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No AVI option when selecting an ASCOM camera

Posted: Tue May 23, 2017 3:50 am
by jmgoldba
Why isn't there an option (v3906) to save in AVI format when I select an ASCOM camera?

Jesse

Re: No AVI option when selecting an ASCOM camera

Posted: Tue May 23, 2017 8:02 am
by admin
Hi,

AVI only supports 8 bit colour depths. If your camera ASCOM driver is reporting a MaxADU of more than 255 then it has a sensor that has a larger bit depth than 8, so SharpCap cannot save the images it produces to AVI without data loss.

cheers,

Robin

Re: No AVI option when selecting an ASCOM camera

Posted: Mon Jun 10, 2019 7:21 pm
by iamhondo
The ASCOM Camera V2 Simulator is fully configurable (like most ASCOM simulators).

For this application, you can test operations with an 8-bit simulated camera by going into the Simulator Setup screen. Just click Show on the Options in the Camera Control Panel under Camera Controls.

Inside the Simulator Setup, just set the Maximum ADU to 255 to give the 8-bit range 0-255. Then the Output Format drop-down will allow for AVI recording.

Nitpicky error report: SharpCap will allow you to record AVIs if the camera Maximum ADU is 256. But 8-bit range is 0-255. So ASCOM should prohibit AVI recordings if Maximum ADU is greater than 255.

It's not likely that a real camera will ever record in 257 colors (ie, Maximum ADU = 256) but this edge-condition error is probably easy to fix (says the person who doesn't need to fix it).