WFC3 Pipeline

There are 3 major components to the STScI WFC3 data processing pipeline that runs within the OPUS processing environment. The first, known as "generic conversion", does the work of translating the raw data telemetry from WFC3 into FITS files containing the raw science images (_raw.fits) and telescope and instrument engineering data (_spt.fits). It also queries the STScI Calibration Data Base System (CDBS) to determine which calibration reference files should be used for subsequent instrumental calibration.

CALWF3 is the second pipeline component, which is used to apply instrumental calibration to all WFC3 raw images, and produces various calibrated image products such as _flt.fits, _ima.fits (IR only), and _crj.fits files. MultiDrizzle is the third and final stage of processing, taking the calibrated images produced by CALWF3 and producing distortion-corrected and, for associations of images, a combined image product (_drz.fits files).

When WFC3 data sets are retrieved from the HST archive, the data are rerun through this entire processing system, starting with the raw instrument telemetry, using the On-The-Fly Recalibration (OTFR) system. This provides calibrated products using the latest and best software and calibration reference files.

Here you will find links to news and information about these various processing components.

CALWF3 Release Notes

CALWF3 v2.3 contained a fix to the IR zsigcorr routine that can have a significant effect on the calibrated results for IR sub-array exposures containing very bright sources. See the CALWF3 v2.3 release notes for more details.

Modified 01/11/2012 HAB