Plate Solve in Goto Target/Coordinates not working

[donboy]

Plate fails in the Goto Taget/Coordinates but works all other places.

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Regards

Don

[donboy]

One of my astronomy buddies said that he had the same failed experience but when he changed his exposure to 2sec from 5 minutes using a ASI2600MC and 100gain he had success with 5 different targets. Of course he had to remember to change exposure settings; which is what we're trying to avoid.

Don

[admin]

Hi,

this looks like a side effect of trying to shorten the exposure during the GOTO procedure to avoid it being very slow (waiting for new frames, etc). The code is set up to drop the exposure to 4s and boost the gain to compensate, which should be fine in terms of plate solving, but perhaps not always.

I was hoping to avoid making this something that was an option (it's easy to get too many options), but will probably have to

cheers,

Robin

[donboy]

Plate solve in the Goto Catalog/Coord not working due to the change in exposure setting. The 4 seconds is alright but changing gain to 371 for me was way too much I use the ASI2600 and 4 sec works just fine at 100gain for plate solving. It would be nice if you allowed one to select their own exposure for the Goto Catalog/Coord. The operator knows what exposure works with their imaging gain for plate solving.

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Don

[ScopesNC]

I would have to agree ,that allowing the operator to select their own gain would be a much better option. Each person would know what setting for their set up works best. As an example 4 seconds is working for me but with a much lower gain of 100. It may not be perfect but does tend to work most the time. In my case and with my set up.

[admin]

Hi,

thanks, that's good feedback. It would be interesting to know what gain/exposure you start out at that gets changed to 4s/370 gain. The current code tries to keep the image brightness the same by boosting the gain as much as it drops the exposure, but that is probably a mistake as a dimmer image should work for plate solving even if it is not enough to see galaxies/nebulosity.

In the latest update (yesterday's version) there is an option to disable the exposure drop/gain boost, but I will take this idea on board for next week's update.

cheers,

Robin

[ScopesNC]

This for my own curiosity and might be a a silly question ,but I'll ask anyway.
Does the zoom in / out function have anything to do with plate solving? I noticed last night my go to plate solves failed 4 times in a row and I was zoomed in about 25% each time. When I set the zoom to auto they worked 5 times with one meridian flip failure. My sync recenter button for mount control seems to always work no matter which way I have it set. While I have my doubts it has anything to do with how the plate solve works, I have to ask. Does the zoom affect or could it affect how the go to plate solve works?

[admin]

Hi,

no, the zoom does not affect plate solving at all, just the view of the image shown on screen. The plate solving program gets sent a saved copy of the image which is unaffected by the zoom setting.

I suppose there could be an indirect effect - if you adjust the gain/exposure differently because you are zoomed in then that would change the actual image itself and therefore affect the plate solving. If you leave the camera settings alone while changing zoom there will be no effect.

cheers,

Robin

[Oberon510]

For what it is worth my process is to set the exposure/gain/brightness for the target I am going to before I do the goto. With galaxies I need to have ~30s exposures so a 4s/high gain would not work for those situations.

I agree with the others to let us determine the correct exposure settings before the goto.

Thanks Robin and enjoying the beta cycle (more engaged with features then I have ever been),
Ken

PS -any idea when the beta will come to an end. It seems all the new features keep me using 4.1 so will be glad when it is in production.

[admin]

Hi,

first the easy question - when will the beta finish... I am aiming for 'summer', so most likely around July sometime. However, I would prefer to carry on longer with the beta to get things more stable if necessary rather than rush something out.

Thanks for the further feedback on the plate solving/goto settings. I am still trying to work out the best approach here - ideally I want it to work automatically for as many people as possible, with flexibility for people who want to customize.

During the goto procedure, ideally the things I want to achieve are

* Shorter exposures so that the procedure is faster and less time is wasted waiting for a long frame to finish when the mount has settled, etc
* Plate solving should still work
* Image brightness should be maintained (but a noisier image is acceptable subject to plate solving still working). This will allow the target to be seen

I have been wondering if the issues with plate solving on the shorter high gain exposures are linked to perhaps having a lower 'sigma' setting in the plate solving options. This could lead to noise being detected incorrectly as stars once the gain is turned up.

cheers,

Robin