Wednesday, January 13, 2016

Finally! Observatory can probably be called "operational".

I recently got the observatory running on remote control through wireless connection to the home network.  Not that it was difficult, but just since I finally tried to open a port through Windows firewall to allow remote access since I was blocked from the network by all that protection. 
It's connected though an 802.11AC connection.  I forget the speeds off hand, but somewhere around 400+ Mbs when I have the antenna set right.  That's fast enough for a decent remote desktop connection.
Here is one of the first images taken totally on remote control.  It was about 29 degrees out that night and just miserable outside - but very clear.  I ran out and hooked up the camera, aligned, got calibrated the autoguiding, focused what I needed to focus, then ran back in the house.
It all worked very well!  I did have some minor dome/scope alignment issues, but I'll work on that.  
Here is the Horsehead and Flame nebulas in Orion.  7 images at around 5 minutes each, ISO 800 and a few at 1000, Canon 60DA with CLS filter, imaged through Orion 80ED, guided with Starshoot autoguider on a 50mm finder. 

A little snow, but cleared up nicely after this.
Success! Indoor control of the observatory.

Not a bad image of Horsehead.  Easy to see the darker skies here at Crest!


2 comments:

Jordan said...

That image of Horsehead looks great. Glad to see things are finally coming together! I expect to see great things come out of it.

Unknown said...

Thanks! Despite my decline in processing skills over the last years since I last did this, I think the slightly darker skies here at the new observatory location are helping. It was fairly easy to pull out some details and faint hydrogen clouds around the horse. More to come....one of these days when it clears up again. :-)