Polar alignment using Plate Solving (alternatives to ASIAIR and SharpCapPro)

[B4silio]

Hi!

I've been doing my polar alignment with drift alignment for years, dedicating the necessary number of hours to get something really good, until I recently got an ASIAIR plus, which comes with a nifty module for polar alignment using plate solving. I was awed by how quickly I was able to get a fantastic alignment, making it possible to do 3 minutes unguided subs after 5 minutes of alignment (compared to the 40+ minutes I'd have to spend using drift alignment). What I particularly like of the setup is that it uses my main scope for imaging, which I guess means that in theory I could get very accurate alignment if I spent more time on it. (My seeing makes the point moot since there's no reason to shoot more than ~5 minutes images on my Bortle 6-7 sky).

SharpCap Pro does the same (although the interface is not as user-friendly).

 

So I was wondering: what free software (or software combinations) would allow to do the same alignment without having to use ASIAIR or SharpCapPro?

Note: for polar drift alignment I've been using PHD2, and I've used PlateSolve2 for plate solving and synching within CCDCiel, but I haven't found a "Polar align with plate solving" solution in the couple of software I've actually tried.

 

Any suggestions?

(thanks and have a lovely day!)

 

p.s. For reference, what ASIAIR does is : take a first image at home position and plate solve, rotate around the RA axis by about 90 degrees and take another image and plate solve. The error between what the 90 deg rotation should bring you to if the mount were properly aligned and where you actually end up is calculated and displayed, then you enter a cycle of --> adjust mount --> snapshot+solve --> adjust again --> snapshot+solve ... until the computed error is low enough. The cherry on the cake is the "auto refresh" mode in which it continuously takes snapshots so you just keep correcting until you're done without having to manually interact with the software again.

[AstroMuni]

1 hour ago, B4silio said:

So I was wondering: what free software (or software combinations) would allow to do the same alignment without having to use ASIAIR or SharpCapPro?

NINA (for windows users) and Ekos (for Mac/Linux/RPi users)

1 hour ago, B4silio said:

but I haven't found a "Polar align with plate solving" solution in the couple of software I've actually tried.

Ekos certainly does this.

 

Edited February 27 by AstroMuni

[B4silio]

2 hours ago, AstroMuni said:

NINA (for windows users) and Ekos (for Mac/Linux/RPi users)

Ekos certainly does this.

 

Ooooh fantastic! And also Thanks for proposing a Linux option! (Have only used Ekos on mac but it's high time that I tried it on linux)

[Budgie1]

Astro Photography Tool (APT) also has the PA tool built in and seems to work as well as SharpCap.

It works slightly differently to the others in that it doesn't just move in RA, it picks & plate solves 3 diffareas of the sky and then gives you the PA alterations needed.

Edit: Here's a link to the User Guide which explains the process - https://www.astrophotography.app/usersguide/polar_align_via_ps___paps.htm

Edited February 29 by Budgie1
added link

[michael8554]

PHD2 has two more PA routines as well as Drift Alignment, both when pointing toward the NCP.

Polar Drift Alignment, and Static Polar Alignment.

Michael