NAME

       mFlattenExec - Remove the background from an image

SYNOPSIS

       mFlattenExec [-p imgdir] [-d] [-n(o-areas)] [-s statusfile] images.tbl flatdir

DESCRIPTION

       Runs both mFitPlane and mBackground on a set of images.

OPTIONS

       -p imgdir
              Specifies path to directory containing images to be flattened.

       -d     Turns on debugging.

       -n     No-area-images  flag,  indicating  that mFlattenExec should not require area images
              for all the input FITS images.

       -s statusfile
              Output and errors are sent to statusfile instead of to stdout

ARGUMENTS

       images.tbl
              Metadata table (generated by mImgtbl) describing images to be flattened.

       flatdir
              Path to directory where output files should be created.

RESULT

       Creates "flattened" versions of each input FITS image.

MESSAGES

       OK     [struct stat="OK", count=nimages, failed=nfailed, warning=nwarnings]

       ERROR  Cannot open status file: statusfile

       ERROR  Cannot access flatdir

       ERROR  flatdir is not a directory

       ERROR  Invalid image metadata file: filename

       ERROR  Need column 'file' in image metadata file filename

       ERROR  mDiff or mBackground error

EXAMPLES

       $ mFlattenExec output/images.tbl output/flattened
              [struct stat="OK", count=5, failed=0, warning=0]

BUGS

       The drizzle algorithm has been implemented but has not been tested in this release.

       If a header template contains  carriage  returns  (i.e.,  created/modified  on  a  Windows
       machine),  the cfitsio library will be unable to read it properly, resulting in the error:
       [struct stat="ERROR", status=207, msg="illegal character in keyword"]

       It is best for the background correction algorithms if the area described  in  the  header
       template  completely encloses all of the input images in their entirety. If parts of input
       images are "chopped off" by  the  header  template,  the  background  correction  will  be
       affected.  We  recommend  you  use  an expanded header for the reprojection and background
       modeling steps, returning to the originally desired header size for the final  coaddition.
       The default background matching assumes that there are no non-linear background variations
       in the individual images (and therefore in the  overlap  differences).  If  there  is  any
       uncertainty  in  this  regard, it is safer to turn on the "level only" background matching
       (the "-l" flag in mBgModel.

COPYRIGHT

       2001-2015 California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California

       If your research  uses  Montage,  please  include  the  following  acknowledgement:  "This
       research  made use of Montage. It is funded by the National Science Foundation under Grant
       Number ACI-1440620, and was previously  funded  by  the  National  Aeronautics  and  Space
       Administration's  Earth Science Technology Office, Computation Technologies Project, under
       Cooperative Agreement Number  NCC5-626  between  NASA  and  the  California  Institute  of
       Technology."

       The  Montage  distribution  includes an adaptation of the MOPEX algorithm developed at the
       Spitzer Science Center.