Troubleshooting

Remove Satellite Trails from Planetary Images

How to remove satellite trails, airplane lights, and other streaks from your planetary photos using proper stacking techniques.

Quick Solution

Use Median Stacking stacking algorithm for the best results.

The safest choice - naturally rejects outliers and artifacts

Common Causes

  • 1Satellites (especially Starlink) crossing field of view
  • 2Airplane lights
  • 3Meteor trails
  • 4ISS passes

How to Fix It

1

Use median stacking - outliers are naturally rejected

2

Use sigma-clip stacking for statistical removal

3

Capture longer videos to have more clean frames

4

Manually exclude affected frames if possible

Settings to Adjust

Stacking AlgorithmSigma Threshold

These settings in Uranum's Advanced Mode can help resolve this issue.

Prevention Tips

  • -Check satellite pass predictions before capturing
  • -Capture multiple short videos instead of one long one
  • -Plan captures when fewer satellites are visible

Why Median Stacking?

Median Stacking
Beginner
The safest choice - naturally rejects outliers and artifacts

How it works:

  • 1.For each pixel position, collects values from all frames
  • 2.Sorts all values and selects the middle value (median)
  • 3.Outliers (satellites, hot pixels, cosmic rays) are naturally excluded

Best for:

  • -First-time planetary photographers - safe and reliable
  • -Removing satellite trails, airplane lights, Starlink streaks
  • -Videos with occasional bright artifacts or hot pixels

Try with Your Planet: Median Stacking

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