How to manually Blink to compare a star mask with its underlying image?

[Rudy Pohl]

Hi There,

I have been working through Adam Block's two videos on star removal based on Fabian Neyer's method. The problem is that I can't figure out what Adam is doing in order to compare a star mask mask with it's underlying image that allows him to toggle back and forth between them. You can see him doing this at the 14:35 minute mark of his Part 1 video here: https://youtu.be/1rEBbZhsDIU

Can you please detail for me step-by-step what he does to place the star mask correctly onto the image, and then what process or keyboard shortcut he uses to toggle back and forth between them?

I have tried dragging and dropping the mask onto the image while holding down various combinations of shift, control and alt keys, but I just can't get the two files linked together somehow, so I can't use the Control + Page Down keys to toggle as directed in another PI post addressing the same question here: https://pixinsight.com/forum/index.php?topic=12138.msg74353#msg74353

Thanks very much,
Rudy

[pfile]

there's no drag/drop or masking going on here. he's simply putting the windows one directly on top of the other, and then doing the control-page down thing. that toggles between the currently-selected window and the previously-selected window.

on macosx the key shortcut is option-page down

rob

[Rudy Pohl]

Thanks Rob.

I just tried that and there was no response.

I carefully dragged the star mask and placed it directly on top of the image file and then held down the control key and pressed the down arrow (page down) and nothing happened. I am using a PC with a Windows 7 operating system.

Do you have any idea why this is not working or anything else I could try?

Thanks,
Rudy

[pfile]

down arrow and page down are different keycodes... a full PC keyboard should have both - at least my Sun keyboards do.

rob

[oldwexi]

Hi Rudy!
On my Win 7 PC i simply press
Ctrl  and (on the numeric block on the right side)  the 3

Gerald

[Rudy Pohl]

down arrow and page down are different keycodes... a full PC keyboard should have both - at least my Sun keyboards do.

rob

Thanks Rob, got it... yes my my keyboard does in fact have these keys and now I am making it work! I never use these keys and someone got it into my head that the up and down arrows did the same thing. Hilarious since I have been computing since 1989!!!!

Cheers,
Rudy

[Rudy Pohl]

Hi Rudy!
On my Win 7 PC i simply press
Ctrl  and (on the numeric block on the right side)  the 3

Gerald

Thanks Gerald, that also worked perfectly!

Best regards,
Rudy

[pfile]

great, glad to hear it's working!

rob

[ngc1535]

If I can add...
This is always the danger of publishing videos that are not seen in context (relative to the complete set). I have had many questions on this particular topic in my own inbox because of this video. 
This kind of information is covered in the introductory lessons so that it isn't mysterious later on.
I felt the topic was so important... I spent 30 minutes on the various ways to compare images in PI. (I am a bit crazy...)

Concerning the up and down arrows- the information is almost correct...but it only applies to PREVIEWS of a view...and it is CTRL+ <- or -> arrows. In my opinion since previews are vertical by default... the up/down arrows would make more sense.

 -adam

[Rudy Pohl]

Thanks so much for this info Adam!

Cheers,
Rudy