You take one picture, let sharpcap analyze it, rotate your mount by about 90 degrees about the ra axis and take the second picture. Then they point to the sun and use the standard image drift method to make fine adjustments to align the polar axis as follows. Polar alignment tool video tutorials ken has put together some video tutorials on the new phd2 polar alignment tools. Polar scope align will calculate the position of polaris or octantis in your polar scope reticle for your location using your phones gps, allowing a quick and accurate polar alignment. A wide range of features makes sharpcap suitable for many types of astroimaging including planetary, lunar, solar, deep sky and eaa electronically assisted astronomy. The p1 performs a precise polar alignment in just a few minutes time, with an accuracy of up to 30 arc seconds. One of the coolest polar alignment methods to come along is the freeware polealignmax by larry weber and steve brady. Polar alignment sharpcap lunar, planetary, solar and deep.
This is a great utility that will help you with your polar alignment on your equatorial mount. Polar scope align pro for ios free download and software. When used with a single raonly axis mount, good polar alignment will minimize drift in the dec axis, therefore maximizing the performance of your mount. Themos has been kind enough to help with testing and suggestions during. Features include one touch night vision touch the heading of. Simply attach the p1 to your mount with the included adapter, load up the software on your computer, and follow the easy step by step directions to.
Phd2 is guiding software inspired by stark labs phd guiding. It includes basic tools for leveling your equatorial mount spirit. A precise telescope mount polar alignment using alignmaster software. Easy polar alignment for astrophotography step by step. The polemaster uses a sensitive camera to take a picture of sky around polaris. For instructions on polar alignment using drift align in the southern hemisphere, visit how to polar align easily in phd2 drift align.
Polar drift alignment pda and static polar alignment spa they can be viewed here. A polar scope makes aligning the polar axis of this mount with the north celestial pole much easier. Accounts for refraction to produce a more accurate result than other drift alignment methods. The drift align method can be used in either hemisphere by using free software called phd2 guiding.
The list includes polealignmax, align master, eq align, wcs, pempro, polar finder, star targ 2. Polar scope align for ios free download and software. The skywatcher heq5 in this example features a builtin polar scope with an illuminated reticle. Astromate is a project for automating repeating astrophotography tasks, such as equatorial mount polar alignment and target centering, by integrating existing tools and especially plate solving to the. You can easily achieve alignment accuracy better than 1 arcmin in 5 minutes of time. Polar alignment information southern hemisphere roger. Polar alignment software software software for people. Avoid camera use and program the precise orientation and parameters you need, then monitor the process and the result to verify the correctness of the results. Polar alignment wizard leads you through the steps to achieve the best possible polar alignment quickly and painlessly. Provides an alignment layer driver to sit above indi telescope drivers. Celestrons allstar polar alignment feature can help with this. Tpoint by software bisque, used in conjunction with thesky tpoint will provide polar alignment data which can be used to polar align the mount. Polarscope is a polarscope alignment app that runs on your windows desktop, tablet and phone.
Polar alignment freeware for free downloads at winsite. Adjust the mount using the alt and az bolts so that the pole star is in the little circle. Parot is software for ultrafast and precise polar alignment of equatorial mounts. Oct position calculation, including atmospheric refraction, stellar aberration, nutation. Starshoot p1 polar alignment camera w atlasprosvp adapter. Oh, and i would have liked a little better accuracy than what aspa produces, especially after only one iteration. Octantis in your polar scope reticle for your location using your. Obviously there could be others that i am not aware of.
Since using the polar drift alignment tool in phd2, the overall time for my alignment procedure has increased, but the accuracy. Product support starshoot p1 polar alignment camera with. Astromate x64 is a project for automating repeating astrophotography tasks, such as equatorial mount polar alignment and target centering, by integrating existing tools and especially plate solving to the ascom telescope control interface. Here are a few apps that can give polaris orientation in the fov of a polar scope depending on the observers position and local time. How do you polar align using an altaz mount with a wedge. Automate the process of goto mount aligning to the polar axis. The best program for polar alignment mounts cloudy nights. Set up and align the goto system in whatever way the mount requires.
Because the camera is much more sensitive than your eyes, it can see the faint stars that surround the north star, providing a more exact location of. Qhy polemaster electronic polar scope high point scientific. The method how we achieve it is called polar alignment and it starts with a rough alignment of the ra axis. The polaraligner is a simple astronomical application to help you to align your mount easily. The equipment used in this example a skywatcher heq5. The method has some hefty prerequisites in that it works with a ccd camera, either ccdsoft or maxim dl, and either thesky or pinpoint for plate solving some versions of. Features include one touch night vision touch the heading of any page to toggle night vision on and off.
By recognizing the stars in each of the pictures, sharpcap can work out two things. Using sharpcap for polar alignment revised youtube. I intend to include more detailed comparisons, but in the short term, i hope that the following is useful. The following is a list of all the polar alignment software that i am aware of. Feel free to contact the developer with any questions, feature requests, extra reticle requests and any problems you have with the app. The software seeks to assist owners of german equatorial mounts with polar alignment. Polar align with polar finder scopes electronic polar. Using goto for polar alignment without software feature. Please note that the only inapp purchases available are tips. Ken has put together some video tutorials on the new phd2 polar alignment tools. Move the mount in dec so the polar scope can be used and in ra so the pole star marker corresponds to the same position as shown in the polarscope view window.
The best aid for this is to use a polar finder scope with a reticle. Sharpcap is an easytouse and powerful astronomy camera capture tool. Survey of polar alignment methods celestial wonders. You also need to set the rotation center of the mount, which can be calibrated after clicking the clear rotation center button onscreen. Qhy polemaster polar alignment camera free shipping opt. Phd2 is free of cost, open source, and communitydeveloped and supported. Allstar is our exclusive, innovative polar alignment procedureavailable on select celestron computerized telescopesthat allows users to choose any bright star not just one near the ncp while the software calculates and assists with polar alignment. Starshoot p1 polar alignment camera with sirius adapter. Octantis in your polar scope reticle for your location using your phones gps, allowing a quick and accurate polar alignment. Polar alignment free polar alignment software download. Compass alignment is useful for wide field photography and initial alignment of telescopes to then refine the alignment with a more detailed approach later. In this video, i show how i made adjustments on german equatorial mounts using latitude knobs, right and left azimuth knobs to get polar alignment using. Infact polarfinder using the gps location calculate the sideral local time. The program is based on the rotation method of polar alignment.
In fact, you dont really need software polar alignment features in your scope. Roughly polar align the wedge using the hex bolts to be within 5 degrees. With its help im able align my eq6 mount with subarcminute accuracy in five minutes of time. Sophisticated guiding and analysis tools for experienced users extensive support for commonlyused equipment. Celestron cgem, skymaster pro, altas eqg, atlas pro, neq6, exos2gt, and the eq6azeq6. Youll need to enter in your latlong coordinates of your location, which you can easily find online or using the gps on your phone. Allstar is an innovative polar alignment procedureavailable on selected celestron computerised telescopesthat allows any bright star not just a one near the ncp to be chosen while the software calculates and. Polar alignment software free download polar alignment top 4 download offers free software downloads for windows, mac, ios and android computers and mobile devices. Our antivirus check shows that this download is safe. Polar alignment features uses electronic drift alignment is considered the most accurate polar alignment method. Polar alignment is the act of aligning the rotational axis of a telescope s equatorial mount or a sundial s gnomon with a celestial pole to parallel earths axis. Also, just in case you are rotating the wrong way, you can correct easily.
Sharpcap lunar, planetary, solar and deep sky imaging. Very popular software for web cam imaging, which i believe can also be used for polar alignment. Page 1 of 3 the best program for polar alignment posted in mounts. Polar connection is a simple fourinarow game played on a polar circular grid instead of the traditional rectangle. It can be used with dedicated astronomy cameras, webcams and usb frame grabbers. Free polar alignment software download polar finderscope by dr. Astrotortilla is a project for automating repeating astrophotography tasks, such as equatorial mount, polar alignment and target centering. Polar alignment sharpcap lunar, planetary, solar and. I always used this to align on my cg5, it is of course only as good as you can copy it. Align your mount using eq north or south align and follow the onscreen instructions on the hand control. 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. A simple polar alignment by software polar scope align pro. Using a compass and knowing the magnetic deviation of your compass from celestial southnorth at your location you can roughly align your polar mount to.
Move the knobs slowly so you can see the change in your eyepiece. The drift align tool in phd2 can be used to quickly obtain a precise polar alignment of. The polar alignment works by analyzing two pictures taken of the area near the pole. The best free webcam astronomy software download version 3.
Ive been googling all evening and lost for a possible solution for tweeking the polar alignment for an observatory based heq5 mounti use the alignment tool in eqmod, which rotates the mount to the ha for polaris, but there are two factors which allow for a near enough rather than a. The time and latitude for calculating sideral local time are read directly from. First, new technologies are emerging, as a result, the equipment is being improved and that, in turn, requires software changes. With the orion starshoot p1 polar alignment camera, you can forget about all of that. All of the telescope mounts on the list above include a polar alignment scope depending on the version you order, with the exception of the celestron cgem. Parot is a program for ultra fast and precise polar alignment of equatorial mounts. The red reticule pattern describe the polaris position like a polar scope.
Polarfinder calculate, just in time, the sideral local medium time and the position of the polaris. Once you are polar aligned, you will only need to perform a onestar alignment a real time saver. The qhy polemaster allows you to obtain a high precision polar alignment up to 30 arcseconds in about two minutes. When astronomical observations or imaging is done using an equatorial telescope mount, the rightascension ra axis should be parallel with the rotation axis of the earth to avoid startrails and errors in guiding. The idea was inspired by the photopolaralign application created by themos tsikas. It works in both the northern and southern hemispheres, and comes with a selection of popular polarscope reticles.
Drift alignment software for german equatorial mounts. The position of polaris depends by the latitude and the sideral local time. For my mainly short focal length, short sub imaging, i can get away with less than perfect polar alignment, but it would still be nice to have the option of being able to. The equipment used in this example a skywatcher heq5 german equatorial mount. Secondly, the needs of users are growing, requirements are increasing and the needs are changing for polar alignment software. After calculating sideral local time polarfinder calculate the polaris position. To use the current version of parot, you will need. Polar alignment software free download polar alignment. When doing polar alignment in northern hemisphere, the user should put polaris on the the correct circle corresponding to the present year for better alignment precision. The program takes an image, makes a plate solve and finds the position of the celestial pole in the image. Polar drift alignment pda and static polar alignment spa they can be. Polar cat is a board game based on tic tac toe classic game using polar coordinates. Polar scope align will calculate the position of polaris or.
902 137 292 935 475 185 1294 908 621 1011 312 590 1149 1482 1473 999 446 966 513 295 423 821 1481 1597 342 1164 708 1454 1275 1231 1283 992 1302 704 969 1422