I have downloaded the Pempro V2 trial. I am trying to use it to Polar Align with the Wizard
My software/hardware is
CCD Soft V5
EQDIR running EQ6 under Ascom
Everything talks OK but Pempro has great trouble finding a star. When it does its fine but then i make the adjustment and it cant find a star again. I can see them in CCDSoft but when it selects the find window there is rarely a star in the window.
I set, Binning to 3, exposure to about 10 seconds, find window to 200 pixels, the maximum i think? and min brightness to 500.
Any tips as I would really like to get this working
The min and max brightness should be 1000/30000 respectively (defaults). A 1x1 or 2x2 bin should be sufficient to find a star. At least with 5 or 10 second exposures anyway.
I'm assuming you're using the wizard. What happens when you measure your arcsec/pixel. This is when you stop tracking on the mount and exposure is taken. You then select the start and finish of the star trail. The software then in turn calculates the arcsec/pixel and camera angle. Does this work - do you see trails?
For OSC camera, are you converting colour to mono? If not the output in Pempro will look grainy due to colour matrix information and may impact accuracy. This maybe the cause of your problems. You'll find the screen shot of the option I mention below.
I've noticed that when you move the mount it alt or az it can take some time to reacquire a star to measure. Typically to more than 10 seconds however. You can then monitor the drift for a while before making another adjustment. The process is iterative until you've got no drift for the desired length of time. I've got mine dialled in so there is no drift for approx 30mins, but that's a permanent setup.
I am putting a star roughly in the center of the 3 by 3 binned image. Certainly focusmax has no problem finding it.
Sometimes even when it shrinks the box down to the 200 px i select and I can see a star, Pempro cant see it. It has managed once or twice to find a star and I get some drift calcs but then it loses it. The only filter is the IR/UV cut.
Hi jase,
Yes, i do see star trails at that step of thew wizard. I didnt select the convert to mono as the text mentions Maxim and I am using CCDsoft.
I will try it with this option and if that doesnt work try Maxim.
(1) With CCDSoft/Maxim DL depending on the measurement time in step 2 of the wizard I get star trails but when i click on the start and end it says the value is too small and not in range max to min. The value is around 0.03.
I ignored this step and looked up arcsec/pixel for my TV85/0.8 reducer/SBIG 2000 and got 3.2 arcsec/pixel which i entered.
I am not sure of the camera angle to enter. With the scope in the home position and the camera plugged in straight up and down, what should the angle be? Then will this angle change when i slew to the meridian or does it just mean the angle of the camera when i am trying to polar align?
(2) No matter what I do CCDSoft cannot seem to find a star for tracking. Note that there is no convert to mono option for CCDSoft. Maxim DL can find a star easily. However, sometimes I get a good pinpoint image when I watch the maxim dl preview while tracking, and sometimes it goes all grainy. It does not seem to matter if i select convert to mono and pick LISSAA or high quality RRGB, sometimes grainy, sometimes sharp.
(3) Pressing on, at least Maxim DL does track, (note I dont have the autoguider cable) so assume EQDIR is doing the tracking, etc. The adjustments I get are all over the place and I am reasonably close to the pole. When I say reasonably close, maybe a few degrees and close enough to get a reasonable alignment visually in 30 minutes. For example it says 100 arcminutes west, then i adjust and it might then say 200 arcminutes west or even east and then back to west again.
maybe its the wrong camera angle; and the fact that sometimes the image is grainy and sometimes not. Anyway I am buggered and definately need some help
(1) With CCDSoft/Maxim DL depending on the measurement time in step 2 of the wizard I get star trails but when i click on the start and end it says the value is too small and not in range max to min. The value is around 0.03.
I ignored this step and looked up arcsec/pixel for my TV85/0.8 reducer/SBIG 2000 and got 3.2 arcsec/pixel which i entered.
How long is the star trail exposures Paul? Only 0.03 trail. You sure you turned off the mount tracking. I typically place the mount into terrestrial mode (or what ever is off). You may need a 20 to 30 sec exposure to get a long enough trail.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Zuts
I am not sure of the camera angle to enter. With the scope in the home position and the camera plugged in straight up and down, what should the angle be? Then will this angle change when i slew to the meridian or does it just mean the angle of the camera when i am trying to polar align?
Once you get the length of trail, the camera angle will also be calculated for you. Its important to get this right. If you are still having problems, you can use the MaximDL telescope control window to calculate the angle for you (a screenshot is provided below).
Quote:
Originally Posted by Zuts
(2) No matter what I do CCDSoft cannot seem to find a star for tracking. Note that there is no convert to mono option for CCDSoft. Maxim DL can find a star easily. However, sometimes I get a good pinpoint image when I watch the maxim dl preview while tracking, and sometimes it goes all grainy. It does not seem to matter if i select convert to mono and pick LISSAA or high quality RRGB, sometimes grainy, sometimes sharp.
Yes, sorry forget that you needed MaximDL for Pempro to convert the image to mono. How is the auto dark subtraction - is it working ok?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Zuts
(3) Pressing on, at least Maxim DL does track, (note I dont have the autoguider cable) so assume EQDIR is doing the tracking, etc. The adjustments I get are all over the place and I am reasonably close to the pole. When I say reasonably close, maybe a few degrees and close enough to get a reasonable alignment visually in 30 minutes. For example it says 100 arcminutes west, then i adjust and it might then say 200 arcminutes west or even east and then back to west again.
Strange. I'm assuming your adjustments aren't that large! I'd say its down the initial set up of the wizard. You need to get the star trails sorted.
Finally, have you swapped chips to validate the results? In MaximDL (and probably CCDSoft) you can change your imaging chip to become the guide chip. As such your guide chip becomes the imaging chip. Make sure you remember to change them back! (see second attachment).
I posted a few questions on the forum. The author was very quick to respond which was great but the reply wasn't much help.
Posted 19 May 2008 10:45 PM Hide Post
Hi Paul,
1) Do you have "," defined as a decimal point and "." defined as the thousands separator? If so, try reversing them so they have the same meaning as we here in the USA use.
2) The graininess of the image doesn't matter. That's just the way the data is stretched by Maxim or CCDSoft.
3) You should try to get the calibration wizard to work by changing the meanings of "," and "." in Windows regional settings.
How long is the star trail exposures Paul? Only 0.03 trail. You sure you turned off the mount tracking. I typically place the mount into terrestrial mode (or what ever is off). You may need a 20 to 30 sec exposure to get a long enough trail.
I have tried 5 to 30 seconds and always get roughly the same answer. On my 1024 by 768 laptop, the trails range from around 1/4 inch at 5 seconds to around 2 inches maybe at 30 seconds, so I think they are long enough to measure. Basically something is not right and I may look at re-installing.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jase
Once you get the length of trail, the camera angle will also be calculated for you. Its important to get this right. If you are still having problems, you can use the MaximDL telescope control window to calculate the angle for you (a screenshot is provided below).
Thanks, a very good suggestion. I will try this next night out.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jase
Yes, sorry forget that you needed MaximDL for Pempro to convert the image to mono. How is the auto dark subtraction - is it working ok?
This is a strange one. I have given up on CCDSoft and Pempro and use Maxim. CCDSoft cant seem to find a star but Maxim manages to get one after a few exposures. Even here though, when I view the Maxim preview while tracking, sometimes the image is pinpoint with a good star image on a black background and then it goes grainy on the next exposure, then good for a while and so on. Scratching my head over this one as well
Anyway, I have given up on the imaging side for a bit and have decided to try and sort out the software side. I would like to get Pempro working together with the integration to the Sky 5. This is a reasonable task for a treed in back yard.
Once I have all this sorted then back into it. At the moment I feel my images wont improve unless I master my current hardware/software environment. The robofocus was a real eye opener to me as to the benefits of certain forms of automation.
Still having heaps of trouble with Pempro V2. I will wait for Ray to reply then may give it away. I wasted three hours last night trying to Polar Align with it when I could have done it with the trusty Meade reticle in under 40 minutes.
Anyway, I have posted a link to my CCDWARE forum post which contains info about my problems.
You've lost me Paul. I read through the CCDware forum thread. Never experienced the grief you're going through. Incompatibility with EQDIR perhaps. I'll be surprised if Ray can't get you on the straight and narrow.
You've lost me Paul. I read through the CCDware forum thread. Never experienced the grief you're going through. Incompatibility with EQDIR perhaps. I'll be surprised if Ray can't get you on the straight and narrow.
Hi Jase,
I've lost me as well , still I can see the benefit in Pempro and would like to get it working. Unfortunately Ray is on holiday for a week, hopefully when he returns he will read my post and sort out my problems
