anything but Black & White. What finally worked for me was using the Siril conversion function and performing a conversion from SER to SER but with the Debray checkbox checked (menu based - I have not tried writing scripts). The converted result behaved in color as I expected. I assume that the converter recognized from the SER metadata the files were raw16 RGGB pattern then the debray option created some alternate representation with separate color layers extracted. This is quite workable but if there is a more direct approach I would love to hear it. As I mentioned before, the external viewer utilities (e.g. Ubuntu ser-player) did automatically debray the SER files, but SIRIL did not for me.
Simply check the debayer button before opening an SER file. The opendialog has a debayer button for this purpose. A SER file is just a Siril sequence. That’s why another conversion is useless, apart from taking up space on the hard disk.
Well there you go. That is what I was looking for. I simply did not see the little debray option in the lower left corner (I am very new to all aspects of Astronomy - equipment and software). Thank you - sorry for the silliness!