Help with PHD2 guiding roadblock?

[Seanelly]

17 hours ago, kens said:

Te log tells me that you have selected the GPINT mount driver. Now I'm guessing that you have an ST4 cable from your camera to the mount and the camera is connected to your laptop with a USB cable.

If so then you should be using the "On-Camera" mount driver.

If you are using EQMOD then select the EQMOD ASCOM HEQ5/6 driver

Basically, due to the wrong driver the mount was not moving at all so the calibration was failing.

All you've said in the first line is correct. I don't remember exactly, but from the initial set-up I couldn't get PHD2 to recognize the others, so when it recognized GPINT I figured that must be the one, though to be frank, I can't say for sure that I tried On-Camera initially or not. I can see that 'On-Camera' is in the mount selection, and I have now chosen it. I hope you will indulge me in one (at least, haha) more thing: I don't know if I am using EQMOD (how do I check, if necessary?), but that is not on the list of mount selections, so can I assume that I am okay as is?

17 hours ago, kens said:

You might be able to test it in the daytime by pointing at a distant object with tracking off. The use manual guide to see if the mount moves.

I was wondering if testing could be done in the house without having to go through the entire set-up outside first. I definitely will try it tomorrow in the light of day. I'm this close, kens, I can feel it, haha. I think I have everything else figured out, at least well enough to start gathering some worthwhile data. All that's left is Adobe PhotoshopCC, and that subscription is my Christmas present, though I'll have another learning curve there, for sure.

If this works out I am in your debt, you've been great, thank you.

[kens]

There are two ways to guide the HEQ5. One is ST4 which is what you are using. That uses an ST4 cable from camera to mount to send the guiding commands. The other way is more sophisticated and also lets you control the mount fully from the computer including goto and star alignment. This uses the EQMOD software and you either connect straight from computer to mount in place of the hand control using an EQDIR cable OR you connect the computer to the hand control with a USB serial cable and set the hand control to PC Direct mode.

[Seanelly]

5 minutes ago, kens said:

There are two ways to guide the HEQ5. One is ST4 which is what you are using. That uses an ST4 cable from camera to mount to send the guiding commands. The other way is more sophisticated and also lets you control the mount fully from the computer including goto and star alignment. This uses the EQMOD software and you either connect straight from computer to mount in place of the hand control using an EQDIR cable OR you connect the computer to the hand control with a USB serial cable and set the hand control to PC Direct mode.

Okay, thanks for the added info. This may be something to look into in the future when I get some experience behind me. I'll let you know how it goes tomorrow.

[Seanelly]

On 14/12/2018 at 20:40, kens said:

There are two ways to guide the HEQ5. One is ST4 which is what you are using. That uses an ST4 cable from camera to mount to send the guiding commands. The other way is more sophisticated and also lets you control the mount fully from the computer including goto and star alignment. This uses the EQMOD software and you either connect straight from computer to mount in place of the hand control using an EQDIR cable OR you connect the computer to the hand control with a USB serial cable and set the hand control to PC Direct mode.

Update, if you can indulge me further: Calibration was successful  with On-Camera! I could tell the difference right off when the box around the star starting moving. That said, after calibration, every twenty seconds or so, the screen flashed red a few times and this message on the calibration button came up: calibration complete but scope pointing info not available/not in use. 

I attach the guide log in case it is of some use.

 

PHD2_GuideLog_2018-12-15_203207.txt

PHD2_GuideLog_2018-12-15_201104.txt

[kens]

When guiding, as you move away from the celestial equator you need to move the mount more in RA to compensate for a given offset seen in the guide camera in pixels.

In PHD2, if it knows the declination where the calibration was done and the declination where you are guiding it can apply this compensation automatically. Then you can tick the "use Dec Compensation" option in Advanced settings. You can also tick the "Auto-restore calibration" option so you can re-use a known, good calibration.

If it does not know the declination then these are not possible. Seeing as you are using ST4 guiding PHD2 cannot get the declination from the mount. So check in the Advanced settings (the brain) and make sure these settings are unticked.

This is one of the reasons for getting an EQDIR cable and connecting the mount to your computer.

Another approach is to set the Aux Mount in PHD2 to "Ask for coordinates". With this setting, when you do a calibration or start guiding PHD2 will ask for the declination which you can enter manually. That then satisfies the criteria for Dec compensation and Auto-restore Calibration.But you need to enter the declination correctly (within a few degrees) or guiding will be erratic.

[bottletopburly]

@kensIn PHD2, if it knows the declination where the calibration was done and the declination where you are guiding it can apply this compensation automatically. Then you can tick the "use Dec Compensation" option in Advanced settings , Ken does this mean you don’t need to recalibrate on a new target each time as I am led to believe, just have the use dec compensation ticked .

dave 

[kens]

47 minutes ago, bottletopburly said:

Ken does this mean you don’t need to recalibrate on a new target each time as I am led to believe, just have the use dec compensation ticked .

Within a PHD2 session: Use Dec Compensation works as long as the calibration was done in the same session and declination was known.

Across PHD2 sessions: Auto Restore Calibration will take a calibration from a previous session and if the declination was known for that calibration then Dec Compensation will work.

 

[Seanelly]

14 hours ago, kens said:

When guiding, as you move away from the celestial equator you need to move the mount more in RA to compensate for a given offset seen in the guide camera in pixels.

In PHD2, if it knows the declination where the calibration was done and the declination where you are guiding it can apply this compensation automatically. Then you can tick the "use Dec Compensation" option in Advanced settings. You can also tick the "Auto-restore calibration" option so you can re-use a known, good calibration.

If it does not know the declination then these are not possible. Seeing as you are using ST4 guiding PHD2 cannot get the declination from the mount. So check in the Advanced settings (the brain) and make sure these settings are unticked.

This is one of the reasons for getting an EQDIR cable and connecting the mount to your computer.

Another approach is to set the Aux Mount in PHD2 to "Ask for coordinates". With this setting, when you do a calibration or start guiding PHD2 will ask for the declination which you can enter manually. That then satisfies the criteria for Dec compensation and Auto-restore Calibration.But you need to enter the declination correctly (within a few degrees) or guiding will be erratic.

Let me see (please, no eye-rolling, haha) if I understand correctly: Because of non use of EQDIR, I cannot get (post) calibration declination from the mount, so I should uncheck Use Dec Compensation, unless I set the Aux Mount to 'Ask for Coordinates', in which case I can enter those coordinates from the calibration site, meaning the star I am calibrating from, the declination of which I can find on the synscan, if I'm not mistaken?

8 hours ago, kens said:

Within a PHD2 session: Use Dec Compensation works as long as the calibration was done in the same session and declination was known.

Across PHD2 sessions: Auto Restore Calibration will take a calibration from a previous session and if the declination was known for that calibration then Dec Compensation will work.

 

These options I believe I understand.

My only follow-up question, if you would once again be so kind (I so much appreciate the time and effort you are providing me, and can only hope to repay you by helping someone in a similar predicament down the road, which I believe you would be happy to see, and I'd be proud to do): For astrophotography, would the simpler method (it seems) of unchecking 'Use Dec Compensation' provide as good imaging results as entering the coordinates in the Aux Mount setting, or worse, or the same? I would take the extra time to enter coordinates when necessary if it provides better results, even if only minimal, as I want to get every edge I can from the equipment I have.

[kens]

I would recommend to keep "Use Dec Compensation" ticked and if you are not able to supply declination then untick "Auto restore calibration". This means you need to calibrate on every target (unless they are at the same declination give or take a couple of degrees). With no declination the dec compensation is ignored. I accidentally misled you earlier by saying to untick both to remove the message about pointing info. The option to disable dec compensation only exists for certain mounts that automatically apply the dec compensation themselves.

So you only need to tick/untick "Auto restore calibration" depending on whether you can supply the coordinates or not. One caution is that if you dismantle your scope each session and the guide camera orientation could change then you should recalibrate each session so leave "Autorestore" unticked.

Dec Compensation should provide the same results as calibrating on every target provided the coordinates are within a degree or two. 

 

[kens]

This is a good guide on using PHD2: https://openphdguiding.org/phd2-best-practices/

I’d also add that whilst some things like calibration are fundamental to guiding, many of the guiding options are fine tuning for specific situations so don’t agonise over them. Most serious guiding issues are mechanical and cannot be corrected by altering guiding parameters beyond the recommended values and in those situations PHD2 becomes a useful diagnostic aid.

[Seanelly]

1 hour ago, kens said:

I would recommend to keep "Use Dec Compensation" ticked and if you are not able to supply declination then untick "Auto restore calibration". This means you need to calibrate on every target (unless they are at the same declination give or take a couple of degrees). With no declination the dec compensation is ignored. I accidentally misled you earlier by saying to untick both to remove the message about pointing info. The option to disable dec compensation only exists for certain mounts that automatically apply the dec compensation themselves.

So you only need to tick/untick "Auto restore calibration" depending on whether you can supply the coordinates or not. One caution is that if you dismantle your scope each session and the guide camera orientation could change then you should recalibrate each session so leave "Autorestore" unticked.

Dec Compensation should provide the same results as calibrating on every target provided the coordinates are within a degree or two. 

 

Gotcha. I've done as you've suggested. Finally completing a callibration the other night on a target only took about 6-7 minutes, so the time is not really an issue in these early stages for me, especially if the results should be the same as providing coordinates, but I can see that at some point down the road it would be nice to have the option of shortening up the preliminary setup.

 

1 hour ago, kens said:

This is a good guide on using PHD2: https://openphdguiding.org/phd2-best-practices/

I’d also add that whilst some things like calibration are fundamental to guiding, many of the guiding options are fine tuning for specific situations so don’t agonise over them. Most serious guiding issues are mechanical and cannot be corrected by altering guiding parameters beyond the recommended values and in those situations PHD2 becomes a useful diagnostic aid.

I will check out the guide you've linked. 

Since you have suggested that many of the features are for specific situations, is it safe to say that in the Brain/Camera options for Auto Exposure, the settings of 2 minutes for minimum and 6 minutes for maximum are adequate? Do they make any difference when changed, and what is the link, if any, to the Camera Exposure Duration box beside the Screen Gamma (brightness) slider? I understand what this exposure duration is for, but then why the minimum/maximum exposure duration in the Brain/Camera? (Sorry if it seems these sessions are unending, but I much prefer to deal with one individual who obviously knows what they are doing rather than try to sort through multiple answers in a more public questioning, if it's all the same to you. I will dedicate my first good image to you!)

[michael8554]

11 minutes ago, Seanelly said:

settings of 2 minutes for minimum and 6 minutes for maximum are adequate?

Erm, seconds not minutes shurely ?

Michael 

[Seanelly]

44 minutes ago, michael8554 said:

Erm, seconds not minutes shurely ?

Michael 

Yes, I meant seconds, I just checked and the maximum setting for either is 30s. But the combination of parameters concerning the Brain/Camera min/max auto exposure settings and the Camera Exposure Duration box beside the Gamma slider have me baffled as to which overrides the other, though I believe that the latter should prevail as the main exposure setting, which leaves me wondering what the former does and why.

[kens]

Don’t use autoexposure. Apparently it is meant for use with AO devices. Just select an exposure time on the main screen of 2 to 4 seconds. You’ll see in that dropdown an Auto option. As long as you don’t choose that you’ll be fine

[Seanelly]

24 minutes ago, kens said:

Don’t use autoexposure. Apparently it is meant for use with AO devices. Just select an exposure time on the main screen of 2 to 4 seconds. You’ll see in that dropdown an Auto option. As long as you don’t choose that you’ll be fine

Okay, I think that does it. I won't know for a couple of days, but I think I'm on my way. Thank you again.

[Seanelly]

On 17/12/2018 at 01:05, kens said:

Don’t use autoexposure. Apparently it is meant for use with AO devices. Just select an exposure time on the main screen of 2 to 4 seconds. You’ll see in that dropdown an Auto option. As long as you don’t choose that you’ll be fine

I thought you might like to hear that after nearly two weeks of weather watching I was recently able to put to the test your advice on my PHD2 guiding system and it has proved correct. I collected 51x180s subs of M45 along with 15dark, 15flat and 2bias (my bad) which I may show later, but more importantly the data looks good. I settled on the default 2s exposure rate as it seemed to work best while graphed.

To finish off the night I gathered 7x180s subs of M42 at iso1600, which I show here, composed along with 5dark, 5flat and 2bias images. I'd heard that M42 was a good starter target, but the detail surprised me for the 21m ttl. It was compiled and adjusted in DeepSkyStacker, as PhotoshopCC has yet to be realized.

This is my first crack at M42, and was more of an afterthought to end the evening, so I'm quite pleased with it.

 

[kens]

Nice work Sean. 180s subs is a huge step forward. 

[bottletopburly]

Nice work Sean , if your using Apt ?  You could get dithering working and that would save you time of having to take Darks ?

[Seanelly]

12 hours ago, bottletopburly said:

Nice work Sean , if your using Apt ?  You could get dithering working and that would save you time of having to take Darks ?

Not using APT, though perhaps should? I'm using a battery remote for camera exposure settings. In PHD2 (brain/global settings) there is a setting for dithering, which is set on random. Would this be what you are suggesting with APT, and if so am I wasting time taking darks for no reason?

[bottletopburly]

10 hours ago, Seanelly said:

Not using APT, though perhaps should? I'm using a battery remote for camera exposure settings. In PHD2 (brain/global settings) there is a setting for dithering, which is set on random. Would this be what you are suggesting with APT, and if so am I wasting time taking darks for no reason?

Tbh honest I’m not sure you would have to read phd2 notes on their website  I think you have to use another program such as Apt , there is a few settings you have to tick in phd2 first ,  ,depends how simple you want to keep it .

[Seanelly]

7 hours ago, bottletopburly said:

Tbh honest I’m not sure you would have to read phd2 notes on their website  I think you have to use another program such as Apt , there is a few settings you have to tick in phd2 first ,  ,depends how simple you want to keep it .

Okay, I'll read up on it, thanks.

[bottletopburly]

 Had a quick look you can manual dither but tbh your better off letting a third party software automate it  such as APT  https://openphdguiding.org/man-dev/Tools.htm