Image Processing Software

Before you can download images from SDSS, you will need a program to view them. A good freeware program called Iris is available for download on the Internet. You can download it from the IRIS Home Page.

Scroll down to "For installation of version 5.34, click here," then click the link to download the file iris.zip. You will need to unzip it using a program such as WinZip. After the program is unzipped, run setup.exe to install Iris.

If you scroll down on the Iris home page, you will see a tutorial. The tutorial will introduce you to all the features of the program.

When you open the program, you will see the screen similar to the screen shown below:

Next, you need to set up Iris so it knows where to find the pictures you want to use. Click on File and then Settings. The following window will appear.

If you plan on getting your images from a CD-ROM, be sure the drive letter is correct. Change the working path to the directory where you plan to store your images. You might create a directory with your name to store your images. Change the working path to c:\MyName\

Fits files can have a file type of either .fit or .fts. The rest of this project will use the .fts extension, so change file type to .fts. Click OK.

Now, you need to get some images to analyze!