Field Rotation and Fork Mounts

[MunichAtNight]

Hi Robin

Unfortunately, ASCOM does not provide a way for SharpCap to send the message to turn on/off the live derotation function to the Falcon driver, so that must be done in the Falcon window.

I thought like this! That's not a problem for me. It is great that you support directly the Pegasus rotator!

One additional thing I wanted to ask you. I had always a problem to install a camera without the Falcon as well now with Falcon rotator that the orientation of "UP" heading exactly to direction North! Using an AltAZ mount and now with the rotator there are endless possibilities to do it wrong! I was wondering if Sharpcap can give to such a stupid user as am I a hint how much °- degrees, clockwise or counter-clockwise I have to turn the camera that in the end for example the long and upper edge of the camera sensor is exactly heading to North?

When thinking about this challenge, I had the idea that this should be a question of plate solving! Do you think you can add a functionality like it is now already realized in Sharpcap the menu item or button "Plate solve and centre!" with an additional button "Plate solve, centre and make direction North!"?

In case you need somebody for testing, I would be more than happy to help!

Servus - MunichAtNight - Ewald

[admin]

Hi Ewald,

I can see what you are getting at. RIght now though this should be fairly easy to do manually - just run a 'Plate Solve and Sync' or 'Plate Solve Only' command and when it completes successfully you will see in at the end of the notification bar something like

"Up is 27 degrees E of N"

That means that you either need to rotate by -27 or +27 degrees (depending on the orientation of the field rotator, diagonals/secondaries, etc being present or not). Test once and you will quickly work out which way to go and from then on it should be a very quick action.

cheers,

Robin

[StarManFlorida]

Does SharpCap support Optec's "Pyxis LE Rotator" ? I use the rotator on my Celestron Evolution mounting.

[admin]

Hi,

SharpCap should support any rotator that has an ASCOM driver (that's how SharpCap communicates with the rotator).

cheers,

Robin

[MunichAtNight]

Hello Robin!

I can see what you are getting at. RIght now though this should be fairly easy to do manually - just run a 'Plate Solve and Sync' or 'Plate Solve Only' command and when it completes successfully you will see in at the end of the notification bar something like

"Up is 27 degrees E of N"

Great! Thank you! It works fantastic!

Here some screenshots for evryone who want to know how it looks like!

rotator-02-A.jpg (211.39 KiB) Viewed 1592 times

rotator-01.jpg (163.74 KiB) Viewed 1592 times

rotator-06.jpg (182.68 KiB) Viewed 1592 times

I used the Pegasus Falcon software to correct north orientation, which runs in the background. But there is a control section inside Sharpcap, too which can be used to do the same rotation of field.

sharcap-rotator-02-A.jpg (157.61 KiB) Viewed 1592 times

Robin! As always your software does a wonderful job and is more than helpful!

From now on, I am able to do perfect north orientated EAA images. This is a functionality I always looked for !

MunichAtNight - Ewald

[admin]

Hi Ewald,

glad it worked out nicely for you - any particular reason that you want North pointing upwards? I tend to tweak the orientation for each target to get it to fit nicely inside the camera field of view.

cheers,

Robin

[MunichAtNight]

Hi Robin!

any particular reason that you want North pointing upwards? I tend to tweak the orientation for each target to get it to fit nicely inside the camera field of view.

Same with me! I like to position the target nicely inside camera FOV, too. But sometimes it helps when you know where is North when you want for example to compare the own photo with the view in Stellarium.

And as I am struggeling with, I call it field shift, I wonder if I can find the reason why my "derotated" FOV moves out of the camera sensor.I hope to find an explanation by knowing how the sensor was exactly positioned.

Thank you for your support and all your valuable help!

Ewald