Analysis of isoplanatic high resolution stellar fields by the StarFinder code

We describe a new code for the deep analysis of stellar fields, designed fo r Adaptive Optics (AO) Nyquist-sampled images with high and low Strehl rati o. The Point Spread Function (PSF) is extracted directly from the image fra me, to take into account the actual structure of the instrumental response and the atmospheric effects. The code is written in IDL language and organi zed in the form of a self-contained widget-based application, provided with a series of tools for data visualization and analysis. A description of th e method and some applications to AO data are presented.