Likwid

3 hours ago, teoria_del_big_bang said:

Ah glad it is sorted and sounds pretty much like what I thought was happening as I thought plate solving outside the sequencer would not know which frame to centre on.

All's well that ends well I suppose and you live and learn and all that 🙂 

Steve

Everything is working! I guess that is what happens when you are using multiple complicated pieces of software and assuming how they work lol. Thank you all for your help, i really appreciate it! Here is a quick and dirty mosaic from last night as a test.

So I went on the NINA Discord channel today and sent my screenshots and everything else in. I think I know what is happening, and my rig is imaging right now. In Framing Assistant, when you hit "Slew and Center" I think it actually points to the center of the mosaic, not the Frame that you have selected. I was stopping there thinking that it was not working, and why waste more time if Frame Assistant couldn't even center my target? So when I spoke with the people on the Discord channel today, I put the coordinates into DSO-Browser and they were exactly centered on my mosaic. I think I figured it out from there. Just now I made a new sequence, put my 2 Frames into it and the first one seems to be slewing correctly. I have it on autopilot and in about 30 minutes, I will know if the second frame slews correctly and adds to the mosaic. I am hoping that I will be able to post a 1 hour mosaic of NGC 6992 and NGC 6960 tomorrow to show you all that it worked and that I am an impatient idiot lol.

4 hours ago, teoria_del_big_bang said:

Actually my workflow if doing a mosaic would probably be as follows:

1. pick the target
2. slew to target and track, probably it would guide at that point as well automatically.
3. I might then play about with framing assistant to see how many frames I need and what rotation I would want on the camera but after getting an idea of what I want just go back to one frame for now.
4. At this stage I would just centre on the main nebula, galaxy etc and run auto focus.
5. I might also run a platesolve just to check it all works, just on the single frame.
6. I would rotate camera if I need to, I have a rotator connected to NINA so platesolving on the single frame does the rotation automatically
7. Then use the framing assistant to set the frames for a mosaic and position them where I want them with sufficient overlap.
8. Send the frames to the simple sequencer.
9. Set my imaging required, check all checkboxes in the sequencer I require as in previous post and press run sequence.

Steve

That is essentially what I am doing currently. I have been trying to do a mosaic, but let's say I type in NGC 6960 and bring it into the Frame Wizard. My rotation is parallel to NGC 6960 currently. Since there is a lot of interesting nebulosity between NGC 6960 and NGC 6992, I wanted to capture that in my frame the day I found out about this issue. I typed NGC 6960 into Sky Atlas, imported into Frame Assistant, determine rotation, and instead of centering NGC 6960, I wanted to move it to the "top" of the frame and have all the extra nebulosity "below" it to take up the whole frame. When I hit Slew and Center, it did a "successful" plate solve and NGC 6960 was cut off in the frame. This happens whether it is a mosaic that I am planning, or just messing around with the framing of a single image. Right after that, I just went straight from Sky Atlas to Simple Sequencer and did a plate solve there to center NGC 6960 and it was dead center of the frame. Honestly, if every single plate solve was off consistently in the same direction, I would say it is some weird thing with the mount coordinates or how NINA is talking to my mount. It's absolutely baffling that this in only happening when I use Frame Assistant, and it works flawlessly if I go straight to Sequencer with the default DSO coordinates. I will try to get some screenshots or a video tonight. The other thing is that I have an ASIAir Plus backordered. Maybe that will talk correctly to the mount if it ever ships lol. Are there any other free suites that will help plan a mosaic like NINA does? If it does the same thing in a different program, then it is definitely the mount. If it works fine in a different program, then it is NINA causing the issue.

Great, thank you!

I am honestly completely baffled. Ok, this is exactly what I did last night: I changed to ASTAP and went into Sky Atlas to type in my target. In this case, I want to do a widefield view of NGC 6992 and NGC 6960, so I type NGC 6992. I click slew to get my telescope in the general area, so it can then figure out the rotation in the next step. I click Open in Framing Assistant, which brings me to the window and automatically loads the image of the region. I click Determine Rotation, and the preview box changes angle accordingly. I want to a mosaic, so I change Vertical Frames to 2 because of the current angle. I move the frame to center the entire Veil Nebula region as shown in my previous screenshot. I click Load Image again to center the mosaic in Framing Assistant. I click Slew and Center and it put NGC 6992 way into the upper right of the frame, half cut off. I think that I just didn't put the mount EXACTLY in the home position because I am human, and Plate Solving will correct that for me, because that is the point of it. Plate Solving does what it does and makes small adjustments to the mount and then says it is successful. I take look at the last image that was taken to determine if it actually framed correctly, and NGC 6992 is still in the upper corner of the screen, cut off. Based on how I framed it in the mosaic, it should almost be in the center of Frame 1. That is when I got frustrated, cleared the data in Sky Atlas and typed in M31. Clicked set as Simple Sequence, Slewed, went to the Imaging Tab and did a Plate Solve. M31 was perfectly centered as it should be, I started guiding and then I started taking 5 minute subs of M31 that were perfect. This is why it is so baffling. Single targets work flawlessly every time. Whenever I go into Framing Assistant and change anything about the framing, everything falls apart. It is supposed to be clear tonight again, so I will try to take a video or get screenshots of what is happening. This is so frustrating because I built this rig specifically to take mosaics. I want to essentially do a mini sky-survey and image the whole Milky Way. That is not going to happen if my mount can't figure out where it is pointed.

So I am out tonight, and I tried using ASTAP with the same issue. It looks like the image is off just about the same as it was previously. I wasn't able to get any screenshots because I was working 2 different telescopes at the same time. I got frustrated and didn't want to waste another night fighting with the mount, so I am just imaging. Considering that both ASTAP and Astrometry are doing the same thing in the same way, it either has to be NINA or my mount causing the issue.

Bubble Nebula in SHO. This is about 6 hours of data over 3 nights!

Hello Everyone,

I am trying to dip my toes in a little bit of Radio Astronomy and I figured a good starter project would be Meteor Scatter. I live in an area that is very cloudy, and I would to be able to learn some Radio Astronomy when I can't do Astrophotgraphy. I have been doing a lot of research in the past few days, and I am just looking to get an already built antenna. I don't mind building one, but when I am learning I would like to have a known working and tuned antenna to keep my learning curve down. For the most part, I am reading that people use 144 Mhz Yagi antennas for Meteor Detection. I was wondering if this would be a good starting point for an antenna, or if there is something else around this price point or a little more expensive that might be better? Thank you!

https://hamcity.com/ham-equipment/antennas/base/beams-yagis/144-mhz/a144s5.html

After further research, this may only apply to the UK. In the US, I will have to use FM.

10 hours ago, scotty38 said:

I think he's used Astrometry mainly, not sure he's had ASTAP do anything. The reason he'll be asked to use ASTAP is that it's way faster given the local database install, it may even fix the solving discrepancies too which is why I want to try it.

Actually, I just checked the offline program I was using and it was using "All Sky Plate Solver" and not ASTAP. When I was using All Sky before, it Plate Solved and tried to tell NINA where to go. NINA thought it was slewing but the motors wouldn't move at all. Then it would take the 10 seconds to settle, take another image which would be the exact position it was in before and go in an infinite loop. I went back to using Astrometry as my main Plate Solving source and it just worked great until I started playing with the Frame Assistant. I am installing ASTAP and the database on my imaging PC now, and I believe it will be clear on Friday so I will give it a whirl then! Thank you everyone!

13 hours ago, scotty38 said:

I might have missed it but if not can you try using ASTAP for plate solving and see what happens?

Oddly enough, when I use ASTAP for Plate Solving, NINA doesn't tell my mount to go anywhere. It thinks it is slewing, and then settles but doesn't actually move. That is actually why I started using Astrometry. Hopefully I will have some time after work today to hop on to the NINA Discord and talk with the developers about it. I'll make sure to update everyone after!

9 minutes ago, teoria_del_big_bang said:

I cant image anything as too cloudy but I can power up my rig and see what I am on.

I think this is maybe getting beyond me as I have not really done much at all regarding mosaics but I think when I did it I didn't really do much regarding plate solving whilst in framing assistant and just used it to set the frames I wanted, then (without slewing and centring at that stage) I just sent them to the sequencer and made sure that slew to target and centre were enabled in each of the panels I had elected to use in the sequencer and it just worked when I started the sequencer so it did all the plate solving in the sequencer.

But again when initially setting the panels in the framing assistant I am sure I had to click recentre image before sending to sequencer (but I could be wrong).

But it is not only mosaics the OP is having issues with so it almost looks like it is the fact he cannot hit recentre image.

Steve

NINA has a Discord server, so I may jump on there when I get home to see what they have to say about "Recenter Image". If I find out anything good, I will let everyone know. Thank you all so much for the help today, I appreciate it.

3 minutes ago, Craig a said:

I’m wondering now it’s it’s a bug and re center disappearing is a mistake 

That is exactly what I am wondering now as well.

Just now, teoria_del_big_bang said:

Me neither so probably have an update to do, what version are you on ?

Steve

2.0 HF2, it just recently came out.

3 minutes ago, teoria_del_big_bang said:

Mmmm must admit I thought you had to click recentre image after moving the frame but can't remember for sure now.

So is that by adding slew and centre to the sequencer ?

Steve

If you click on "Imaging" on the left, on the top row of icons, there is an option for Plate Solve. My normal workflow before I was using Framing Assistant was to add the target to the sequence, and then go into Imaging and Plate Solve so I could see the window better. I just got this screenshot from my imaging PC so you could see what I am talking about. It Plate Solves whatever you have selected in Sequencer.

2 minutes ago, Craig a said:

It doesn’t exist on my Nina either ive got the latest version too, but have you clicked load image once you have moved your frame about on the framing assist 

Yup! And it will center the frame for me in the window. I tried it with and without clicking "Load Image" after putting the frame where I want it with the same outcome. When I saw the thing about "Recenter Image" I figured that clicking Load Image would have the same effect.

1 minute ago, teoria_del_big_bang said:

So after this was set in framing wizard what did you do next, send to sequencer or hit slew and recentre ?

I tried both and they both do the same thing. When I send to Sequencer, it brings up Frame 1 and Frame 2 with different coordinates. When I Plate Solve through Imaging on either Frame 1 or Frame 2, it puts the target off the frame, but then says Plate Solving was successful. When I Slew and Center in Frame Assistant with either frame selected, it puts the target off the frame but finishes "successfully" still. Whatever is happening is specific to the Framing Assistant. When I bypass it and just go from Sky Atlas to Sequencer, it Plate Solves and centers the target perfectly. I am really at a loss. The only thing I see different that I am doing from tutorials or the actual manual, is not hitting "Recenter Image" at the end because that target does not exist on my version of NINA.

One thing I just noticed in both the online tutorial, as well as the couple YouTube videos that I have watched, is that they all say I have to hit the "Recenter Image" button once I have my target framed correctly. If you look at my screenshot, I do not have that button in my Framing Assistant. I also just updated my software and it is still missing. I wonder if it is not sending the coordinates correctly because it isn't "centered".

4 minutes ago, Craig a said:

That’s weird because that plate solved image looks like it’s in the middle of the two panels if you get what I mean

Correct, but according to Frame Assistant, I placed NGC 6992 essentially in the middle of Frame 1, and NGC 6960 in the bottom of Frame 2 for the mosaic to show both objects. In the Plate Solve image, NGC 6992 is cut off half way in the top right side of the image.

9 minutes ago, newbie alert said:

Sounds weird... Just to check the mount is tracking shoot a 30 sec, 60 sec sub.. any mount should be able to handle that.. if your subs are trailed then fix that issue first

Have you tried a different framing assistant, see if that is any different?  What are you using for a platesolver?

I know it is, I shot 18 x 5 minute subs on that same rig directly after my issue last night I have tried HIPS 2, NASA, SkyServer, and ESO I think. I am using Astrometry.net for Plate Solving.

39 minutes ago, Craig a said:

sorry but are you saying you go straight to setting  a simple sequence then plate solve? Have you tried going straight to framing assist first getting the frame as you want it then plate solve then set as sequence? 
pardon my confusion 

Yup! When I go straight to setting a Simple Sequence from Sky Atlas everything is great and everything Plate Solves and centers perfectly. If I set it for Framing Assist and move the target in the Frame, then Slew and Center, everything is misaligned.

29 minutes ago, newbie alert said:

I'm in complete agreement... Op needs to fix that issue first

Normally I would agree as well, but this is only happening when I use the Framing Assistant. Directly after the issue I had last night, I cleared out Sky Atlas, typed NGC 6992 back in it, hit Add Target to Sequence, plate solved and it was centered in the frame. When I don't use Framing Assistant at all, everything works great and my targets are centered. When I use Framing Assistant, everything is misaligned.

Ok, I found my submissions on Astrometry.net from last night. This is the successful Plate Solve image for NGC 6992, along with a screenshot of what I had in Framing Assistant. Where I have NGC 6992 in Framing Assistant is far from where it ended up in the "Successful" plate solve. Also, since Astrometry marked the image correctly, it knows exactly what it is looking at. All the noise aside, there are perfectly round stars in the image. I should say that the screenshot from NINA is not from last night, I put in the approximate rotation that NINA determined from last night to show as close as I could to what I was framing it as last night.

5 minutes ago, teoria_del_big_bang said:

That could be significant, there is a settle time somewhere in NINA that should at least be a couple of seconds but the fact it works with a single frame and not when you try to offset the framing in the framing wizard is very odd.

I do not think the altitude will cause an issue I have had mine set wrong many times, although I am only at 180M anyway and many times it was set at zero.

I wonder is it just the angle of rotation that is causing it to fail, maybe the rotation direction needs inverting (just a way out thought) but I l know when I fitted my auto rotator and it was wrong it just never worked, it kept tryung to rotate and centre but eventually gave up. I know you are manually rotating camera but I wonder if when setting to 2 frames whilst the angle has not been solved can cause an issue, 
Maybe try selecting a single frame in middle of image and slew till it is centred (but not rotated) then determine the rotation angle and rotate the camera till the anlge is correct, or in acceptable limits, and then change the framing or select two frame mosaic and try again.

Steve

This same thing happens whether I use 1 frame or multiple. If I just type NGC 6992 into Sky Atlas, set as Simple Sequence and Plate Solve from there, it centers it perfectly every time. If I go into Frame Assistant and change anything about the framing, it puts the target on the edge of the frame and cuts part of it off. What I am seeing in Frame Assistant is not close to what NINA thinks is a successful Plate Solve. This makes me think there is something wrong with the Frame Assistant and not my hardware or drivers. I will try to get screenshots or video this weekend showing what I am seeing. It is hard to explain via text. I was trying to see if I could find my plate solve images from last night on Astrometry but I couldn't find them.

3 minutes ago, jjosefsen said:

I think this is a procedural mistake somewhere, but without seeing what you do it is really hard to guide you. But I haven't heard of anyone with the same issue like this.

Could you take some step by step screenshots or even better a video?

What are your pointing tolerance settings?

https://nighttime-imaging.eu/docs/develop/site/tabs/options/platesolving/#pointing-tolerance

I should be able to do that. I won't have another clear night until this weekend so I won't be able to do it until then.

9 minutes ago, Craig a said:

This is going to be a simple fix it usually is, without setting my gear up and running through the steps your doing I’m just guessing 😂

And that is why it is so frustrating lol. I have wasted 2 or 3 clear nights trying to figure this out. I am sure it is something really small that I am missing!