Operating a dome / observatory can involve quite a few pieces of software to tie it all together. With the NexDome, this article and more so in the video, I outline how I run things. In the video I show the results I achieve for both the Crab Nebula and a run on the Cigar Galaxy.
My dome sits about 120 feet from my house/office area in the house. Inside is usually where i control things, especially during the winter. If I need to change equipment beforehand, I’ll usually turn the heater on in the dome and then go outside. It doesn’t take long to warm up. For that I have the heater on its own “circuit” / “remote toggle device”. I did this because when I had the 750/1500 watt heater on the UPS, it would trigger a failure, even at the lower heat setting. So now I have the Digital Loggers Remote Web unit and another one that I found an amazon. For the DL Remote control I can use a web page and for the heater it’s an app on the phone.
Once the hardware is in place or any cover is removed from the scope, i go to the office and remote desktop connect (Windows RDP) to the remote pc as below.
I’ll then go into the Digital Loggers remote web interface and turn off the dehumidifier and turn on the DC power to the Cem120. If heat was running I shut that off from the phone and also make sure in the DL Web area that the lights are off.
Now that the power has been turned on, we are ready to go. (Note, for more details on the ASCOM portion here, you can take a look at my NexDome build log post, in there I go into much greater detail.) First I open the cem120 application and launch the panel and then open ASCOM Device Hub and connect the telescope and dome. Then its time to open the shutter in the ASCOM device hub (takes about 1 minute). After this I can open NINA (Nighttime Imaging ‘N Astronomy) for DSO imaging and connect all equipment via the Nina equipment area (Its more ideal to use FireCapture or SharpCap for planetary):
Here is the camera being connected under equipment
One nice feature of NINA is that you can launch a separate profile for each telescope configuration, ie: an F7 one or a Hyperstar profile.
In the Plate Solving tab, i have the various plate solvers configured, but my main one is ASTAP. Its very fast to solve compared to the others.
Plate Solving Settings (ASTAP)
Here is a better look at the equipment area and the settings. I’m still working on getting a good auto focus curve. The settings below are different than in the video I did for this, afterwards I made a few changes to try next time.
Equipment Settings
I have various file naming patterns set in the Imaging Settings tab. This makes it easier to see things like star HFR and gain in the file name.
Imaging Settings (for file names)
Of course the main area used in NINA is the Sequences area. Here you can set targets and pull targets from Stellarium using the “GPS” button in the upper right. When I name a sequence, I try to keep the names the same for each target, focal length and filter, then underneath this folder will be various dates for that exact configuration. Its easier to find things later. We can set things like when auto focus should run, the slew to target and plate solve options and other settings. Taking a look at the curve can help to identify when the optimal imaging times are for each object.
Sequences in NINA
Below is a shot of the Cigar Galaxy during a sequence. You can arrange the various info boxes around the image by locking on to the arrows that appear as you drag the windows around. Also, in order for HFR values to appear in the file names you must make sure the star is “turned on” in the mini menu to the upper right of the image.
And that is about it for capturing DSO targets with my NexDome setup + NINA and Stellarium. There are other deeper features in NINA, but for the purposes of this article this was a broad overview. NINA is pretty versatile and I’m still working out getting my auto focus to be a little better each time.
