Allsky Camera, cutting the ribbon.

[Paul M]

The trial and tribulations of all-sky cameras...

The Paulsky Camera has been off for 10 days. The Ras Pi. shut down or otherwise stopped responding. Then the mini PC I use as a both a server for the Pi imagery and some genera purpose PoE cameras I have watching the world go by, decided to do similar. Couldn't VNC into either of them. Can't remote reboot if it's like that. 

So now we're back up on site and I've installed a smart multi plug that I can talk to remotely (ie from home). I set the Bios in the Mini PC to reboot on restoration of power so hopefully I can force that to reboot now, tests have been promising. The RasPi, as we know, just boots on power-up. Very civilised.

I haven't tested the mini PC to see if it reboots if, for example I accidentally shut it down over VNC, then power it off then on via the smart plug. I'll test that tomorrow.

Other exciting news; I've changed the lens on the Paulsky Camera. It's image circle now fits entirely on the ASI178 camera's sensor. I've cropped the surplus width in the frame, so saving on file size. Not that storage is an issue, but file write time is, or can be!

Just for fun, here is a single frame from last night. 

North is at the top, and it just shows a lovely string of solar powered light that have very recently been strung along the length of a neighbours luxury villa. Bang on my north horizon! They come on even in the long periods when the occupants aren't even here. Luckily they don't seen to be bothering exposure of causing dome flares. And in winter they won't get enough sunlight to work.

 

Edited May 28 by Paul M

[Norris Adams]

On 26/04/2024 at 00:18, Paul M said:

In a land far, far away, Cumbria to be exact, there is a pristine clear sky.

I'm not there to witness it, but the Paulsky Camera is!

While flicking through the images, I spotted a nice meteor. So here is that frame. It'll be lost as a sub-second flash in the overnight time-lapse.

Cloud and moonlight have been blighting the Allsky Camera recently but it's improving again, maybe a window of opportunity before the all-night-twilight sets in.

The Great Glowing Cheesball is just starting  to affect the camera now. So, it's downhill for the rest of the night...

 

In other news, emboldened by @Skipper Billy's Allsky camera linked to above, I've ordered a lens that will fit the whole image circle on the ASI 178 sensor. So a full 180deg view. That and I've ordered a much bigger dome. Again, Skipper Billy suggested that on his website as it allows ventilation holes to be drilled around the camera, allowing the very warm air from the RasPi to circulate in the dome, hopefully keeping it condensation free.

There is a newly released firmware (EEPROM) for the Raspi, which allows even greater overclocking. I can't dream of taking the enclosed Pi to the max but I still had the original firmware on my Pi 4B which limited the CPU to 1.5 MHz, I've now set it to 2.0 Mhz. It might, and probably will cook in the summer. So I'll likely stop recording daytime images and just let it idle in the heat of the day. I'm looking to swap the Pi4 for my Pi5 to limit some of the issues with image handling. I tried at the weekend but it balked at boot-up, complaining of voltage drop. Thinking about it, the PoE splitter is only rated at 2A, so I've got a higher rated one on order. The PoE injector is a big 8 channel PoE switch rated at 85w total load. It is also running 2 x PoE surveillance cameras, but I'm confident that total load will be compliant.

That'll be an ongoing project into the summer, due to my limited opportunities to get up there once the parts arrive.

Beautiful image!

[Paul M]

Darkness is once again arriving in the skies above my remote allsky camera in Cumbria. The internet has been down for nearly 2 days due to a trunk fiber optic cable being damaged out on the network somewhere.

Back up now, so looked over the last few timelapses. Here is a nice frame from early this morning. There was an earlier meteor on very similar track, maybe related/not sporadic? One thing for sure, it aint no early season Perseid!

Other items of interest: Saturn just drifting into the tree gap on the southern perimeter.

The Great Glowing Cheesball, obliterating the left (east) of the image.

Deep sky enthusiasts will be able to spot M31, but M33 seems to have been washed out by the GGC and the approaching dawn.

The bright light, bang on the north cardinal point is a neighboring Luxury Cumbrian Villa, who's hung out a string of LED lights. The good news is that in winter they'll run out of steam. 

 

[Paul M]

Last night was, I think, the first dusk to dawn clear night since I installed the allsky camera.

There was a weak aurora, a few meteors, and some image glitches as I played with the stretching parameters. I fell asleep and left it not best.

Anyway, here is the timelapse.

 

 

[Paul M]

Another 1st for the allsky camera. It's currently clear ooop north but maybe not particularly transparent. The ever increasing sky glow form Penrith is very troublesome when there is water vapour about.

Anyway, I decided to stack 10 consecutive 20 sec exposures using ASTAP. It did the best it could. Not really designed for fisheye imagery. No scientific value. But M31 is plainly visible, and I'm pleased to see it's pulled Corona Borealis out of the murk, indeed the stars in that area are much better than elsewhere in the image. Unfortunately, still no Blaze Star (T CrB).

 

Edited September 5 by Paul M

[Paul M]

The gift that keeps giving, and today's exciting installment is titled "Gas Giants".

Jupiter is obvious in this single 20 second frame from 3am this morning (Mars there too).

I guessed the once the Pleiades got further away from the dawn glare, high in a dark sky, I'd be able to star hop to Uranus. And I could!

With cropping and stretching and labeling in ASTAP, I give you Uranus as you might never have seen it before...

The vivid red "stars" left of Jupiter, plus a good few less conspicuous "extras" are camera hot pixels. I could map them and automatically remove them in the allsky software. But I didn't.

Edited September 7 by Paul M

[iwols]

Nice images there,how do you control dew I have an inbuilt heater in the small dome but still struggles e dew

 

[Paul M]

5 minutes ago, iwols said:

Nice images there,how do you control dew I have an inbuilt heater in the small dome but still struggles e dew

 

I installed a dew heater too but my eventual project used PoE and there wouldn't have been sufficient juice available.

I've not had too much trouble with dew so far. I'm in the process of putting it all in a bigger box with a bigger dome. This allows a few breather holes inside the dome to let heat from the PI circulate. 

Currently using a Pi4 but conna try the Pi5 on changeover. More heat to keep it dry but might struggle again with the PoE. I've upgraded to splitter already so might be OK.

Next weekend is earmarked for the changeover. 

[iwols]

Thanks was it the circular type and what was the bigger dome

[Paul M]

1 hour ago, iwols said:

Thanks was it the circular type and what was the bigger dome

Yes is was the bespoke circular heater.

The new dome came via Aliexpress:

Big dome needs big box! Got this from screwfix:

[iwols]

Thanks that looks a better dome for the job,when you say bespoke was that home made or do you have any details thanks 

[Paul M]

1 hour ago, iwols said:

Thanks that looks a better dome for the job,when you say bespoke was that home made or do you have any details thanks 

Not home made, it was the item sold here: https://www.dewcontrol.com/product/dew-heater-module---all-sky-camera

I bought their custom case too, but that just didn't fit a Rasp Pi + SSD + PoE splitter and various cabling. So I got a box from the same line as that I linked above but smaller. It's been great so far... but...I want to move the camera from where it is now, on the SE corner of the caravan to the NW corner. There'll be less obstruction from overhanging trees and less direct glare from a neighbour who has an occasional habit of leaving an external light on all night.

So While I'm at it, I'll try the Pi 5 again and hopefully the ventilated dome will keep it condensation free over winter. It gets chilly up there in central Cumbria!

[Paul M]

Quite a lot of clear sky over the allsky camera last night. Clear air too.

Just to play with what I had, here is a stack of 20 consecutive 20 sec frames from around 3am. I stacked them in ASTAP initially but it struggles with the roational movement, so stars far away from center were elongated. 

This was done in DSS, which made short work of it and made a great job of stacking. Did a bit of curves n'stuff in P.S.

It's a stark reminder of how my "dark sky site" aint really dark these days. Still much better than my home sky.

[happy-kat]

milky way is nice and bright, did you select a reference frame when you stacked, I choose the one generally with the highest score in DSS.

[Paul M]

10 minutes ago, happy-kat said:

milky way is nice and bright, did you select a reference frame when you stacked, I choose the one generally with the highest score in DSS.

I just left DSS to do its own thing. Its so long since I used it I didn't get too involved. 

I thought it might balk at the rotation plus fish eye distortion but it didn't grumble even once. Actually I thought there were 21 images but it only stacked 20. They all looked equal quality to me.

ASTAP will solve small cropped areas of the allsky camera images but the result is of limited use. It can't work with the field distortions. 

[Paul M]

Today was going to be changeover day. New enclosure and dome, retry the Pi5 and relocate the whole installation, further away from the almost overhanging trees.

Didn't go to plan. We also had some fostering business in Penrith today which ended up taking up much of the day.

Late afternoon saw the sky getting more overcast so time was limited.

Unfortunately the existing standoff bracket doesn't standoff far enough for the proposed new location. The Pi5 changeover was going to need me to connect to TV via HDMI to reconfigure VNC but time was against that.

I did change the case and that's all I managed before spots of rain were evident. It seems happy in its new house. Focus seems OK.

So here is the new case

Here it is, up and running.

[Paul M]

Early this morning there was a nice bit of auroral activity, just before dawn. The cloud motion adds some aesthetic quality on this occasion, I think.

This is an inverted time cropped edit to focus on the aurora. The Moon washed out everything else..