Fivel

Hi James. With the latest version for Mac, most of the captures are fine. I do get a few (2 or three per Autorun (same if I do it all manually). Those images come out far to bright. I cannot tell if it is the app or the camera that causes the change. I do not see any changes to the text file, as there is only one file per Autorun, and the errors occur later in the run. What do you suggest I check? Fivel

Thank you Han for your reply. I did see the same on Cloudy Nights. I will try these suggestions and hope to get it workin soon. Fivel

Hello. I have tried with the latest, and the previous versions of ASTAP. Wether I use a tiff image or a fits image, the app could not get a solve. I tried the online and off line (local) methods and they both could not solve. I also tried to stack using the star align method, and it did not work. Ironically, when I pressed the Tetrahedron test button, it showed numerous formations, but the running log displayed that it could not form them, so the stacking failed. When I downloaded and installed the Mac version, it showed version 0.1, but that is not the latest version. I am running OSX El Capitam (10.11) on an iMac with 32GB Ram and a1TB SSD. Here is the readout from the screen log: SIMPLE = T / file does conform to FITS standard BITPIX = 16 / number of bits per data pixel NAXIS = 3 / number of data axes NAXIS1 = 3840 / length of data axis 1 NAXIS2 = 2160 / length of data axis 2 NAXIS3 = 3 / length of data axis 3 EXTEND = T / FITS dataset may contain extensions COMMENT FITS (Flexible Image Transport System) format is defined in 'Astronomy COMMENT and Astrophysics', volume 376, page 359; bibcode: 2001A&A...376..359H BZERO = 32768. / offset data range to that of unsigned short BSCALE = 1. / default scaling factor DATE = '2019-09-19T20:30:58' / UTC date that FITS file was created XBINNING= 1 / Camera binning mode YBINNING= 1 / Camera binning mode PROGRAM = 'Siril v0.9.11' / Software that created this HDU END PLTSOLVD= F / No plate solution found. COMMENT 1 Please assist. Fivel

Thank you James for your great app and excellent support. I am sure that those who are involved with EAA will be anxiously awaiting the rollout of OALive. Fivel

Hello James. I have had great results using the latest MAC version of OACapture for both planetary videos and DSO imaging. The last time we communicated about feature requests you mentioned that you are concentrating on the development of OALive. Since (your description) that will be for EAA, will you still be adding new features to OACpture? I had previously suggested a couple and have one more, if you are still working with it. When I set up a sequence of DSO image captures, the Autorun work well and the status shows completion of each capture (i.e. 1 of 10). We only see each capture after it has completed. It would be helpful to add an additional status bar to show the progress each of the image captures, with a timer, in seconds. Thanks again for a great app. Fivel

Hi Rene. I posted that question on the Affinity forum last year. The sad and simple answer is no, it is not compatible with Affinity (Photo). It is not a plug-in package. Most of the PS plug-ins will work though. Fivel

Hi Steve. I have been using Affinity Photo for a few years, with great results. As for final noise reduction, I use Neat Image on my tiff images. It has great tools also for reducing artifacts, and for sharpening. You can get a good balance between the noise reduction and sharpening. I have been using the free Siril app for registering and stacking, I use it to save the fits files as 16 bit uncompressed tiffs. Siril also has some excellent post processing tools, such as asinh stretching, color correction and background neutralization and extraction. These apps, especially Affinity Photo, have been getting me great results. Fivel

Hi Steve. If my memory serves me right, the FC website says to install "libusb" as a prerequisite. Here is some info on how to use "Terminal" to do that/ http://macappstore.org/libusb/ I believe that you can then insstall FC with no issues. There are a couple of FC features that do not work with the Mac version. If you have any further issues installing or using FC, contact the developer, Torsten at firecapture@wonderplanets.de Best of luck. Fivel

James, thank you for a quick resolution. All works well, and I am anxious to try the Autorun, on the next clear evening (maybe tonight). You are a true wonder and very generous with your time and skills. May I add one more feature request please? Provide a capture duration count up or down, in large numbers, so we know that the captures are progressing properly and the length of each is the correct amount. Maybe this count can be in a pop-up screen that can be moved and closed as desired. Thanks again. Fivel

Blessings to you James, for your diligence. Thanks that you liked the images. It shows how ell your capture and save functions work. I hope the new and improved version maintains all that works well with version 1.6.2. Fivel

Hello again James. I just check with version 1.4.1 (Mac El Capitan) and the setup for Autorun works as it should. As soon as i click on"Enable Autorun" I can see that icon, on the capture screen, turn gree, and the run works well. So, what could have changed with version 1.6.2? Here are the two oblects that I imaged on the 6th . So, as you can see, I am well plrased with the captures (Saved in tiff from 16bit GRBG matrix and Bilinear algorithm). Thanks for this capability. Now to just get the Autorun working so I can do longer runs from my office. Fivel

Hi James. I did use the app last night and got several great captures. The only problem I had was since Autorun did not work, I had to capture the numerous images manually. I am very sorry to be such a pest, but your app is the one I prefer for captures. I set up the run in the "Settings/Autorun" section, and pressed "Enable Autorun" , saved it and then pressed the capture arrow, but only got one image. In the 'Capture" portion of the panel, the "Autorun" icon was not available (greyed out). Hopefully this may be just a case of operator error. I appreciate all the work you put into coding and support for it. You are a very patient and giving gentleman. Fivel

Hi Keith. In order for anyone to help, please tell what equipment you will use for the remote control. For example, many have a computer at the scope and one at the remote location for control, such as a home office. How far from the scope is the control computer? What connectivity will you have between the control computer and the scope setup? In my case, I have a omputer (Mc Mini) at the scope and desktop computer (iMac) in my office. The are about 370 feet apart and connected via a Cat5e cable. The SkySafari (or other similar app) is on the Mac Mini and, I use a remote desk (screen sharing) to control it from the iMac. The Mac Mini is connected to my scope via an Ethernet cable, but your Ioptron may be able to use a USB connection. The SkySafari setup to control the scope is not to difficult. Simulation Curriculum has some info online for that setup. Best of luck. Fivel

James, thank you for the quick and helpful reply. I set the "Option" (not preference) to Demosaic and all is well. The only item that I noticed is that the Option is not saved, so each time i open the app, I need to select it again. How are the feature requests coming (to provide auto stretch of the image preview and two more) , that I suggested? Will it be included in version 1.7.0? See the requests in the top post in this thread. Thanks again, and now that it should be working again, the weather is stormy. Thanks Murphy. Fivel

Hi JAmes. I tried the new (and older) version tonight and here are two issues. 1. The app no longer provides the tiff save format (the previous version had the tiff option)-all the settings were the same as previous. 2. I could not save any capture. The error "Unable to create file for output" is displayed. Here is the format for the files "oaCapture-%DATE-%TIME-%INDEX". It is the same as for the older versions that do save the captures. Since all the versions are doing the same issues, I may need to delete the preference files, o see if that helps. I attached the text file for the camera settings, but it obviously does not show the app settings. Fivel oaCapture-20190603-234813-000001.txt

Thanks you James. I will try it out the next clear night we have (rare these evenings). Thankfully. Fivel

James, thanks for checking this issue. Here is the TIFF image. oaCapture-223440-20190524-000000.tiff

Hello again James. I got to test the new version of oaCapture last night. It looked good until I checked the saved tiff file (attached). I also attached the text file with the camera and app settings. The camera settings were the same as I used (successfully) with the older version (1.4.1) that did not crash. What caused this strange rendering of the GRBG 16 bit image? Fivel oaCapture-223440-20190524-000000.txt

Hi James. Thanks again for all your hard work fixing the issues. I have a few feature requests, that I hope are not to intense to code. I did post this first one at the end of the issues thread. 1. Add an auto stretch for the preview to aid in framing and focusing. That will be only for the image preview. 2. For the focus aid maybe change the colored line segments to a couple of rings of different colors. When focus is achieved, they will overlap. 3. Add an auto focus capability. I realize it will require a method to integrate focuser drivers. Since your app finds and utilizes the camera drivers, maybe it is possible to do the same for the focusers. As soon as we can get some decent nights, I will look forward to using oaCapture for DSO imaging. I will also use it for planetary videos when the season arrives. Thanks again. Fivel

Thank you James. That works much better-no crash. I have a feature request, if you have time to code it. For previewing a capture, have it display using an auto stretch, (preview only) to aid framing and focus. Thanks again for correcting the crash issue. Fivel

Hello again James. As I mentioned in the post for version 1.6.0 it still crashes. I have a different issue now in that when I set the camera capture for RAW 16 bit (GRBG16LE) I sometimes get the TIFF save option. To get it I have to open my other camera with RAW capture and can get the TIFF save. Then I reopen the main imaging camera (ZWOasi1600mc-c) and may get the TIFF option back. I will be contacting the store where I bought my Mac Mini and have them reload El Capitan. It may have some issues. If oaCapture version 1.6.0 works with Mojave, I may just upgrade to that OS. Of all the capture apps I have tried, this one has more of the features and simplicity I am looking for. Thanks again for your hard work developing and supporting this app. Fred

James, that last suggestion worked. On my computer, the .plist files were in a hidden library folder. but it is working again. It took a bit of fiddling, with the camera setup, but I finally got the tiff save option back. As for version 1.5.0, I still get a crash when selecting the main imaging camera, even after checking the .plist files. I am thinking it doesn't work properly with the OSX El Capitan, where version 1.4.1 does work with it. Did you change from the .plist to .ini files with version 1.5.0? Your thoughts on that please. Fivel

Hello again James. I have the app on two Macs and neither one has the.ini file. Is this file for a Windows or Linux version? On my office iMac it has an older version 1.1.0. and it opens OK. I tried that version on the Mac Mini and it will not open either. On the at-the-scope Mac Mini, I had two versions available (see my initial post above) and neither will open. So, waht else can be causing this problem. Fivel

Hi James. Thanks again for your quick reply. I attached that terminal output as well as the lengthy (sorry for that) Mac crash report. I hope you find some useful info in them. Fivel oacApture crash report.rtf OaCapture run from terminal report.rtf

Version 1.4.1 (for El Capitan) was working on my Mac Mini at the scope, but it crashed and will not reopen. It crashes as soon as I try to open it. Version 1.5.0 still crashes when I select the ZWOasi1600mc-c camera. Both versions open on my office iMac, but It only has the built-in webcam . I tried deleting and reinstalling version 1.4.1, but it still will not open. This was the only capture app I had, that could properly save the color images in tiff format. I hope James or someone else can help me with this. Fivel