"adm" wrote in message
news

"Robin Leadbeater" wrote in message
...

"adm" wrote in message
...
I also just noticed that the new K3CCDTools version has a Drift
Explorer
and
Autoguide feature.....

Am I missing something here or does this potentially give the ability
to
autoguide my LX200GPS with the Toucam Pro or DSI Pro and no additional
equipment - i.e. Guidescope and separate camera ? Just connect the
laptop
via the serial port to the scope, set up K3CCDTools and hit the
"guide"
button (probably not that simple, but....)


Hi,

Drift Explorer and Autoguide have been features of K3CCDTools for a
while
now. You still need a separate camera for imaging. You can either use
an off
axis guider on your main scope or a separate guidescope for your guide
camera. BTW do you know there is a Yahoo support group?
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/K3CCDTools/
There is also a lot of knowledge about K3CCDTools on the QCUIAG group

Cheers Robin - will check it out. However - it's a bit on the "new
features" page that caught my interest. It says:

"Possibility to Autoguide during WDM sequence capturing by using the
same camera for capturing and autoguiding".....
If you think about it, using a device like the Toucam, as a 'video' input,
it is not potentially hard to look at each frame in turn, and guide on any
errors in this, while at the same time integrating multiple frames to
produce a 'psuedo' long exposure image. Downside is that with short
exposures, unless the object is relatively bright, there will not be
significant data recorded in the individual images, to give any record in
the result. However it is a simple (and cheap...) solution. It sounds as
if they have implemented something along these lines.

Best Wishes