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Here's a photo of my triple widefield, narrow band imaging rig with 200mm focal length lenses. Mainly 3D printed to my own design. Further details to follow. Mounted on my EQ8 in the observatory. Three cameras 2x ASI 1600MM-Cool and 1x ASI 294MM-Pro. Mounted in the adapters directly on the cameras are Ha, OIII and SII Astrodon 3nm NB filters. In the middle is an ASI 178MM with 55mm lens for guiding. The main imaging lenses have remote focussing controlled by the Astroberry Focuser INDI driver in Raspberry Pi SingleBoardComputers. The guider uses fixed focus as the focussing on a guider is not critical. The ASI 294MM-Pro camera is run from an RPi 4B with Astroberry Server and controls the mount for slewing, plate solving and guiding as well as imaging in Ha. The other cameras run from RPi 3B boards. The 3 RPi boards are contained in the yellow 3D printed box with blue top. 3 Ethernet patch cables connect the SBCs to a Network switch and a CAT6 Ethernet cable to the house. The RPi boards are air cooled with a fan run at low speed to avoid vibration. The turret rotation angle is controlled separately from an ESP32 SBC and MQTT network over WiFi (same network as I use for my weather station). Controlling the turret rotation this way was much easier than producing a new INDI driver and matching control in Ekos. MQTT network and Code-RED Dashboard make for an easily programmed control and data gathering system.

As I remember it was painful for me at the beginning to find complex list of the software that needs to be installed on your PC to control your rig remotely so I have decided to tie all things together and share. I will try to explain it simplest I can. As whole idea is quite complex I am not going to be too detailed. You can treat it as quick catch up for novices and beginners only. I have tested it all on Windows 10. I am a beginner as well but true is that I have struggled a lot to find those information all together (what actually you need to install) so it could make some confusion for novices I think. That’s why I want to tight things a bit together and reveal the tip of the iceberg. But at least COMPLETE tip. It should be suitable for most of equatorial mounts with guider. First why I am not using SynScan hand controller? Answer is simple. Controlling rig through PC is way more accurate and more convenient. So in general I have USB hub attached to one of tripod legs. To this hub I have connected: HEQ5 Pro mount through EQDIR USB cable (it is plugged on mount into hand controller port) ZWO ASI 120MM-S guide camera which is attached to my guide scope Canon 6D camera 2 x dew heater straps (for scope and guide scope). Those are attached to charging only ports on my USB HUB. Mentioned USB HUB is plugged to the laptop which is outside, close to my rig during sessions. Then I use RDP to connect to laptop from inside of my house as both, laptop and my desktop are connected to the same router. Concept is simple as you can see but it needs whole bunch of software to be installed and configured to work properly. Again I will go through it quickly to do not mess too much and I will try to provide links for some tutorials which I have used at the beginning to understand whole concept. ASCOM; You can understand it as a platform which will create environment for EQMOD driver (I will explain what EQMOD is in next paragraph). This, alongside with EQMOD, is core part which will communicate with your rig through USB and also will create a kind of link between all astrophotography software that you need. Please watch Dylan’s short vid who has explained it in convenient way: https://youtu.be/Se88i3Cs6M0. You can find and download ASCOM platform in here: https://ascom-standards.org/. EQMOD (EQASCOM) is a driver that provides the astronomical 'brains' of the mount control system as per: http://eq-mod.sourceforge.net/eqaindex.html. As you can see there a list of functionality is huge. You can download it from here: https://sourceforge.net/projects/eq-mod/files/EQASCOM/. FTDI Virtual COM Port Driver is another small piece of software that you need to install. In general it is driver for your EQDIR cable. To be honest I haven’t heard about it in ANY tutorial. Like everybody has forgot about it but without it nothing will work. So in general EQDIR USB cable needs to be emulated as standard COM/Serial device. You can find it in here: https://www.ftdichip.com/Drivers/VCP.htm. It will install itself as COM1, 2 or 3 device. You will need to pick same port in EQMOD with same speed. Above three apps are core and needs to be installed. If you have doubts (I am sure you do, like I had a bit more than a month ago) please just lurk YouTube and watch more related tutorials. You will need also to install drivers for your main and guide cameras. You can find it on your manufacturers website. Now I will describe software of my choice (of course you can pick another, as there is a few alternatives for each of it). Those software will let you auto guide your object in more accurate way, perform polar alignment without looking through polar scope, will help you to plan your session on particular objects and check FOV, will control your main camera wit GoTo functionality and many others: PHD2. Ok in here there are no alternatives. If you have decided to control remotely you rig you need an autoguiding software and PHD2 is probably only or at least best and simplest option. In general it will connect with your mount, guider, will “stick” on one or more stars close to your object, will look on it carefully through your guide scope/guide camera and will send information to your mount how and where it should move to stay on track. You can visit again Dylan for more info: https://youtu.be/Mt0luBLaHDw. You can download PHD2 from here: https://openphdguiding.org/. This is first example of software that will communicate and control your rig through 3 core software described above. SharpCap; This is actually software of my pick. Its main purpose is planetary astrophotography but it has one very useful for me functionality. A great and cheap tool for polar alignment. You don’t even need to look through your polar scope or spent fortune on dedicated polar cameras. It will use your guide scope camera! I have used this tutorial to learn it: https://youtu.be/ivlgbgNIeTU. It is really simple and straight forward. No more kneeling in the wet grass for just 10 quids: https://www.sharpcap.co.uk/. If you struggling with standard PA process you should definitely consider to check it out. I am super happy with it. Cheers @SharpCap. Stellarium. This is planetarium software of my pick. I use it to plan my session in time, plan FOV (at what angle should the main camera be attached to the focuser to cover object in best possible way) and before I used it as GoTo tool (now I use Plate Solving GoTo). You can find more info and download it in here: http://stellarium.org/ A lot of people use app called “Cartes du Ciel” but I have never tried it.. Astro Photography Tool – APT. Next software of my pick. I use it to control my main camera, plate solving and few other minor, but still very important things. Cost is less than 20 quids per year for further updates. I think I have decided for APT because I like interface, functionality and something silly- most of experienced astrophotographers which I have watched on YT have used it. And I absolutely do not regret it. You can check demo version or buy it in here: https://www.astrophotography.app/downloads.php. You can watch Trevor’s walkthrough as well: https://youtu.be/icd9Tlrb9Jg. Lots of astrophotohraphers uses NINA which is offering similar functionality and it’s free. I haven’t tried it for longer yet as I have already get used to APT but if you want and you will like it - it could save you 20 quids. Plate Solving – is one of very cool APT and NINA functionality (based on external free software). In general it works like this: You can for example take a blind shoot of night sky and ask plate solve software to tell you where exactly you are shooting with your scope and how FOV look like for you. So if your software knows it already it can take you to any other object on the sky just like that (like GoTo). I have learned how to install and use it from this video: https://youtu.be/dpYXoYEKFpA. It is 2 apps plus databases. You can also consider to buy (or at least check out) ZWO ASIAir. In general it is micro PC which has all software similar to above installed and tied together on one simple panel which you can control through WiFi on your tablet. A lot of astrophotographers use it. I didn’t have any occasion to try it yet but it looks so complex and simple in the same time. Definitely it looks very convenient and handy as well. At the end just few words about post processing software of my choice: AstroPixelProcessor; why I have decided to pay 60 quids to rent (or 200 to own) software to stack images if there is free Deep Sky Stacker? Because I live in Bortle class 7/8 area so my data is not the best quality. I have found that APP is handling it much better and it has important for me, and well working functionality to remove light pollution and perform initial photo stretch. You can find more info in here: https://www.astropixelprocessor.com/. I have learned it from Tim’s tutorial: https://youtu.be/9EAKNqZ201Q. It is very simple in use as you won’t need to change most of the default settings. Someday maybe I will switch to PixInsight which offers even more cool postprocessing functionalities but like for now I am happy with APP + PS 2021. PhotoShop. I am absolutely not PS magician but I just get used to it already. You can try free GIMP if you would like to. If you have read this to the end you see that actually to control your rig remotely and PP your photos you need to install… around 15 different applications and drivers. As I have mentioned at the beginning this makes a lot of confusion for beginners because you can find detailed instructions for particular programs or drivers but you will never find complex list from A to Z (at least I haven’t found) of software that you will need. I will highlight it once again that most of the described apps are my personal choice and you can find other options (I have tried to provide a few alternatives). Another problem is that most of this software needs to be configured properly so unfortunately you will need to dig more on your own but I think this is pretty good portion of information if you have just started. Good luck and clear skies, Raf

I have searched SGL for a tutorial incase this has been covered so forgive me if it has. I've also searched the web in general and couldn't find a full tutorial to do this, so i have collated a couple of tutorials that make it work. I have managed to get SkySafari to work with a £32 ish Raspberry Pi3 and the cable that came with my scope with a usb to serial converter - the same things you need for connecting to a PC. It allows me to control the scope using the SkySafari Plus app on my tablet or phone AND it creates a wifi hotspot on the Raspberry Pi so it doesnt have to be on a network to work. This also turns the pi into a natty mini wireless router which is handy if you travel since it gives you a private wireless network when plugged into hotel wired internet ? ***STANDARD DISCLAIMER*** I AM NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY DAMAGE THAT MAY OCCUR TO YOUR HARDWARE BY FOLLOWING THIS POST OR ANYTHING LINKED TO THIS POST It takes about 30 mins to do the tinkering, make sure you use the latest LITE version of raspbian. You need: Raspberry Pi 3 Portable power to it (preferably) Raspbian Lite Image file Appropriate cables to connect your Telescope to it via USB Computer connected to network Network cable to connect Raspberry Pi for initial setup A GoTo / Push To etc telescope mount compatible with SkySafari Plus / Pro A nice case for the Raspberry Pi You need to know a little about accessing the Raspberry Pi by SSH. For windows, use Win32 Disk Imager to burn the latest Raspbian LITE image to a micro sd card. Open the card on the pc (called boot) and make a blank file on it called 'ssh' - no file extension. This enables ssh access automatically. Stick it in your Pi and plug it into your network router and a power source. Find its ip address - i log into my router by typing its ip address into a web browser and look at connected devices, there are other methods though. I use a program called Putty to ssh. There are many tutorials on how to do the above and it isnt as hard as it first seems. I used 2 tutorials to do this and i will link to them directly as the original authors explain it better than me. The first one is muuuch longer than the second which is just 3 steps so bare with it. ***NOTE*** When the first tutorial suggests a reboot after the upgrade, DO IT! Then ssh back into the Pi and continue. Don't bother rebooting after tutorial 1 either. Tutorial 1 - Turn Raspberry Pi into a portable wifi hotspot See 'CONNECTING' after doing step 2 in the next tutorial to actually connect to the scope as what you have just done changes it a bit. Tutorial 2 - Make it talk to SkySafari App and the 'Scope You can now unplug the pi from your router. Plug your USB to serial adapter into the pi, your telescope cable into that and connect it to your scope as you would do with a pc (mine is into the AutoStar hand box) and use it as a stand alone adapter just like the £200 SkyFi adapter! CONNECTING: To connect SkySafari to the pi you simply connect your tablet or phone to the pi's network like you would any other wifi network, i called mine Scope, connect using the security key / password you made up in tutorial 1. Open SkySafari and follow step 3 in the second tutorial but with IP address 192.168.0.10 - the port is still 4000 (unless you changed it) If you are at home and your cable is long enough to reach your router you can plug the pi into that and use your home internet too - which you cant do with the SkyFi adapter! I am going to shorten my serial cable to make it a neater package, i can always solder new plus to make an extension if i ever need one. I am also working on finding out how to make it share usb internet so a 4g dongle can be plugged into it when out and about since when you connect to the pi's wifi in the field you will not have internet on the device connected to it. Also the Pi could possibly be used for imaging or tracking, someone on here will probably know more on this.

Hi folks The group I am part of, called The Flame Trench, recently got a lot of interest in building a remotely accessible AP setup for people who follow us to get involved with. We'll be looking into using it for a lot of outreach, especially with a second telescope carrying out some live observing. More info on the build can be found here. I thought I'd make a thread to show the build as we start to get hardware in and watch it progress! Currently we have a Celestron 6SE w/ EQ-wedge, and a canon DSLR - looking at hooking that up to some web tools to enable some live observations to get the outreach part kicked off early. We'll be looking at somewhere to make the setup semi-permanent or entirely permanent once it's built. I've attached our planned kitlist for the AP setup: Thanks for having a look ? Ben

Hi guys I currently own a 12" skywatcher collapsible dobsonian but need to upgrade now to have goto functionality. It is way to expensive for me though and I can only spend up to 1200 AUD ~ 900 USD. Could anyone please help me think of some alternatives, to track and remotely control my dob? Thanks guys!!