Today we released Observatory 1.0.5, an important update for PixInsight users.

In this release, we’ve added support for the XISF image format. XISF is the native file format of PixInsight, an image processing software platform designed specifically for astronomical imaging. You can now import these images in addition to FITS, SBIG, DNG, NEF, CR2, TIFF, JPG, and many more image formats.

We also added the capability to open a master image in an external editor, like PixInsight, directly from Observatory. And because Observatory now actively monitors master images to detect if they were altered or deleted, it is very easy to keep your libraries in sync with the file system.

We didn’t stop there though. We have added something that we thought PixInsight was dearly missing: Quick Look and Spotlight plugins for XISF images! This is in addition to the FITS and SBIG plugins that we added previously to Observatory. What this means is that you can preview your XISF images and display metadata in Finder itself, and use Spotlight to find these images by some of their metadata.

There is more to this release than PixInsight support though, like extensive drag & drop support. You can now organize images by just dragging them to albums, or you can stack images by just dropping them on each other.

Also exciting is the new ability to drop a Finder folder onto the Observatory application icon. This will create a new library with all images in the folder and its subfolders. It’s a great way to quickly inspect last night’s images. And it can serve as a starting point for a much larger library as well.

Another bonus: greatly enhanced documentation.

Check for updates via the App Store application and read the full release notes here.