AllSKY Camera

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smgvbest
Posts: 6
Joined: Mon May 29, 2017 6:11 pm

AllSKY Camera

#1

Post by smgvbest »

I'd love to see a AllSKY Camera option in SharpCap.

you already do the timelapse part which is a big part of it
you create avi's also which is another big part.
but adding FTP or sftp to a site would be great as an added feature
where we can send a fixed filename to a site for the current image

some kind of mask overlay would be great as well so we could embed information into the image
Things like temp, humidity and other information
a NSEW pointer on the image, logos, obs name and so on.

short of that adding Emgu CV to the python lib and we could do our own overlays.
the mask should be saved with the image unlike the Reticules.

one thing that would help greatly is automatic exposure control so handle both day and night imaging.


We dont' have any canned software really to do AllSky Camera work and i really think if you added the features to sharpcap you'd have a very enthusiastic audience.
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admin
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Re: AllSKY Camera

#2

Post by admin »

I can see from your other post that you are thinking about how to do this in python scripting, which is the best approach for now.

You can add extra python libraries outside of the main python lib, just put them somewhere on disk and add them to the python search path.

Overdrawing on the frame before it is saved via python isn't possible right now, but it's something I could consider.

Finally, auto-exposure is currently a feature of individual cameras - many but not all support it, and if they do there will be an 'Auto' check button in the exposure control UI.

cheers,

Robin
smgvbest
Posts: 6
Joined: Mon May 29, 2017 6:11 pm

Re: AllSKY Camera

#3

Post by smgvbest »

ok, so I'll look at continuing down that road.
any overlays would have to be post processed then. ie overlaid after save from the sound of it.
i did see that weather display which I use for my weather station has extensive webcam support which is a quick solution but not for me the best solution
smgvbest
Posts: 6
Joined: Mon May 29, 2017 6:11 pm

Re: AllSKY Camera

#4

Post by smgvbest »

ok cool, did some quick playing around and added an lib externally really easy

>>> import sys
>>> for line in sys.path: print line
...
.
C:\Program Files (x86)\SharpCap 3.0\Lib
C:\Program Files (x86)\SharpCap 3.0
C:\Program Files (x86)\SharpCap 3.0\DLLs
C:\Program Files (x86)\SharpCap 3.0\PythonLib.zip
C:\Program Files (x86)\SharpCap 3.0\PythonLib.zip\site-packages
>>>

So C:\Program Files (x86)\SharpCap 3.0\Lib is a library path and one that does not exist yet so a simple mkdir Lib fixed that then I added Pyro4 to that Lib and imported it and did a simple config dump

>>> import Pyro4
>>> print(Pyro4.config.dump())
Pyro version: 4.60
Loaded from: C:\Program Files (x86)\SharpCap 3.0\Lib\Pyro4
Python version: IronPython 2.7.6 (cli, nt)
Protocol version: 48
Currently active configuration settings:
AUTOPROXY = True
BROADCAST_ADDRS = <broadcast>, 0.0.0.0
COMMTIMEOUT = 0.0
COMPRESSION = False
DETAILED_TRACEBACK = False
DILL_PROTOCOL_VERSION = -1
FLAME_ENABLED = False
HOST = localhost
ITER_STREAMING = True
ITER_STREAM_LIFETIME = 0.0
ITER_STREAM_LINGER = 30.0
JSON_MODULE = json
LOGFILE = None
LOGLEVEL = None
LOGWIRE = False
MAX_MESSAGE_SIZE = 0
MAX_RETRIES = 0
METADATA = True
NATHOST = None
NATPORT = 0
NS_AUTOCLEAN = 0.0
NS_BCHOST = None
NS_BCPORT = 9091
NS_HOST = localhost
NS_PORT = 9090
ONEWAY_THREADED = True
PICKLE_PROTOCOL_VERSION = 2
POLLTIMEOUT = 2.0
PREFER_IP_VERSION = 4
REQUIRE_EXPOSE = True
SERIALIZER = serpent
SERIALIZERS_ACCEPTED = set(['serpent', 'marshal', 'json'])
SERVERTYPE = thread
SOCK_NODELAY = False
SOCK_REUSE = True
THREADPOOL_SIZE = 40
THREADPOOL_SIZE_MIN = 4
USE_MSG_WAITALL = False

So this is good, very easy to extend python here. just remember ironpython doesn't work with pyc files as they are not .net compatible if I understand the reasoning
frankieusn
Posts: 18
Joined: Fri Dec 22, 2017 9:30 pm

Re: AllSKY Camera

#5

Post by frankieusn »

Has anyone made progress with this?
michaelmorris
Posts: 2
Joined: Wed Jan 02, 2019 1:00 pm

Re: AllSKY Camera

#6

Post by michaelmorris »

I too would love to see an All Sky camera function in SharpCap. All sky cameras are becoming increasingly popular amongst amateur astronomers, but there is only one serious piece of software that addresses this function - Allskeye.
However, whilst Allskeye is very feature rich, it is overly complex and really isn't very stable. For me, SharpCap has proven to be a very stable platform - essential for a camera that is left running 24/7. As far as I can see, it only only needs a few extra functions to turn SharpCap into great software for running an ASC.
1- automatic start/finish image capture based on user defined interval/before local sunset/sunrise
2 - automatic production of a video of the previous night's images.
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Re: AllSKY Camera

#7

Post by admin »

Hi,

Right now it should be possible to achieve the timing functionality (i.e. start before sunset stop after sunrise) using the Python scripting that is built into SharpCap. In the next major version there will also be a sequencing engine that will allow you to set up a command sequence such as wait until 4:17 PM, then capture images continuously, then wait until 8:13 AM then stop capturing. However this will not have built-in calculator functionality initially so won't quite fulfil the target of being able to calculate sunrise and sunset times.

As for the requirement of creating an output video file – why not just capture into AVI or SER format straightaway?

Cheers, Robin
michaelmorris
Posts: 2
Joined: Wed Jan 02, 2019 1:00 pm

Re: AllSKY Camera

#8

Post by michaelmorris »

admin wrote: Wed Jan 02, 2019 8:22 pm As for the requirement of creating an output video file – why not just capture into AVI or SER format straightaway?

Cheers, Robin
Ideally, I would want to take 50 second exposures. Can I save this as an avi file?
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Re: AllSKY Camera

#9

Post by admin »

Hi,

yes you can save any exposure length you want to an AVI or SER file – in fact I believe some people leave the cameras and auto exposure setting so that the exposure is varied automatically as the brightness of the sky changes that all can go to 1 of the video file formats. Note that by default SharpCap will save exposures longer than about 5 seconds to a still file format like FITS or PNG, but this can be overridden by setting the output format control to manual and choosing the file format you want.

Cheers, Robin
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