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Post by davy on Jul 3, 2017 7:25:00 GMT
I joined the arduino site and sent the chap a message saying I was intrested in the concept and put our forum link in,,i don't know if the chap still visits that site.. ive been intrested in doing arduino for a while but never saw something I wanted to do.. I ordered a arduino uno r3 for £5.69 ouch ,,the 1 sheed android version is £63,,, skip that I thought,, need to look into other versions available and do more research priced the rest of the kit up and the full kit made would come in at about £90 if the module that interfaces with the android phone was cheaper this would be a very cheap bit of kit..to experiment on..once you have all the controller done I believe with a bit of tinkering you could have a really nice tool for astronomy Ouch the 1sheeld is pricy. But is has a hell of a lot of stuff, and the routines are already done to put on the phone. And the phone stuff is the harder bit. So if you weren't going with the 1sheeld then as you have done, think of another way of inputting xyz co-ordinates to control the pan/tilt. One simple way would be a joystick - they have standard interfacing to arduino. And there's other options like the gyroscope sensor. They are not massively accurate, but should be OK. I fiddled with a gyro on my first scope (a 5" F5 newt) and it was nearly accurate enough - so it should be fine when using a camera at much shorter focal lengths Hi Chris did you not see the new link I put up,,there is an app for it,,check my posts,,new one is very cheap to build
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Post by davy on Jul 3, 2017 7:27:43 GMT
Hi John What DSLR are you using that has WiFi,, I had looked at the WiFi cards for the canon cameras I have davy, Quite a few of the recent Canons have wifi connections which allow full LiveView as well as full camera control from either a PC or tablet or iPad type device. The cheapest is (I think) the 750D. Then prices jumped to the 6D (I think it was). And all the expensive full frame 35mm sensored ones have it too. I looked at the 750 and 6D a couple of years back, but ended up buying a 700D. At the time I was thinking "Nah, I don't need any fancy WiFi BS"! LOL! Wish I had! Also, the wifi memory cards (as far as I know) only allow the images to transfer to your PC or smart device. It's one-way so you can't control the camera from the PC or smart device, only receive the images. I've got one in my Nikon J2 which I've played with for astro stuff. Cheers Howie Yeah I saw that with the WiFi cards,so I never went with that idea,,but I didn't know you could get full control on the 750d , cheers
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Post by Dragon Man on Jul 3, 2017 9:15:51 GMT
Google Sky works by a similar idea of the accelerometers in the phone. Just need the same program able to drive the mount. But without the Google Sky images, just what your camera sees. It only needs the accelerometer sensors working. If you know what I mean
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Post by davy on Jul 3, 2017 9:22:46 GMT
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Post by Dragon Man on Jul 3, 2017 9:28:22 GMT
Davy, will it drive a mount? or just that little Alt/Az thing they show? Will the camera view show on the phone?
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Post by davy on Jul 3, 2017 10:08:52 GMT
Davy, will it drive a mount? or just that little Alt/Az thing they show? Will the camera view show on the phone? I used an app on an android tablet to use a webcam via micro usb ,, and it worked,, So if we can find a decent camera that could wireless connect it would be good. I found heavy duty servos on eBay so if they would drive a pan and tilt with a DSLR bingo nice easy job If not we would need to go with stepper motors and then add a stepper motor drive board you can get precise movement
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Post by davy on Jul 3, 2017 16:56:29 GMT
Davy, will it drive a mount? or just that little Alt/Az thing they show? Will the camera view show on the phone? I'm looking to make a bigger pan and tilt as my tester project,, Would be nice to make an alt ,az mount to hold a small scope and use stepper motors and do a different type of control, Like a Bluetooth joystick to control the mount,and have a set tracking rate, could have it on a wedge as well I suppose. It's one of those projects that has a lot of potential in astronomy. Wonder if you could get it to track meteors ect 😁
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Post by davy on Jul 3, 2017 18:01:02 GMT
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Post by ChrisV on Jul 3, 2017 23:11:29 GMT
A bigger pan tilt sounds good Davy. That one on the video looks too wobbly for astro. Even a wide angle camera.
But even with a bigger one I reckon gears are needed. It helps with power and accuracy. Its starting to look like a new mount project !!!
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Post by davy on Jul 4, 2017 7:30:30 GMT
Totally agree Chris, the pan and tilt in the video is moved by servos and I knew they were too jittery,so I was watching arduino videos on controlling DC motors last night and a chap was using a capacitor on one of his tests.
The other way is the stepper motor route
I've never done anything like this so it's a hit and a miss bit of fun for me. Would be good to buddy up with someone to go through the project.
Google thing with arduino is , it's so adaptable,, Project is smallish but yeah it could quite easily turn into a mount but it's too big a project just now,, if and when this one is done and tested and it's feasible going bigger is an option, would be alt az on a wedge if it went ahead.
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Post by howie1 on Jul 4, 2017 22:24:01 GMT
Just a lateral thought here re the arduino thing.
In effect, the guy in the original arduino camera pan and tilt post was basically inventing a stepper motor and arduino controlled Alt Az mount. We already have those in the astronomy world in the form of many ASCOM controllable Alt Az and EQ mounts which are capable of holding any size of OTA and if given the ASCOM signals can slew to all parts of the sky very accurately.
So, wouldn't it be easier to simply take those same smart device gyro signals which the guy uses, but unlike the guy who takes those signals and sends them to the camera pan tilt mechanism, to instead simply convert them to ASCOM signals?
It would be the same end effect and save investing in a bunch of hardware to reinvent the Alt Az mount. The clever idea the guy had is in the programming bit ... taking the gyro's in the smart device and making a OTA (lens on camera) point wherever he points his head. Duplicate the code which grabs the gyro's signals, but instead convert it to ASCOM and away all us atronomers go ... we already have heaps of mounts which will accept the ASCOM code.
Anyone a programmer?
cheers Howie
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Post by davy on Jul 4, 2017 23:00:15 GMT
Lol,, aye right o.. I done six months of computer hnc about twenty years ago and it would send me into melt down to get back into that,,phew..brings back shivers,,
I would not know where to start Howie,, But I can see where your coming from,,,I fancied giving this a go because the chap made it look easy (,,, famous last words..can see this project coming back to haunt me..) Easy wiring on his design,, and if I wanted to make it more upgradable I can use my auto spark knowledge to do a work around. Speed is the other factor The control side build is straight forward, just the new pan and tilt to work out and have a good idea in my head,,of a design.
If it goes well as a prototype then there are other ideas I have,, but going to stick to just enough to get it working. The mount I just need to make it adaptable to make higher speck.
Lol will end up a good toy for the grandson
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Post by davy on Jul 4, 2017 23:38:53 GMT
Lol,, aye right o.. I done six months of computer hnc about twenty years ago and it would send me into melt down to get back into that,,phew..brings back shivers,, I would not know where to start Howie,, But I can see where your coming from,,,I fancied giving this a go because the chap made it look easy (,,, famous last words..can see this project coming back to haunt me..) Easy wiring on his design,, and if I wanted to make it more upgradable I can use my auto spark knowledge to do a work around. Speed is the other factor The control side build is straight forward, just the new pan and tilt to work out and have a good idea in my head,,of a design. If it goes well as a prototype then there are other ideas I have,, but going to stick to just enough to get it working. The mount I just need to make it adaptable to make higher speck. Lol will end up a good toy for the grandson Oh no,,, I'm turning into my uncle John.. Let's not buy one,, we will make it ourselves aaaaaaaaaaRgh
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Post by Dragon Man on Jul 5, 2017 6:39:22 GMT
Just a lateral thought here re the arduino thing. In effect, the guy in the original arduino camera pan and tilt post was basically inventing a stepper motor and arduino controlled Alt Az mount. We already have those in the astronomy world in the form of many ASCOM controllable Alt Az and EQ mounts which are capable of holding any size of OTA and if given the ASCOM signals can slew to all parts of the sky very accurately. So, wouldn't it be easier to simply take those same smart device gyro signals which the guy uses, but unlike the guy who takes those signals and sends them to the camera pan tilt mechanism, to instead simply convert them to ASCOM signals? It would be the same end effect and save investing in a bunch of hardware to reinvent the Alt Az mount. The clever idea the guy had is in the programming bit ... taking the gyro's in the smart device and making a OTA (lens on camera) point wherever he points his head. Duplicate the code which grabs the gyro's signals, but instead convert it to ASCOM and away all us atronomers go ... we already have heaps of mounts which will accept the ASCOM code. Anyone a programmer? cheers Howie That's exactly what I meant Howie. Move your head around wearing VR Goggles and it moves the mount, and the camera shows what it sees on the phone inside the VR goggles. It would need a 5 second retarded slew motion though to stop it moving with every little head movement. By having a retarded slew it will allow the camera to get a few seconds exposure before any head movement moves it again. Impossible to keep your head absolutely still. Have a voice command to turn Google Sky map on and off so you can find what you want to see, then say 'Map Off' and the map dissapears leaving the real view through the camera and scope. If this idea is made it would sell faster than hotcakes! Turn the mount on, put on VR goggles, and look around the sky through a telescope. WOW!!!!! Telescopic eyes!
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Post by davy on Jul 5, 2017 7:17:35 GMT
Yip you have hit the mark ken,, this would be the goal.. I'm hoping as you said the code can be manipulated to do this,as we've all seen it's very twitchy on the video. Great news Chris I will put up my parts to let you see what I've bought,, all bought via eBay
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Post by ChrisV on Jul 5, 2017 8:22:27 GMT
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Post by howie1 on Jul 5, 2017 9:14:29 GMT
Here's an interesting article .... maybe a guy to get hold of davy (?)... www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2400958/Hacker-pilots-drone-Google-Glass-using-just-head-movements.htmlThe article says he put code up on a blog somewhere. Also, this software/app might be of interest .... kinovr.kinoni.com/Its all becoming kinda interesting for my setup as is it. The style I shoot pretty much means setting the toaster stretch and color sliders alone for the whole evening. Set and forget kind of thing. So I could have a IR remote trigger the canon camera ($10 for the remote on eBay), which sends the shot to Toaster which automatically in 15 seconds or so presents it in the Toaster viewer window. If I had that kinovr app running on the toaster full screen mode then it would split it into two and send that image wifi to my iPhone running the kinovr iphone app, and then having the iphone in the google cardboard or google daydream VR headset I'd see the image on VR. Only thing missing is the turn head to make the mount slew. Hence my other posts re programming the head turning bit translated into ASCOM rather than arduino driving. Cheers
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Post by davy on Jul 5, 2017 10:03:02 GMT
Look at this tonight after work,,looks good,,,. I think we have a good plan to make it pretty interesting project
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Post by ChrisV on Jul 5, 2017 10:27:16 GMT
Put up lots of details of how you make the pan/tilt gimbal. You've got me interested Davy, I might have a go making something similar but I'm a complete bunny making mechanical stuff (I should have paid attention at metalwork when I was at school - but hey it was the 70s).
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Post by davy on Jul 5, 2017 10:30:39 GMT
Ok been a diddy, Let's look at adding motors to an undriven eq or az mount,, I have a manual az mount.
Let's just make it a big new bit of kit and implement the ideas we have so far
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