Wyvernp

Thank you, much appreciated. I'll keep this thread updated as I find out more.

3 minutes ago, vlaiv said:

I'm afraid you will need to code it yourself.

PixInsight actually has open source library with all algorithms that it uses - maybe that would be a good starting point, since you don't really need to implement all of it - just combine different bits in wanted workflow.

Another option would be ImageJ as it is java based - I know it can be scripted in various languages - not sure if it can work headless.

 

Thanks, I'll look into that. I'd consider myself a reasonable beginner coder so not afraid to give that a go.

Who knows...maybe if I can get something that works I'll start a "stacking as a service" 😂

Thanks for the feedback so far! yep I could definitely run a UI on top initially however my endgame would be to automate the process using the user data to initialise the stack command somewhat like the following workflow.

Upload subs to S3 bucket (storage) -> start server -> transfer subs to server -> execute stack command with configurable params -> output stacked image -> transfer to S3 -> shutdown

That of course is oversimplified as you'd need to specify what flat/dark files to use, stacking algorithm and all sorts of other things. And yes of course I would need to factor in bandwidth costs etc.

Morning, 

A thought occurred to me the other day to use Amazon web services computing power to stack my images. This will allow me to "rent" a 96 core 192GB ram machine for about £1.50 per hour which would be much cheaper than springing out for a new PC (on the basis that I upload the subs, fire up the machine, stack, download and shut down as you don't pay whilst it's shut down). The snag is that for me to get it at that price it has to be linux, which is fine but I'm not familiar with stacking tools which can be run as a command line. Ideally I'd like to use something like pixinsight but without the user interface. Has anyone done anything like this before? 

Cheers,

Wyvern

I was lucky enough a few years ago to witness a satellite breaking up in a fireball that streaked across the sky, very slow compared to anything else I've seen but quite a site to behold.

Morning,

I use one of these between my battery and my mount, it regulates the voltage to 12v and is capped at 5A. A fuse is always a good idea too.

https://www.banggood.com/DC-DC-XL4015-Adjustable-5V-12V-5A-Regulator-M291-Digital-Display-Buck-Module-p-1280432.html?rmmds=search&cur_warehouse=CN

Regards,

Wyvern

Glad you managed to replace some of the files with new ones. 

You could try something like this. https://www.ccleaner.com/recuva

I was thinking the same when I saw the specs. I imagine it's geared towards people who can do very long exposures. Although AMD have released a 128 core CPU now, along with some solid state storage one just might be ok.

1 minute ago, Peter Drew said:

I doubt whether the laser beam would be bright enough to show but the spot might.  There is a photographic version of the film that has less extinction.     🙂

That's a good point, 450nm is not particularly bright to the human eye. It's possible that when it's actually in use the laser spot may give off other wavelengths but it will probably depend on what you are cutting.

I have a feeling that the laser will simply burn through the film.

Sorry just re-read this

I thought you meant protection against the laser beam itself. It might be worth a go.

Well, I've got all the electrics working. So just waiting for the aluminium bar for the mounting plate and rod for the bit that attaches the motor to the focuser. I've decided to keep the fine focus knob intact and remove the knob on the other side as the stepper motor has a 27:1 gear box so the steps are tiny.

Bear in mind, you will need to subtract dark frames at the same exp time from the images now you have turned this off. Apologies if you know this already but thought I should mention it.

Evening, 

At the moment I mostly image from my back garden which is classified as suburban, I guess bortle 5/6. I was wondering if there are any accessible locations in the mid sussex area that I might try once this lockdown is over?

Wyvern

30 minutes ago, Beardy30 said:

My scope has sky align built in 

Yep, all the nexstar scopes have. It has multiple options when it comes to alignment. Star align requires you to align 3 stars unspecified stars in your viewfinder whilst 2 star auto alignment allows you to specify 2 named stars. I have found this to result in a better chance of a successful alignment. 

As for the star sense, it may be worth the investment if you are really struggling to get a successful alignment but in my opinion the cash would be better spend on decent eyepieces.

Wyvern

I have always found the 2-star auto align works better than the skyalign on the nexstar controller and only takes a min or 2 to set up so i'd try both first before investing in anything else. 

23 hours ago, Craney said:

A contributor on Astrobin has recently posted a picture of the Owl nebula with a nearby Quasar. 

"How amazing"  I thought, probably one of those humongous scopes and totally beyond my skill set ........ but hang on there.   

Immediately I scurried off to my hard drive and dug out my attempts at this object. Sure enough,  there it is... well I 'm hoping it is.

It is actually quite hard to verify, even with the internet.     The best I.D. I have is  QUASAR J111504.4+55-143  with a magnitude of  +19.1 .

Here is the amazing bit,   distance = 8.2 Billion light years.    That just seems incredible....... from my back garden !!!!!!

Anybody else know anything of this object ?    

<details.   C8 EdgeHD with Atik 414 mono.  LRGB shot  60mins L and 45mins each on RGB>

< The Owl looks like he's squinting... must have sat on a thorn   😖 >

Sean

 

 

That's amazing, I just checked my shot of it from a few weeks back and it's there too

Thanks so much for sharing this.

4 minutes ago, smr said:

Thanks, so if I wanted to add a Ha filter at some point how could I go about that, clip in Ha and an IR in the optical train ?

The Ha filter will only let through a certain nm range of light so that should cut the IR out anyway. Here's the graph for baader 7m Ha filters

There is a bit of leakage at the end but that "should" be very minor as I think most CMOS sensors are not very sensitive to these wavelengths

Glad you got it working!

I have the 8se and it's a great scope, yes the mount can be a bit wobbly whilst you focus. I solved this with a diy electric focus adjuster which I cobbled together for about £30. From a bortle 5/6 site I have have seen both M81/82 galaxies and the orion nebula. I have even managed to take some images through it with an attachment for my m4/3 olympus camera.

Electric focus diy hack

Bodes galaxy using 8se + stock mount. 200ish exposures of 15 secs.

30 minutes ago, Peart said:

I'm in the same position with light pollution filters and will be purchasing the one you have link. I'm still quite new but from what I have read it will work on the camera but I'm not sure if it will block out the LED streetlights that surround me as it only blocks sodium lines from the lights. But like I said I have read about them and that filter seems like a good start for me at least. 

If you want to try and block different wavelengths of LP you may want to look at a tri or quad band filter, as I understand it will not block all of the light from LED lights but may give you more contrast depending on what you are photographing.

Ahhh ok, never tried it on a Mac. It could still be the baud rates on the com port so that's worth trying.

Wish I'd seen that when I was playing around with setting it up.

6 hours ago, MarkAR said:

With a standard USB cable ? Tell me more, pretty please.

Sure thing, it's been a while but here goes.

Yep, standard usb cable. I believe inside the mount it has a usb to serial converter which will appear in device manager as a com port.

Download and install the ascom platform and the latest driver pack from their site. Bit more info here http://eq-mod.sourceforge.net/eqaindex.html

As I recall I had to change the baud rate on the com port, but again it's been a while. I'm due to get another PC set up with this within the next couple of weeks and I'll pay more attention and maybe write up a how to doc.

Wyvern

1 hour ago, MarkAR said:

My AZ EQ6 has a USB B port in the handset to connect to computer and also one on the mount. Still no idea what the one on the mount does, can't connect to EKOS on my computer with it.

It took some fiddling but I have used the port on the mount to computer control via eqmod.