JSeaman

I have a raspberry pi and a monitor mounted on the side of my observatory. Just a cheap one and it has been there for ~3 years with no issues and no protection at all, used in all temperatures without issue.

Last night I finished off NGC281 (Pacman Nebula) which is an SHO image with 3 hours per filter I also did a 'quick' Pleiades in RGB with 1hr for red+green and 2 hours for blue

Well if there is an eclipse I might have another go. Although nice to hear I haven't done terribly!

Couldn't agre more and thank you!

I have never tried solar imaging before but I was given some Baader film yesterday so I 3D printed a cap for my ED80 and gave it a whirl. Whilst I don't really know what I'm doing, I managed to get this image using FireCapture with ~1.5mS exposure time and it's exactly what I hoped to get. Using autostakkert and registax gave me the final image and I'm not sure how far from 'real' I have made it, I didn't intend to create any kind of artefacts etc. A little false colour made it orange and now I will probably give up and move back to DSOs!

No problem, just using levels and curves in photoshop will give you a similar result. The data looks fine to use so snap away and process at your leisure!

Here's a quick SHO with STF autostretch on each channel and then a bit of smoothing to deal with the small amount of data

I did a while ago, I'm happy with my new set up though for now

I was finding the Ekos focus was very erratic, simply running it over and over gave me different results every time. I also found that it rarely met the focus that the Bahtinov showed so it's more reliable

Hi, for focus I use Kstars/Ekos. The autofocus with Bahtinov Mask is a bit hit and miss so I tend to do that myself

I finally got around to doing something I have wanted for ages, automating the Bahtinov mask on my ED80. I have tried the various autofocus routines but always got better results with a mask so wanted to stick with this method but without the back and forth of going outside to use it. I finally got around to designing a solution and it looks like this: I have a bash script running on the raspberry pi 4b which toggles a GPIO for 1 second: #!/bin/bash gpio -g mode 4 out gpio -g write 4 0 sleep 1s gpio -g mode 4 in Although this is a 3.3V system, the IO pin is connected to an Arduino Uno's (5V) input which still sees logic high at 3.3V. I use the Arduino's internal weak pull up on the input and same on the Pi's output pin then pull to ground for 1 second to trigger it. The Arduino will go to the open position if it is anywhere else, and moves to the close position if it is in the open position (so in normal use it opens or closes as a toggle). The code is fairly simple: #include <Stepper.h> #include <EEPROM.h> //------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- #define STEPS_PER_REVOLUTION 2038 //Resolution of the stepper motor #define STEPS_PER_DEGREE 6 //Number of steps to move ~1 degree (actual 5.6) #define STEPPER_IN_1 8 //Stepper motor control IO #define STEPPER_IN_2 9 //Stepper motor control IO #define STEPPER_IN_3 10 //Stepper motor control IO #define STEPPER_IN_4 11 //Stepper motor control IO #define JOYSTICK_X A0 //Analogue input for the X position of the joystick #define JOYSTICK_Y A1 //Analogue input for the Y position of the joystick #define JOYSTICK_BUTTON 7 //Digital pin to read the joystick button state from #define BUZZER_FREQUENCY 250 //Frequency in Hz of the buzzer for beeps #define BUTTON_FREQUENCY 2500 //Frequency in Hz of the button press #define BUZZER_PIN 12 //Pin used to drive a buzzer #define IDLE_STATE 0 //States for using the joystick button #define WAITING_FOR_OPEN_POSITION 1 #define WAITING_FOR_CLOSED_POSITION 2 #define BUTTON_TIMEOUT_PERIOD 30000 //Timeout when saving open/close position #define BUTTON_PIN 6 //Pin to use for the open/close triggering #define RELAY_PIN 5 //Pin to drive the relay for the motor #define SAVE_TIMEOUT 5000 //Save 5 seconds after the last movement //------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Stepper StepperMotor = Stepper(STEPS_PER_REVOLUTION, STEPPER_IN_1, STEPPER_IN_3, STEPPER_IN_2, STEPPER_IN_4); int JOYSTICK_STATE_MACHINE = IDLE_STATE; int CURRENT_POSITION = 0; int OPEN_POSITION = 0; int CLOSED_POSITION = 1019; long BUTTON_TIMEOUT = 0; long SAVE_TIMER=0; //------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- void setup() { Serial.begin (115200); Serial.println ("Starting up ..."); //Load any previous positional settings ReadEEPROM(); //Set up the joystick, buzzer, switch and I/O pinMode (JOYSTICK_BUTTON, INPUT_PULLUP); pinMode(BUZZER_PIN, OUTPUT); pinMode(BUTTON_PIN, INPUT_PULLUP); pinMode(RELAY_PIN, OUTPUT); Serial.println ("Setting motor speed"); StepperMotor.setSpeed(5); } //------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- void loop() { //If there were no joystick movements to deal with if (HandleJoystick()==false) { //Handle the joystick button or switch presses HandleButton(); } //If our timer is set to save settings after movement if (SAVE_TIMER!=0) { //If the timer has expired (a time passed since we last moved) if (millis()>=SAVE_TIMER) { //Save settings WriteEEPROM(); //Cancel the timer SAVE_TIMER=0; Serial.println ("Depowering relay"); //Drop the relay so we don't power the motor any more digitalWrite (RELAY_PIN, LOW); } } } //------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- void PowerRelay() { Serial.print ("millis: "); Serial.println (millis()); Serial.print ("SAVE_TIMER: "); Serial.println (SAVE_TIMER); //If we aren't already powered the relay if (millis()>=SAVE_TIMER) { Serial.println ("Powering relay"); //Switching on the relay digitalWrite (RELAY_PIN, HIGH); } } //------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- bool HandleJoystick() { bool ReturnValue=false; int XPos = 0, YPos = 0; long Timeout = 0; //Read the X and Y positions of the joystick XPos = analogRead(JOYSTICK_X); YPos = analogRead(JOYSTICK_Y); //If they are moving us in the close direction if (XPos <= 400 || YPos >= 600) { PowerRelay(); StepperMotor.step(-STEPS_PER_DEGREE); CURRENT_POSITION -= STEPS_PER_DEGREE; //We will save settings a number of mS after the last movement SAVE_TIMER=millis()+SAVE_TIMEOUT; Serial.println ("Saving in 5 seconds due to negative joystick movement"); //Return there was a movement ReturnValue=true; Serial.print ("Current position : "); Serial.println (CURRENT_POSITION); } //If they are moving us in the open direction else if (XPos >= 600 || YPos <= 400) { PowerRelay(); StepperMotor.step(STEPS_PER_DEGREE); CURRENT_POSITION += STEPS_PER_DEGREE; //We will save settings a number of mS after the last movement SAVE_TIMER=millis()+SAVE_TIMEOUT; Serial.println ("Saving in 5 seconds due to positive joystick movement"); //Return there was a movement ReturnValue=true; Serial.print ("Current position : "); Serial.println (CURRENT_POSITION); } return ReturnValue; } //------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- void HandleButton() { int ButtonPos=0; long Timeout = 0; ButtonPos = digitalRead (JOYSTICK_BUTTON); //If joystick the button is pressed if (ButtonPos == 0) { //Give up to 2 seconds to let go Timeout = millis() + 2000; do { delay(20); ButtonPos = digitalRead (JOYSTICK_BUTTON); } //Loop while the button is held and timeout hasn't happened while (ButtonPos == 0 && Timeout > millis()); //If they released it if (ButtonPos == 1) { HandleStateMachine(); } else { Serial.println ("Button held too long, ignoring"); } } else { //If we are part way through saving positions if (JOYSTICK_STATE_MACHINE != IDLE_STATE) { //If timeout occurred if (millis() >= BUTTON_TIMEOUT) { Serial.println ("Button timeout occurred"); JOYSTICK_STATE_MACHINE = IDLE_STATE; for (int Counter = 0; Counter < 10; Counter++) { Beep(BUZZER_FREQUENCY, 50); delay(50); } } } HandlePushButton(); } } //------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- void HandleStateMachine() { switch (JOYSTICK_STATE_MACHINE) { case IDLE_STATE: { Serial.println ("Button pressed from idle, set open position"); JOYSTICK_STATE_MACHINE = WAITING_FOR_OPEN_POSITION; //Beep once to show we are starting the process Beep(BUZZER_FREQUENCY, 50); //20 second timeout starts ticking BUTTON_TIMEOUT = millis() + BUTTON_TIMEOUT_PERIOD; break; } case WAITING_FOR_OPEN_POSITION: { OPEN_POSITION = CURRENT_POSITION; Serial.println ("Open position set, set closed position"); //Beep twice to save the open position Beep(BUZZER_FREQUENCY, 50); delay(50); Beep(BUZZER_FREQUENCY, 50); JOYSTICK_STATE_MACHINE = WAITING_FOR_CLOSED_POSITION; //20 second timeout starts ticking BUTTON_TIMEOUT = millis() + BUTTON_TIMEOUT_PERIOD; break; } case WAITING_FOR_CLOSED_POSITION: { CLOSED_POSITION = CURRENT_POSITION; Serial.println ("Closed position set"); JOYSTICK_STATE_MACHINE = IDLE_STATE; //Thress beeps to complete tone (BUZZER_PIN, BUZZER_FREQUENCY); delay(50); noTone (BUZZER_PIN); delay(50); tone (BUZZER_PIN, BUZZER_FREQUENCY); delay(50); noTone (BUZZER_PIN); delay(50); tone (BUZZER_PIN, BUZZER_FREQUENCY); delay(50); noTone (BUZZER_PIN); Serial.println ("Saving positions"); WriteEEPROM(); break; } //Unexpected default: { Serial.print ("Weird state: "); Serial.print (JOYSTICK_STATE_MACHINE); Serial.println (""); JOYSTICK_STATE_MACHINE = IDLE_STATE; for (int Counter = 0; Counter < 10; Counter++) { tone (BUZZER_PIN, BUZZER_FREQUENCY); delay(50); noTone (BUZZER_PIN); delay(50); } break; } } } //------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- void HandlePushButton () { int ButtonState=0; long Timeout=0; //Joystick is dealt with, now check the push button ButtonState = digitalRead (BUTTON_PIN); //If the button is pressed if (ButtonState==0) { //Give up to 2 seconds to let go Timeout = millis() + 2000; do { delay(20); ButtonState = digitalRead (BUTTON_PIN); } //Loop while the button is held and timeout hasn't happened while (ButtonState == 0 && Timeout > millis()); Serial.println (ButtonState); //Valid press, they released it if (ButtonState==1) { Serial.println ("Button pressed!"); Beep(BUTTON_FREQUENCY, 50); Serial.print ("Current: "); Serial.println (CURRENT_POSITION); Serial.print ("Open: "); Serial.println (OPEN_POSITION); Serial.print ("Closed: "); Serial.println (CLOSED_POSITION); if (CURRENT_POSITION==OPEN_POSITION) { Serial.println ("Closing"); Close(); } //Default to opening, whether in an intermediate or open position else { Serial.println ("Opening"); Open(); } } else { //Beep 3 times to show this is a reset Beep(BUTTON_FREQUENCY, 50); delay (100); Beep(BUTTON_FREQUENCY, 50); delay (100); Beep(BUTTON_FREQUENCY, 50); //Reset to defaults CURRENT_POSITION = 0; OPEN_POSITION = 0; CLOSED_POSITION = 0; Serial.println ("Saving in 5 seconds due to reset"); //Flag that we need to save settings SAVE_TIMER=millis()+SAVE_TIMEOUT; } } } //------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- void Beep (int Frequency, int Duration) { tone (BUZZER_PIN, Frequency); delay(Duration); noTone (BUZZER_PIN); } //------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- void WriteEEPROM() { Serial.print ("Writing location 0 with "); Serial.println (OPEN_POSITION>>8); EEPROM.write(0, OPEN_POSITION>>8); Serial.print ("Writing location 1 with "); Serial.print (OPEN_POSITION&0xff); EEPROM.write(1, OPEN_POSITION&0xff); Serial.print (" ("); Serial.print (OPEN_POSITION); Serial.println (")"); Serial.print ("Writing location 2 with "); Serial.println (CLOSED_POSITION>>8); EEPROM.write(2, CLOSED_POSITION>>8); Serial.print ("Writing location 3 with "); Serial.print (CLOSED_POSITION&0xff); EEPROM.write(3, CLOSED_POSITION&0xff); Serial.print (" ("); Serial.print (CLOSED_POSITION); Serial.println (")"); //Flag to show we have written EEPROM EEPROM.write(4, 0xAA); Serial.print ("Writing location 5 with "); Serial.println (CURRENT_POSITION>>8); EEPROM.write(5, CURRENT_POSITION>>8); Serial.print ("Writing location 6 with "); Serial.print (CURRENT_POSITION&0xff); EEPROM.write(6, CURRENT_POSITION&0xff); Serial.print (" ("); Serial.print (CURRENT_POSITION); Serial.println (")"); } //------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- void ReadEEPROM() { byte ErrorFlag=0; //Flag to show we have written EEPROM ErrorFlag=EEPROM.read(4); if (ErrorFlag==0xAA) { Serial.println ("EEPROM initialised"); OPEN_POSITION = (int)(EEPROM.read(0)<<8) + EEPROM.read(1); Serial.print ("EEPROM locations 1 and 2 = "); Serial.println (OPEN_POSITION); CLOSED_POSITION = (int)(EEPROM.read(2)<<8) + EEPROM.read(3); Serial.print ("EEPROM locations 2 and 3 = "); Serial.println (CLOSED_POSITION); CURRENT_POSITION = (int)(EEPROM.read(5)<<8) + EEPROM.read(6); Serial.print ("EEPROM locations 5 and 6 = "); Serial.println (CURRENT_POSITION); } else { Serial.println ("EEPROM uninitialised"); } } //------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- void Open() { if (CURRENT_POSITION<OPEN_POSITION) { PowerRelay(); while (CURRENT_POSITION<OPEN_POSITION) { StepperMotor.step(1); CURRENT_POSITION++; SAVE_TIMER=millis()+SAVE_TIMEOUT; Serial.println ("Saving in 5 seconds due to positive open occurring"); } } else if (CURRENT_POSITION>OPEN_POSITION) { PowerRelay(); while (CURRENT_POSITION>OPEN_POSITION) { StepperMotor.step(-1); CURRENT_POSITION--; SAVE_TIMER=millis()+SAVE_TIMEOUT; Serial.println ("Saving in 5 seconds due to negative open occurring"); } } } //------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- void Close() { if (CURRENT_POSITION<CLOSED_POSITION ) { PowerRelay(); while (CURRENT_POSITION<CLOSED_POSITION ) { StepperMotor.step(1); CURRENT_POSITION++; SAVE_TIMER=millis()+SAVE_TIMEOUT; Serial.println ("Saving in 5 seconds due to positive close occurring"); } } else if (CURRENT_POSITION>CLOSED_POSITION ) { PowerRelay(); while (CURRENT_POSITION>CLOSED_POSITION ) { StepperMotor.step(-1); CURRENT_POSITION--; SAVE_TIMER=millis()+SAVE_TIMEOUT; Serial.println ("Saving in 5 seconds due to negative close occurring"); } } } The I/O pin is multiplexed to a push button which I use in the video below to trigger an open/close event so I can toggle it outside if needed. There is also a joystick attached which allows me to move the mask manually to save open/close positions respectively which are written to the Arduino EEPROM. The stepper motor is attached to the Bahtinov mask through two grub screws I drilled and tapped in some solid bar which is in turn connected to the 3D frame 234.mp4 The whole thing is powered by a 5V 30A supply with three outputs, this allows me to switch in the stepper motor via a relay to prevent the holding torque of the motor causing things to heat up. I tested it all last night and it worked perfectly, now to print a housing and automate the supply switch on. The mask itself is an 80mm diameter circle with 20 degree slits and 2mm equispaced cuts which I had to make because, in the process of making this, I dropped my existing mask and broke it, happy to say this one works well! James

The final image ...

I still see the corrupt frames in an AVI but I can open this in PIPP In PIPP, I tried using a quality reduction and also exporting after the first 20 frames but both still show frames as bad in Autostakkert. I tried 'limit frames' in Autostakkert and that didn't improve things. I then found you can press space bar on specific frames (first and last in my case) to exclude them from the stack and that fixed it So finally, this is the best 75% of 2,345 frames in PIPP then the best 10% and then 5% in Autostakkert followed by some Wavelet processing in Registax, a big step forward! That will do for now - many thanks for the help Vlaiv

Obviously getting better (Thanks again for the help!) but I have artefacts from the bad first frame which appears in the SER file. PIPP can't open it so I'm trying an AVI to see if that works

OK will give that a try, I have just gone through focusing again and Jupiter's also in a better place now so this next one looks like an improvement. I'll try top 5% then top 10% again

So the offset bottom appeared in one of the first frames, scrolling forward through the stack in autostakkert made it choose a new reference frame and that problem went away It has certainly changed my output but we're not in the 'good' category yet ... I'm finding now the tree has passed it's too bright so I have stayed with 5mS and dropped the gain to 150 and trying again now

Not a great start...

That might be an interesting experiment. The tree is pretty well out the way but this is the quality of the image: I have run a 3 minute video with 350 gain and 5mS, will see how that turns out ...

Ah that's a shame, it's quite possibly the first time I have used it for planetary actually I just did an update and the latest version of firecapture is much more stable. I have managed to get ~20 fps with Jupiter in the fov, just waiting for a tree to get out the way so I can see if it is any good!

Yes a Pi4, switched over a year ago and cured all my issues ... until now!

OK so firecapture seems to be the worst of the 2 and crashes fairly regularly oaCapture seems more stable but also crashes when recording Neither seem to be able to maintain a high frame rate (SER or AVI) , with 640x480 ROI I can get up to about 70fps but it won't maintain that recording, it's very stop/start. I checked RAM and CPU, both are showing light usage, not sure what could cause this I have to limit the USB traffic setting to ~50-60 for it to work at all as well

Ace thanks, I'll take a look!

I'm on astroberry and using the kstars software for everything at the moment

Thanks Vlaiv, was hoping you would chip in It's been so long since I've done planetary I can't remember how I did it! I think my frame length was 0.002 seconds (but will check later), I'll give 5mS a go and several minutes, thanks for that Not sure how I do smaller ROI but I'll have a play with KStars later and see if I i can find it

Hi there, I am finally getting back into things after the usual Summer months off and started with Jupiter. Whilst the picture isn't terrible, it's not great either, so here is the set up - ZWO ASI 224MC, should be a good camera for planetary - 300PDS scope, 12", all the aperture I need (collimated and focused electronically) - 2x barlow lens to give a 3,000mm focal length - Bortle 5, not great but, hey, it's planetary, should be adequate - 30 seconds of .SER footage (8 bit) and best 30 frames, not sure if I could do better with this? - Stacked in autostakkert and registax for some wavelets So, what's the best thing I can do to improve the quality of this image? James