Starlight Live V3.1

[Paul81]

Hi All,

Starlight Light V3.1 is now available to download:

OSX version

Windows version

From the change log:

- Added 3x3 binning for progressive cameras only. 3x3 binning is not available for interlaced cameras.
- Added display for camera firmware version to the camera properties display.
- Modified Lanczos resampling algorithm to dampen sampling artefacts around bright objects (black halo around stars).
- Fixed Bug: Camera stability issues under OSX - updates to the libUSB library have improved stability for OSX 10.11 'El Capitan'. The application will now not crash if the camera unexpectedly disconnects.
- Fixed Bug: Date and time was not being stored in the FITS file when exporting to FITS.
- Fixed Bug: Detection of non-writable directories on Windows platforms.
- Fixed Bug: Signalling of critical or fatal application errors from non-UI threads causes a crash.

As always have fun and clear skies!

Paul

[Ain Soph Aur]

Thank you! It looks like I am forecast for clear skies tomorrow night and looking forward to give this a try!

[ramdom]

Thanks a lot! I've been posting my all images taken with Lodestar Live and now Starlight Live 3.0 along with a couple of bugs/features in a separate thread (included below) but it appears you may have already fixed them. I will check it out with 3.1 and let you know but the issues were that under Yosemite (10.10.05), the RGGB colourspace selection for the X2c would produce an interlaced type of image (but the CYGM selection was fine) and when I started the evening with taking darks first and then switched to lights the program would freeze (whereas if I took lights without dark acquisition first so it had hot pixels and then did the darks and went back to the lights, everything was fine).   Do I need to upgrade to El Capitan for the greater stability?

When it stops being cloudy out, I will try them out with 3.1 and let you know unlesss you know for sure that the RGGB colourspace can't work with the X2c. 

The software is fairly easy to understand but is there any kind of a user guide/updated live stacking notes that Don was putting out?

Again, this is an awesome program and I'm happy to see that it works for all the other Starlight Express cameras!

--Ram

Here's the link:

 

[Paul81]

Hi Ram,

The X2C is a CYGM sensor, so only the CYGM colour space will work. Unfortunately for some cameras I have no way of detecting the sensor type so cannot select the colour space automatically, hence it is down to the user to select the correct one.

[ramdom]

Thanks Paul. I was able to try the software out tonight and I posted the resulting image to my thread on Lodestar X2 images (post linked below).  It works amazingly well and any issues I had with 3.0 appear to have resolved. In fact, the four images I've now taken this season using StarlightLive (2 with 3.0 and 2 with 3.1) have been the easiest relative to the older software versions and the automagic stacking/filtering appears to let me image for much longer total exposure times with a reasonably accurate polar alignment (error in minutes). 

--Ram

 

[laser_jock99]

Thanks Paul - will give this a try soon too.

[ramdom]

I am still having the "bug" I mentioned I had in 3.0. I've been able to replicate it thrice thusfar (as many times I've done steps 1-4 below):

1. Start with everything disconnected/separated (Lodestar, computer). 

2. a. Connect the Lodestar. b. Start up Starlight Live 3.0/3.1 (it doesn't seem to matter which order I do a and b in).

3. Capture a few to several dark frames (usually 8x30s) without capturing any light frames.

4. Then switch to capturing light frames - the process freezes at frame 1. The blue bar goes through the exposure time and stops them and the counter doesn't increment.

A reboot of my computer didn't correct this the one time I tried it. The problem (4) does not happen if I start by capturing a few light frames first, and then capture the dark frames. It only seems to happen if I start a session with capturing dark frames.  

--Ram

 

[Ain Soph Aur]

Perhaps you should try saving the the darks as a master dark in the Dark Calibration tab of Dark Frame Acquisition. Then close SLL, re-open and load the master dark file then try imaging light frames and see if you encounter the same issue.

[ramdom]

I have tried exactly that and I don't have that problem. Whenever I start a session with lights (even if it's restoring a saved dark file), I don't have that freeze up problem as far as I can tell. It's only if I start with darks that I've observed this problem. It was one of the first things I did after I lost the (unsaved) dark frames the first time when SL froze up, save the darks and then go to lights directly.  But then I felt that the image looks better if I don't use a restored dark, but I suspect that's me not doing something right but there definitely wasn't any freeze up problem. 

I do have a fix (which is to start with lights, get it focused, etc., go to darks, and then go to lights which typically requires a recentering and refocussing but the first attempt sets things up nicely so it's not too bad but it would be convenient to start with the darks while waiting for the scope to align, etc.).  I'm just reporting the issue for Paul's benefit. 

--Ram

 

[Paul81]

Hi Ram,

I have been thinking about the issue you have described and I can't see anything immediately wrong in the code, and I am unable to reproduce the issue. 

1. Can you let me know your computer specs - such as CPU and OS.

2. Does the issue still occur if you take some darks, stop the camera (by clicking stop on the exposure tab) and the switch to lights.

Paul

[ramdom]

Hi Paul, yeah, I just pulled out my X2m and reproduced it (I'm almost certain that it has happened at least once with the X2c also). If I start and stick with lights and do everything as I should, then I don't seem to have a problem. It's when I start with darks first and then do something weird, like change the colourspace (between darks and lights, by mistake) or uncheck the stacking option when stacking is ongoing that it happens easily.  Here's a simple way I've been able to consistently reproduce it:

1. Plug in X2m, start SL 3.1, make sure stacking is checked, and colourspace is set to mono for both dark and image acquisition and exposure time is 1s for both. 

2. Go to dark acquisition. Take ONE exposure. Switch to lights. Start taking exposures. Things appear to be fine even after several exposures.

3. As that's going on, uncheck stacking and within ~5 exposures, the freezing occurs.

Here's the info on my computer:

Hardware Overview:

  Model Name: MacBook Pro

  Model Identifier: MacBookPro11,3

  Processor Name: Intel Core i7

  Processor Speed: 2.6 GHz

  Number of Processors: 1

  Total Number of Cores: 4

  L2 Cache (per Core): 256 KB

  L3 Cache: 6 MB

  Memory: 16 GB

  Boot ROM Version: MBP112.0138.B15

  SMC Version (system): 2.19f12

Software Overview

  System Version: OS X 10.10.5 (14F27)

  Kernel Version: Darwin 14.5.0

 

 

 

 

[Paul81]

Hi Ram,

Thank you for the info - based on your info I think I have a suspicion what the issue is. For some reason you are running out of image buffers (could just be the fact that the exposure is 1s but its taking longer to process due to a large number of stars etc). In this scenario the camera controller is meant to just skip the latest exposure and restart for the next - looks like the code doesn't restart for the next exposure in this condition.

I'll put a fix in and try it out later and let you know.

Cheers

Paul

[Paul81]

Hmmm.. So its not what I was thinking in the system is halting due to running out of buffers. I can't replicate your issue, but I added some debug code to ensure it runs out of buffers and the system carries on working fine.

I'll keep having a think...

[ramdom]

Hi Paul, no worries and thanks for giving it a shot. Just to clarify, the 1s test I did was done with the rubber cover on always so there were no stars and I replicated it to 5s and 0.5 second also - I just used the lower exposure numbers since I didn't want to wait too long for the testing. The problems I've encountered in the field were with stars (all but the ones reported above with the 1s exposure).  Also, I presume when you say "system is halting" you mean your program, not the OS which is working fine.

Let me know if you'd like me to try anything specific. Like I said, I have a workaround so I'm fine with doing that. 

--Ram