Phd2 telescope guiding software

The st4 cable between the camera and mount is not used at all and can be removed. I know there are two ways of guiding software or st4 cable and guide ports on the guide camera and mount. The best starting point is to set your guiding rate to 1x, which means that when guiding east the mount will stop completely, and when guiding west it will move at 2x sidereal rate. Its a rather rough outline of the software, as i only a few basic features on a regular basis. Phd2 has been fully vetted as the best all around auto guiding software. By writing the code to use the ascom standard for telescopes, i didnt lock myself into a particular mount or telescope. If youre running an orion autoguider and youve not upgraded their drivers for. Hello, i am posting about the protocol between sgp and phd2. I wrote the software to control my 10 lx200, but made a conscious decision to try and make the software as generic as possible. Enable ascom pulse guiding and verify that sideofpier is pointing ascom once you have connected the mount and before you calibrate or guide in phd2, update your eqascom settings. The lpig series cameras work in a number of freeware autoguiding programs, such as phd2 guiding available from. In addition to phd2, astropibox integrates in its current version the open source software products kstars and ccdciel which can be easily launched from an intuitive gui. The software is available for windows, linux and mac operating systems.

Either way, the phd2 guide logs are the best source of data, and using them is far better than trying to look at the guiding graph in realtime. Tweaking phd2 is easily done and the settings vary from each equipment setup. Following is a description of the problems that may affect guiding operations slewing and guiding commands. Page 1 of 2 autoguiding alternatives to phd2 posted in beginning and intermediate imaging. I got myself a ftdi eqdir cable to do some pulse guiding with ascom. Question about phd2 guiding with celestron avx mount. Beginners guide to setting up your losmandy equatorial. In a session sgp seemed to go through the perpetual starting autoguider no matter what i did. That said, phd2 is the new king of guiding software and makes the process as easy as it can be. Several people were complaining that their canon and nikons for byen cameras werent connecting, that phd2 guiding wouldnt work, and that the orion star shoot autoguider wasnt being recognized at all after the operating system was upgraded to windows 10. That program is the brains of the outfit, and that is what phd2 is, autoguiding software. Phd2 is telescope guiding software that simplifies the process of tracking a guide star, letting you concentrate on other aspects of deepsky imaging or.

Phd2 will also get pointing information declination from the ascom driver. The last time i used guiding was with windows software and phd with oag. Periodic error correction pec and autoguiding in telescope. Beyond its stellar map features, kstars is also equipped to drive a telescope in a goto mode through the indi library installed on the raspberry pi. Sophisticated guiding and analysis tools for experienced users extensive support for commonlyused equipment. Best autoguider and guide scope for 2020 astronomy online. The gt71 was fitted with a wo field flattener 6a2 creating an effective focal length of 336 mm, with a focal ratio of f4. This is not a tutorial on how to use phd2 as there are plenty of. The orion starshoot is an easytouse, affordable autoguider for longexposure astrophotography. Now i would like to use longer exposures and not get star trailing. We also welcome ideas and suggestions for improving phd2, and discussions about phd2 development. You can barely see the crab nebula drifting through the frame because i didnt align my mount well. The guide scope is a small telescope, sometimes as small as a finder, which the camera uses to see the stars. Phd2 users can post questions here about troubleshooting guiding problems or problems with phd2.

Phd guiding basic use and troubleshooting blackwater skies. Open phd guiding welcome to the discussion forum for open phd guiding phd2, a telescope guiding software application for astrophotographers. Guiding will take declination and side of pier into account. The meade skycapture software does not contain autoguiding software. Phd guiding phd guiding is designed to be push here dummy simple, yet provide powerful, intelligent autoguiding of your telescope for both pcs and macs. In this configuration guide pulse signals are sent through ascom. Phd guiding basic use and troubleshooting imaging tips. Connected to a secondary telescope in parallel to the main one, or to an offaxis guider. Phd2 orion star shoot autoguider windows 10 otelescope. By using autoguiding software such as phd2 guiding, our computer can communicate with the telescope mount. Plug it into an autoguider port on your mount and let it do the work for you. Analyzing phd2 guiding results a basic tutorial introduction. Phd2 is an open source guiding program for beginners or advanced users. This tutorial will help you get phd2 setup and running with the default settings.

My autoguiding graph in phd2 using the skywatcher eq6r pro telescope mount phd2 guiding settings for astrophotography. Php guiding is a handy and reliable autoguiding application worth having when you want to calibrate your telescope through a special camera. This is accomplished by using a great piece of free software developed by stark labs. In this tutorial we will explain how to set up this software using an atik titan camera but the same steps can also be made using other autoguiding cameras. Phd2 is guiding software inspired by stark labs phd guiding. Phd guiding, free software for autoguide astronomy academy. Acquisition software generally have to handle highend cameras, dlsr and. This is an important aspect of deep sky astrophotography because it allows you to focus on capturing successful long exposure images and get the most out of your telescope mount. The best equatorial mount will have some mechanical imperfections, resulting in tracking errors that lead to slightly elongated star images. He wrote scripts to automate the software so he could just use the touchscreen, without a mouse or keyboard. This software can also do other useful astrophotography tasks such as drift alignment, which is helpful for those who cannot use polaris for polar alignment. To keep my telescope fixed on an object during long exposures, i needed an autoguider.

A second, cheap telescope or finder and a cheapish guide camera is mounted piggyback on top of the imaging scope, or sidebyside using a dual bar. To use the the lpig or lpig advanced camera as an autoguiders, you must install the lpig ascom driver. Imaging deep sky objects with a complete astrophotography setup astrophotography tutorial duration. The imaging camera used was the one shot colour cmos asi 294 mc pro. I could show what my settings are in the phd2 autoguiding software. Celestron handcontrollers made after 42016 are reported to have a builtin usb to serial adapter. Phd guiding is a free software among the most used for autoguiding since its very easy to use. Phd2 is a telescope autoguiding software that automates the process of tracking a guide star. Phd2 is an open source guiding program for beginners or advanced. How to choose the right guiding setup there are three basic methods of guiding with various pros and cons. I also used the video for windows interface for camera control. Turn a raspberry pi into an astrophotography autoguider. Phd2 works well with eqascom, but youll need to ensure you have the proper eqascom settings.

Astrophotography autoguider project showcase the magpi. Phd guiding is designed to be push here dummy simple, yet provide powerful, intelligent autoguiding of your telescope for both pcs and macs. Lots of devices are required in a setup, and many of each type exist. In summary, if the mount is well made, pec reduces the strain on the autoguiding and ultimately produces better snr, but if the pe is unpredictable, or the guiding system poor flexure, seeing etc then the two will fight and cause a problem. Easytouse, push here dummy guiding for beginners sophisticated guiding and analysis tools for experienced usersu0003 extensive support for commonlyused equipment. I tried having sgp start phd2 from scratch, start phd2 and then begin the sequence so at least phd2 was active, and all became perpetual so i reset sgp to think no guiding is involved and launched phd2. Phd stands for push here dummy, and it very easy to use, once everything is set up properly. This program can be used in conjunction with many atrophotography programs, such as sequence generator pro.

Autoguiding a telescope for deep sky astrophotography. Using ssag with phd2 guiding software phd2 guiding software should have already been installed prior to installation of the driver. A guide camera is used to watch that guide star, but most guide cameras cannot guide the telescope mount without the help of a laptop computer and an autoguiding program. Phd2 for mac, phd2 is telescope guiding software for mac. Phd2 is telescope guiding software that simplifies the process of tracking a guide star, letting you concentrate on other aspects of deepsky imaging or spectroscopy. We tested the performance of ph2 guiding with the star adventurer using a william optics gt71 apo refractor.

Question about phd2 guiding with celestron avx mount my personal opinion is that if you dont use your pc to control the mount already, the easiest way to guide is to connect the st4 cable looks like a phone cable from the camera to the autoguide port on the mount. This will allow the starshoot autoguider to be selected from the camera drop down menu within phd2 software. I said this article was mainly aimed at people experienced with phd, but that doesnt mean you shouldnt start out with phd2 instead of phd. I have been using the synguider 2 for autoguiding but since the st7e has a second ccd sensor for autoguiding, i. Astronomy tutorial off axis auto guiding on comets, page i. But i also hate having a laptop in the field, which is required for most autoguiding. I am quite new to guiding but i have been doing some guiding with phd2 using the on camera st4 cable, it was ok but not great.

I just recently purchased an sbig st7e camera and im looking for autoguiding software other than phd2 since i have never gotten it to work. Phd2 guiding is the successor to phd guiding, which i used for several years before upgrading to phd2. Its best to have the software automatically choose a guide star by press altoptions or choose autoselect star from the tools menu. I dont think i will need very accurate guiding with the widefield rig. There are nearly as many different astronomical setups as astronomers. The latter is useful as a quick check on how things are going, but any serious problem diagnosis or tuning requires a longer time window than what is available in the realtime graph. Losmandy equatorial mount for use with phd2 guiding.

Ive received a lot of requests from people that have asked if i could show what my settings are in the phd2 autoguiding software. Dylan odonnell gives an overview of phd2 guiding software, what it is and how to use it properly. Celestron mount connection openphdguidingphd2 wiki github. Just select your star and hit phd guide and let the software take care of it. The builtin help file inside phd2 contains a wealth of information, or you can download the instruction manual here. This is an important aspect of deep sky astrophotography because. This is an important aspect of deep sky astrophotography because it allows you to focus on capturing successful long exposure images and get the most out of your telescope mount phd2 is easy enough for a beginner to use right away, yet also.

It comes with the software and cables needed to work right out of the box. If the socket on the handcontroller is a miniusb instead of an rj11 telephone type, you can run a usb cable directly from the computer to the hand. With this single camera, you can perform any type of celestial imaging you wish. Phd2 is free of cost, open source, and communitydeveloped and supported. Often, new features or bug fixes can be found in the prerelease section. East and west movement commands reversed in at least one firmware version 1. Joe made extensive use of general purpose opensource software such as raspbian stretch and git, plus astronomyspecific opensource tools libnova, indi, and phd2 telescope guiding software. Our antivirus scan shows that this download is malware free.