Setting up PlateSolving in Astrophotography Tool (APT)

[david_taurus83]

11 minutes ago, matt_baker said:

So all I literally have to do is:

Polar Align

Load up APT and PHD

Use PointCraft to slew to a bright star and focus

Slew to target and solve to centre

Start Guiding

Start Imaging

 

Is this pretty much right?

Yep. My routine is:

Setup in home position

Polar align in Sharpcap

Take first image in home position

Platesolve and sync

Use the drift align tool in PHD to slew to meridian and celestial equator

Calibrate

Slew to target, platesolve, sync and repeat until on target.

Run autofocuser

Run image plan.

Watch clouds roll in.

[Anthonyexmouth]

1 hour ago, matt_baker said:

So all I literally have to do is:

Polar Align

Load up APT and PHD

Use PointCraft to slew to a bright star and focus

Slew to target and solve to centre

Start Guiding

Start Imaging

 

Is this pretty much right?

Yup. That's it. Point craft has a list of all common targets. There's no manual slewing. Just pick a bright star from the list of stars. Click goto++ let APT do it's thing and plate solve onto it. I have mine set to auto sync but you can click sync just to be sure when it's finished, focus then pick an image target from the list in APT. It'll slew and plate solve until it's centered then start imaging. 

In trying to get some screen video capture software to record my process. 

It's so easy. The first time you do it make sure you're sat down as you'll be laughing so much at how easy it is and kicking yourself that you've waited so long to do it. 

[matt_baker]

1 hour ago, Anthonyexmouth said:

Yup. That's it. Point craft has a list of all common targets. There's no manual slewing. Just pick a bright star from the list of stars. Click goto++ let APT do it's thing and plate solve onto it. I have mine set to auto sync but you can click sync just to be sure when it's finished, focus then pick an image target from the list in APT. It'll slew and plate solve until it's centered then start imaging. 

In trying to get some screen video capture software to record my process. 

It's so easy. The first time you do it make sure you're sat down as you'll be laughing so much at how easy it is and kicking yourself that you've waited so long to do it. 

This'll save me so much time, especially when it comes to meridian flips.

Merdian flips + alignment added up to about 40 minutes in wasted time I could've used

This really helps a lot, I'll be sure to use this when I go to capture the Iris Nebula, which is hopefully my next target

[Danjc]

Brilliant this is just what I needed ??

Thanks for putting the time and effort in to do this I’m sure it will be a great help for lots of people. 

[StevieO]

Hi, I'm returning to imaging after a break and have decided to include plate solving as part of my re-education.

I've followed the steps of this excellent tutorial and am now in a position where I can get APT and CDC to slew to any named object, and also to successfully plate solve using ASPS and PS2.

Initially when I pressed the 'Sync' button APT would give the co-ordinates to CDC, which would centre the object in its screen and I could slew to it from there. However, for some reason all I get now when I click 'Sync' is a message in the log that 'Cannot sync to co-ordinates. Exception occurred)', although I can manually input the co-ordinates into the GoTo section and it will slew perfectly. I could settle for that but it's become a challenge. I wonder if the Planetarium setting is correct in APT Settings? The 'Port' setting for CDC defaults at 0. Should that be something else or is this another problem?

Any ideas gratefully received.

All the best

StevieO

[stash_old]

1 hour ago, StevieO said:

Hi, I'm returning to imaging after a break and have decided to include plate solving as part of my re-education.

I've followed the steps of this excellent tutorial and am now in a position where I can get APT and CDC to slew to any named object, and also to successfully plate solve using ASPS and PS2.

Initially when I pressed the 'Sync' button APT would give the co-ordinates to CDC, which would centre the object in its screen and I could slew to it from there. However, for some reason all I get now when I click 'Sync' is a message in the log that 'Cannot sync to co-ordinates. Exception occurred)', although I can manually input the co-ordinates into the GoTo section and it will slew perfectly. I could settle for that but it's become a challenge. I wonder if the Planetarium setting is correct in APT Settings? The 'Port' setting for CDC defaults at 0. Should that be something else or is this another problem?

Any ideas gratefully received.

All the best

StevieO

I think is 3292 but dont quote me on it - so long as CDC and APT use the same port number to should work and APT is pointing to 127.0.0.1 (if the CDC software is on the same PC) then it should be ok. Else check Wins Firewall (temp switch off - does it work). Plus are you sure its CDC not EQMOD giving that message. Does CDC telescope marker jump after the Sync ? Is the EQMOD setting set to "Append" - look on SGL for settings cant remember where they were but it came with pictures 🙂

[StevieO]

Thank you, yes, 3292 works , and once again APT sends the co-ordinates to CDC which centres the location for slewing. Plate solving  was something I'd previously shied away from but now that I'm getting it to work I'm anticipating being a lot warmer next winter!

Cheers

StevieO

[david_taurus83]

Hi. I'm glad this thread is helping people!😀

 

I've had a similar issue myself one night with the same message though it's not returned since. Just "one of those nights". Glad you've got it sorted now.

[bottletopburly]

1 hour ago, StevieO said:

Thank you, yes, 3292 works , and once again APT sends the co-ordinates to CDC which centres the location for slewing. Plate solving  was something I'd previously shied away from but now that I'm getting it to work I'm anticipating being a lot warmer next winter!

Cheers

StevieO

Your life just got a lot easier  , platesolving you’ll wonder how you did without 

[TerryMcK]

Thanks for the great tutorial David

[han59]

In the latest beta version v3.85.1 of APT, you can select ASTAP as astrometric (plate) solver.

[Frank the Troll]

Cheers, thanks for the guide, "Very Good" ( and thats from a guy who has written IT manuals)

 

[Damien Cannane]

Thank you so much for this wonderful tutorial! Everything worked like a charm, both for Solve+ and Blind, using a .FITS image already saved on my PC.... everything except for one issue. It returns exactly the right RA and Dec, but it exactly doubles my resolution. I'm at 1.24"/pixel and it's saying I'm at 2.48"/pixel. I've triple checked my focal length, and it does say 400mm under Tools. This is correct as I'm using a RASA 8. Does this matter? Will it still Sync properly and re-center my targets when connected to my Atlas mount with EQMOD?

To be clear, I just mean the image scale is wrong as displayed in APT. If I run it directly in All Sky Plate Solver, it comes out correctly. 

 

Thanks,

Damien

Edited March 9, 2020 by Damien Cannane

[Anthonyexmouth]

On 09/03/2020 at 05:27, Damien Cannane said:

Thank you so much for this wonderful tutorial! Everything worked like a charm, both for Solve+ and Blind, using a .FITS image already saved on my PC.... everything except for one issue. It returns exactly the right RA and Dec, but it exactly doubles my resolution. I'm at 1.24"/pixel and it's saying I'm at 2.48"/pixel. I've triple checked my focal length, and it does say 400mm under Tools. This is correct as I'm using a RASA 8. Does this matter? Will it still Sync properly and re-center my targets when connected to my Atlas mount with EQMOD?

To be clear, I just mean the image scale is wrong as displayed in APT. If I run it directly in All Sky Plate Solver, it comes out correctly. 

 

Thanks,

Damien

Is it binning the platesolving image?

[Spaced Out]

Hi

Can anyone help please. I've loaded PS2 no probs but I am having problems with ASPS. I have downloaded it OK but when I open it to set it up I get error messages about database files. Any ideas where I am going wrong ?

Thanks

 

[bottletopburly]

31 minutes ago, Spaced Out said:

Hi

Can anyone help please. I've loaded PS2 no probs but I am having problems with ASPS. I have downloaded it OK but when I open it to set it up I get error messages about database files. Any ideas where I am going wrong ?

Thanks

 

Have you downloaded the indexes needed for your setup ,

[Spaced Out]

56 minutes ago, bottletopburly said:

Have you downloaded the indexes needed for your setup ,

It won't let me ?

Just to clarify, I've downloaded ASPS only. I've opened it and gone to the index wizard thingy to try and get the correct indexes but it just keeps giving me that error message and won't calculate the FOV when I enter focal length/pixel info etc.

Should I have downloaded something else (perhaps full indexes ?) alongside the ASPS download to make it work ?

Thanks

[stash_old]

You need to get ASPS to download the correct index's as per you FOV (or largest FOV used for more than one camera) - downloading all is time consuming and will slow Platesolving if all index's are used.

Do it via "Indexes" menu - this screen should appear 🙂

 

[Spaced Out]

On 08/04/2020 at 16:49, stash_old said:

You need to get ASPS to download the correct index's as per you FOV (or largest FOV used for more than one camera) - downloading all is time consuming and will slow Platesolving if all index's are used.

Do it via "Indexes" menu - this screen should appear 🙂

 

Thanks. I tried this using the index wizard thing but kept getting that warning. Uninstalled and reinstalled, same problem, just locks up and won't let me do anything at all. Did this a few times with no success.

Strangely, when I logged out off the PC and then logged back in with a different user account it all ran OK ? I have two accounts on the PC so I am just using the second one now instead, I installed the indexes no probs and it seems to work OK so far. I wonder why it works fine for one user but not the other ?

[stash_old]

17 hours ago, Spaced Out said:

Thanks. I tried this using the index wizard thing but kept getting that warning. Uninstalled and reinstalled, same problem, just locks up and won't let me do anything at all. Did this a few times with no success.

Strangely, when I logged out off the PC and then logged back in with a different user account it all ran OK ? I have two accounts on the PC so I am just using the second one now instead, I installed the indexes no probs and it seems to work OK so far. I wonder why it works fine for one user but not the other ?

Windows user permissions they keep everyone out except hacker's LOL

[Guest]

Thanks for this tutorial. I'm working my way through it. Can you explain what the two add-ons do? - PS2 and ASPS. I know they do plate solving but why are there 2 of them required? What's the difference between them?

Cheers

Steve

 

[almcl]

All Sky Plate Solver does not need to know where the telescope is pointing; Plate Solve 2 needs an approximate position. 

You don't need both, but PS2 is usually quicker, if the pointing info is reasonably close. 

I managed for quite a while with just ASPS but it could take up to 3 minutes to solve (depends on the speed of the machine it's running on to some extent) while PS2 often manages to solve in less than 10 seconds, if my alignment is reasonable.  

Edited April 10, 2020 by almcl

[MylesGibson]

Brilliant post! I have been using APT for a while and just getting to grips with it and exploring all the things it can actually do

[Dan13]

Thank you! This was invaluable at midnight in the freezing cold trying to plate solve M51! 

Worked a treat good job, excellent info.

[TobyW]

What a fantastic tutorial. 

 

Thanks so much for your time in putting this together.

 

Toby