jjosefsen

Hi, I wan't to tell you about a relatively new open source imaging suite that I have been using for around 7-8 months now. Night time imaging n' astronomy or in short NINA! The new website is really quite informative, so check it out here: https://nighttime-imaging.eu/ As a software developer and IT professional I was blown away by this application these guys were creating, when I first stumbled upon it last year. It is a really feature rich application as the very long feature list below will show, and it is absolutely free! I was immediately drawn to the very simple but still quite information rich UI that was presented to me when I tried it the first time. Isbeorn (the developer), Dark Archon (massive contributor) and Quickload (big contributor) have really created something impressive here, and it is constantly being improved upon. It is quite normal to see these guys working on the next cool feature in the middle of the night As it is a "hobby project" and Open Source, and these guys don't have every model of every camera available - sometimes there can be glitches with new equipment, but it is usually sorted out in quick fashion. But this is where we "mere mortals" can help improve this amazing piece of software, by using it and providing feedback and logs (in case of errrors) via. Discord or the Issue tracker on bitbucket. In return for this you get a very comprehensive piece of astro imaging software for absolutely nothing! If anyone needs any help in settings this up, don't hesitate to write in this thread and I will try to help, or jump on Discord and join the "support" channel. I recommend taking the latest beta version, pretty much always, as it has the latest fixes and is generally stable. List of main features as grabbed from the webpage and personal experience (I surely missed some): Equipment control ASCOM Cameras Mounts Filter wheels Focusers Rotators Native camera drivers for Atik ZWO QHYCCD Altair Astro cameras Canon Nikon Touptek Can run multiple camera's and supports syncronized dithering (early version, but tested in the field!) Image analysis Image statistics Auto stretch Full image star detection with HFR calculation (used for autofocus as well) Exposure time recommendation Sequencing Multitarget sequence lists (image multiple targets automatically) Automatic mosaic capture as defined in framing assistant Light, Bias, Dark, DarkFlat, Flat frames of various exposure lengths and gain/iso Automatic filter change Autofocus using full image HFR calculations over time number of exposures Temperature change Automatic centering and rotation of targets using platesolving Save as raw (dslr), fits, xisf, etc. Customizeable filename pattern Automatic meridian flip Can automatically flip and recenter target after flip has been completed Sky atlas Sky atlas with more than 10.000 objects. Filtering on type, magnitude, size, altitude and more Altitude chars showing showing altitude over time for your location Framing assistant Can pull data from various skyserveys, to make framing and planning easier You can see a preview of your fov based on camera and scope details Mosaic planning mode Shows your mosaic tilesin the framing wizard Set desired overlap percentage Offline skymap shows gridlines and all sky atlas DSO's, constellations and coordinates ("Cartes du Ciel'ish") Sleek and customizable UI Imaging tab can be customized to show all the information you could possibly want to see image (duh! ;)) Statistics HFR history PHD2 graph and statistics Mount information Camera information Filter wheel information Platesolve information Weather data and more.. Quick switch between light and dark scheme Customizable colorschemes Flats wizard Set a desired ADU and tolerance for flats Simple mode or multimode where flats are captured for each filter Set minimum and maximum exposure time Guide to help you get the desired flats Can automatically capture matching darkflats Other cool features PHD2 integration with Dithering Weather data from OpenWeatherMap API List of bright focus stars for use with Bahtinov mask, clik and slew to it Polar alignment tools Configuration profiles, so different setups can be used A word about open source: The project is open source, this means that all source code is readily available from bitbucket, and anyone is free to contribute code. The developer is Isbeorn (Stefan) and as the repository manager he decides when and if a submission (pull request) is deemed good enough to enter a release..! There are a couple of other main contributors who do a lot of work, and put in a lot of their free time to this project. You are free to ask for features and request support and people are generally very helpful and quick to implement something if it is a good idea. BUT as this is a hobby project for these people, don't expect the same of them as you would of a company from whom you buy a product, IT IS UNFAIR! A word about Discord: Discord is a free chat (text and voice) platform that anyone can create a server on. Discord as a whole is not run by the people behind N.I.N.A., only the NINA server, and as such is not moderated by the developers.

Man that is awesome.. The tidal stream is very pronounced, beautiful!

My wife does the occasional wedding photography.. I am trying to convince her this lens is a must have for such events..! I don't think it's going well.. ?

Well no I didn't expect it to be as plug and play as a frac, or everyone would use one. Part of the reason I got this one, but went for a higher end CC was that I wanted to see how I got on with a reflector, expecting to do ok, and then to go for something like an 8" F3.9 if it worked out. That plan is on hold for now ? I think my problem is with the secondary still.. The extra speed of this scope is very nice to be honest, and nice to work with.

Pheeew so I had the 130p-ds out last night again.. So far this little project is proving extremely frustrating! The other day I spent all night redoing collimation as I still didn't have great stars, and suspected tilt. I recentered secondary, adjusted tilt in focuser, and got what I believed was a good result when looking down my concenter eye piece. Flats were also looking much better and evenly illuminated, so I figured I was good to go. Last night I set up, and immediately I had what looked like wrong spacing in my CC, didn't have this issue before! Took camera, fw, and CC back ind, took it apart, meassured it and it was correct - 55.5mm.. Back outside camera in and now it looked ok again, but stars in the corners had strange artifacts. I spent an hour checking collimation again with eyepiece and defocused stars and it looked fine in the center of the image.. Finally I chucked the laser collimater in, and it was off - I adjusted it with the laser and took anokther shot - suddenly the stars were pretty good all around!! ? Attached is the unedited RGB master of M37, only 30m of each channel.. Stars look a bit funky towards the bottom right still. The thing is when I check collimation through my concenter just now, it looks completely bonkers and nothing like I would expect!! This thing is driving me mad, and I am just about ready to chuck it in a box and dig out the good old ED80...

Outstanding blood moon!

Then it might be because I over tightened the screws when putting the cc.. I'm scared of the camera falling out. Will check next time. I do plan to add a third screw, just need to buy the tools and screw. Thanks for the input! ?

Whoops! I did tighten it all up quite firm that night, will go loosen it now.

First of all, great shots Adam! I particularly like the Heart / Fish head.. Have you considered shooting a little RGB to replace the stars? How exactly does one over compress a coma corrector? Screw it in too tight?

Hi, I could use a bit of an opinion on this, I can't decide if this is tilt or spacing.. I don't think it is collimation, because that looks pretty much bang on as far as I can tell at least. CCD Inspector did say there was a little tilt, but with my limited knowledge I am not sure if it is enough to give these effects. To me it looks like something is affecting the right side of the image, and a little top left too. Any ideas?

Oh I know! ? I tried a couple of different things, and I can knock it down in post processing. But I think it is just a matter of getting more data to be honest.

Quick stack and a few tweaks in APP of the first light of my little 130pds, just to see what I got. 40x180s in luminance. I did actually do 7x180s of R,G,B but all the bright stars are very green when I combine it. I can see that the red master is very weak compared to the other two, so probably not enough data on it yet. All in all I am encouraged by what I see, and hopefully this problem with the green is just a lack of data.

It all worked out. Got first proper light last night. ?

They have less extreme versions as well which look really good. Their ONTC and UNC newts look great, but more expensive. Thanks for I decide I like these newts I might go for one of those one day. ?

Heh I did it because I thought it would be a cool little project. I will never be able to build my own scope, so doing these small modifications is the closest I will get to it. I've had a blast with it the last two months, fiddling with it and learning a ton of new stuff. On my way home now and it's looking clear, maybe tonight is the night I get a little data with this thing. ?

So had first light last night, but spent all freezing night working out tilt and collimation issues. I must admit I had a slight "why did i buy a damn Newt!" moment for a while.. Most night was spent working on this: See the split diffraction spikes, @Spaced Out same issue as we talked about? I think this has been pretty much resolved by correcting a severe tilt using the collimation screws on the focuser, tightening the focuser up to both the tube it self, and in the small hex screws underneath. My secondary assembly was also not centered in the tube and correcting that made a big difference, one looks slightly wider, so might be twisted a little too. Still a little out, but not too bad.. I still have issues with tilt, but I think they are more related to the two thumbscrew setup in the 2" receptacle in the focuser. So drill and thread a third thumbscrew maybe? Sorry for all these build / collimation posts, but your feedback has been invaluable! Thank you!

Aha! Thank you. I actually already have a longer dove tail, but would need another. The problem is I don't think I can fint that longer dovetail as I have my motor focuser mounted right next to the current one. But will look into this.

Any of you gents use an ST80 for a guidescope, and how much of a problem does that represent in terms of balance? I am already using 1 kg of extra weight on the back of my 130 to get it balanced in dec, and I am worried an ST80 will make it even more front heavy..

Yeah. I was just looking for a sanity check before going all Texas chainsaw on the thing. ?

Ok cool, so I guess I don't have to take off much. Maybe 10mm.. Thanks

So this is the scope roughly focused on stars (just managed before clouds). Do I need to chop it all off, roughly 15mm or do I leave some to protrude into the tube?

Does anyone know of a design for a 3d printed bahtinov mask for the 130pds? Google and thingiverse yielded nothing..

This is taken through the 2" concenter eyepiece, looks pretty good I think. If I understand it is normal for the "shadow" to be slightly elongated on a f5 scope..? I don't know how you guys take such good pictures through those collimation tools.. but naked eye, all three mirror clips are about equally visible as well.

Thank you John, very interrestign approach! I plan on giving collimation a whirl tonight, will be interresting to see how it all goes. I've been reading various sources of information, and Astro Baby's seem to be pretty well thought out so going by that tonight.