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Post by howie1 on Jul 29, 2017 2:26:59 GMT
As this is a stacking example, I am posting in the (stacking is ok) board of this forum, but I have posted up a second video which doesnt use stacking / is just a single 30 sec iso800 frame, in the (stacking is not ok) board of this forum. So this automated process can do both single shots as well as stacked.
Aim: The aim is to show having fun with stuff which isn't normally used for live EAA. Another tool in the toolkit which may come in handy for anyone using any equipment doing EAA and one day finds some situation where the info in this video springs to mind and may help them out. It shows a fully automated end-to-end EAA process using EOS Utilities and Lightroom 6CC. In that vein of having fun ... they are not faint objects ... M8, M20, M21, but they show what can be done.
This video does not show the actual setup of the automated process ... I shall produce another video which shows that. This video just shows the live in-field capture of of a stack of four 8 sec frames, and the other video on the other (stacking is NOT ok) board will show the live capture of a single frame.
Site:
Field at back of a tennis center with all lights blazing on the 4 courts as they had a social night on (we hid in the shadow of a single story building). Field is half way between Brisbane city and Gold Coast city with that corridor having 2.5 million population. Skyglow in the South (Gold Coast) was almost as bad as the LP coming from the tennis center which was to the North of our setup. Moon was quarter phase about 20 degree's above the Western horizon. On top of that very heavy dew with a puddle of water on the ground which had run off my dew protector "box" which protects my laptop from such bad situations! By midnight it was fog, unfortunately - couldnt see the car parked 10 metres away from us!
Equipment:
8" f/5 Newtonian on HEQ5 PRO mount, unguided.
Canon 700d, unmodded, no filters.
2009 Macbook Pro bootcamped running WIN7, EOS Utilities, DSS_Live, Lightroom 6CC
No darks, bias or flats.
Below is link to a 2min 21 sec live HD desktop capture showing a single 30 second iso800 frame of M8/M20/M21
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Post by ChrisV on Jul 30, 2017 3:41:37 GMT
Interesting I've never tried DSS Live as I'd read that it was clunky and buggy so never bothered.
You mentioned DSS Live is faster than Astrotoaster. Could try that with my big files from the ASI071 - I don't have lightroom so could maybe monitor the single subs with astrotoatser? But do you reckon lightroom also does nicer colour/contrast adjustment than AStrotoaster?
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Post by howie1 on Jul 30, 2017 4:48:06 GMT
Hi Chris, I didn't find that. It's twice as fast stacking compared to Toaster in the limited testing I did. But its still slow compared to SharpCaps stacking algorithm. I can't wait to see SC when the author has added DSLR support!! Will be sweeet.
Timed Tests: Stack of 25 iso6400 four second frames in Toaster - timed from starting intervalometer thru to Toaster 'flickering' as the final "Stacked 25 of 25" image appeared on screen : 17 min 14 sec
Another set of captures 25 iso6400 four sec shots stacked via DSS_Live - time from starting intervalometer (to feed DSS_Live) thru to Toaster flickering/displaying the last stacked image from DSS_Live : 8min 35sec
This was with DSS_Live set to output a stacked image after each and every frame. It can be made faster still if you tell it to only output a stacked image after 2 frames. Or save even more time if set it to output stacked frame every 4 frames. Etc.
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Post by howie1 on Jul 30, 2017 5:17:36 GMT
Hey again Chris ... it can go DSS_Live to Toaster (instead of Lightroom) ... no probs. So this leads to is LR nicer than Toaster? It's the usual thing. Experience, features, cost. LR is daunting when you try to figure out how it works. Once you get that, it's a simple thing to use. I'll put up a vid.
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Post by ChrisV on Jul 30, 2017 5:38:45 GMT
Hmmm. Might give DSSlive a go then. Astrotoaster is excruciatingly slow with my ASI071 (even bin x2).
The last few I've been using sharpcapto stack, save the FITS file into the AT montior, and just doing monitor/single/refresh. Works quite well.
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Post by howie1 on Jul 30, 2017 7:18:43 GMT
SharpCap's going to be faster then DSS_Live Chris. Like I said, can't wait for SC to support DSLR's cos its stacking algorithm is so fast! But, if you want to give DSS_Live a go, I will post a video how to set it up, but I am sure you will be able to figure it out cos it's so similar process to what you've done for SC to single refresh in AT. Prob print the stuff below ... 1. Create a folder called DSS_Monitor 2. Set your camera to save frames into DSS_Monitor. 3. Nav to the DSS folder and in there you will find DSS_Live.exe. Create a shortcut to it so you can easily start it from your desktop. 4. Dble clk DSS_Live and once it opens, there is a hyperlink right up at the top which says ... "Monitoring: [Click here to enter folder to monitor] ... or something like that ... click that hyperlink and tell it to monitor DSS_Monitor which is the folder you created in step 1. 5. Then in DSS_Live, click the right-most TAB called "Settings" and you'll see some parameters to setup. The only ones I changed from the default ones were: "Dont stack until at least ..." I changed that to 1 so it will start to operate as soon as it see's 1 frame from the camera in that monitored folder. Then you'll see "Warn ... don't stack if" and then under that "... Star Count is less than" which I set to 20. Up to you to figure what you want. Then under that is "Options ... Save stacked image to file after every ..." I changed to 1 so it stacked after each and every frame ... Toaster will end up viewing this file as a Single image to display. And under that is the "Output Folder" ... click that hyperlink next to that text and change that to the normal AT folder which you monitor with AT. Now MINIMISE DSS_Live 6. Get into the DSS executables folder and start DSS.exe ... NOTE thats DSS.exe and not DSS_Live.exe I start here! In DSS click on the left hand pane Options > Settings > Stacked Settings. In there click on the tab called Output. In there you'll find a checkbox next to "Output File Name > Autosave.tif/fits" don't have that checked because AT only 'sees' and displays those files when AT is set to Stack. If you have AT in Single mode it will NOT display those Autosave.tif/fits ones. That "name" seems reserved for AT stacking or something. We are going to have AT in Single mode, so we need the output file to be called something else ... so tick the radio button next to <File list name>.tif/fits ... this will make the stacked frame be called similar to a regular frame from the camera. And as it's name is not the autosave one AT will actually see it in the AT monitor folder and display it as a "Single" image. Get what I am saying here? 7. Close DSS 8. You're done! To use just have DSS_Live open/minimsed, AT open, Your camera control software running.
Process ... Ok you are ready to send stacked shots to AT. 1. Set AT to Single mode. 2. In DSS_live click the Monitor button, then the Stack button. Should you have frames in that DSS_Monitor folder already, it will ask you if you want to stack those ones or start a new stack. If its empty it will not give this warning but just start monitoring the empty folder ready to stack images. 3. Start capturing frames with your camera. Each frame will save into DSS_Monitor and get pciked up by DSS_Live to stack. It will output the stacked result in the AT Monitor folder for AT to display is Single mode. Done! Lastly .... Note that in the DSS_Live window there are some interesting tabs ... the Stacked image tab shows you the stacked image developed that far, and displays a small magnification window ... wherever you hove the mouse it shows you in the small mag window a close up of that star or whatever you hovered over. You can see if you have tracking or other errors going on. Plus the Graphs tab shows you a few things including Dx Dy which are how much error it is detecting in the stack as it goes. You have to know your cameras/photos orientation in order to use this ... ie my camera is always sensors biggest dimension at right angles to the focal length / RA axle and the sensors small dimension is in line with the focal length / RA axle. ON that graph i see the Dx varying very small amounts ... which is RA tracking pretty well. But the Dy line is steadily worse ... IE Dec errors because I wasnt polar aligned well and I dont guide!
Cheers Aussie Howie
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Post by howie1 on Jul 30, 2017 15:09:26 GMT
But do you reckon lightroom also does nicer colour/contrast adjustment than AStrotoaster? Here's link to video I just made processing a RAW modded camera image. It'll show you some of the best adjustments I have found so far, and what I think about which is better ... (PS big goof by me calling the Milky Ways dust lane nebulosity! LOL ... heck its 1:19am!! LOL again).
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Post by davy on Jul 30, 2017 19:21:42 GMT
Nice posts and videos,, speed is essential out my neck of the woods,,gets cold in Brigadoon,, more a weather issue with clouds appearing pretty fast ,,be great seeing more of it working,, I use byeos so I wonder if it would have any gain over canon utilities
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