The StellarMate Plus Manual
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field, feeding that image to astrometry.net solver, and getting the central
coordinates (RA, DEC) of the image. The solver essentially performs a pattern
recognition against a catalog of millions of stars. Once the coordinates are
determined, the true pointing of the telescope is known.
Often, there is a discrepancy between where the telescope thinks it is looking at
and where it is truly pointing. The magnitude of this discrepancy can range from a
few arcminutes to a couple of degrees. Ekos can then correct the discrepancy by
either syncing to the new coordinates, or by slewing the mount to the desired
target originally requested.
Furthermore, Ekos provides two tools to measure and correct polar alignment
errors:
· Polar Alignment Assistant Tool: A very easy tool to measure and correct polar
errors. It takes three images near the celestial pole (Close to Polaris for
Northern Hemisphere) and then calculates the offset between the mount axis
and polar axis.
· Legacy Polar Alignment Tool: If Polaris is not visible, this tool can be used to
measure and correct polar alignment errors. It captures a couple of images
near the meridian and east/west of the meridian. This will enable the user to
adjust the mount until the misalignment is minimized.
At a minimum, you need a CCD/Webcam and a telescope that supports Slew &
Sync commands. Most popular commercial telescope nowadays support such
commands.
For the Ekos Alignment Module to work, you have an option of either utilizing the
built-in StellarSolver, or remote solver
· StellarSolver: The default solver in Ekos. StellarSolver support native plate-
solving based on astrometry.net. Furthermore, it supports online (internet-
based) astrometry.net solving, ASTAP, and local offline astrometry.net solver
(Available for MacOS & Linux). The built-in solver is fast and supported across
all platforms.
· Remote Solver: The remote solver is an offline solver the resides on a
different machine (for example, you can use Astrometry solver on
StellarMate). Captured images are solved on the remote machine.
StellarSolver Integration
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