New Stuff on SuffolkSky…
June 21, 2024Happy Friday! Looks like we might have some clear skies this weekend… of course it will be lit up by the light of the full Moon. In this Friday morning post I wanted to take a few minutes to introduce a couple…
Category: Equipment
Telescopes, Cameras, and other Astronomy Gear
Learning NINA – Weather Data from OpenWeatherMap
June 17, 2024It is helpful to have current weather information during an observing session. I typically record the current temperature, humidity, and cloud cover in my observation session logs. Weather data can be obtained from a few different sources. In this post I am…
Very Neat Python Opensource Star Charting…
June 7, 2024I was browsing the CloudyNights Astronomy Software & Computers forum and ran across this post about an interesting python script which generates sky charts. fchart3 is an opensource Python script to make beautiful Deep Sky finder charts and star maps in various…
RaspAstro Web – Working with pyEphem Sun and Moon Info
June 3, 2024I have been doing a bit of tinkering with my RaspAstro Web application. I added two new pages one dedicated to the Sun and one dedicated to the Moon. The RaspAstro Web is a web application written in Python which uses pyEphem…
Learning NINA – The Advanced Sequencer
June 2, 2024First light and a chance to test out my sequence using the NINA mini-pc build sequencer on 5/31/2024 shooting M 94, the Cat’s Eye Galaxy. The NINA sequencer is somewhat complicated but extremely versatile. There really is a lot to this astrophotography…
Learning NINA for Astrophotography Gear Control…
May 27, 2024I was looking to learn something new and to try out some different options for astrophotograpy imaging command and control. I have been using KStars/Ekos/INDI to control my gear for both EAA and Astrophotography session. KStars/Ekos/INDI works great but I wanted to…
SeeStar S50 Smart Telescope… Kind of a Review… Just Get One…
May 23, 2024I believe that any telescope can be a good telescope if you have the right expectations of it’s capabilities. I often get asked “What kind of telescope should I get?” My usual answer is get the best one you can afford for…
EQ6-R Pro Mount Tuning…
May 15, 2024I have had my Sky Watcher EQ6-R Pro mount for a bit over a year now and it is a fantastic mount! Great payload capacity and solid performance with my typical guiding RMS around 1 arcsecond or less. Recently I noticed when…
SeeStar S50 Accessories Which are Nice to Have…
May 5, 2024The SeeStar S50 comes with everything you need to start observing in just a few minutes after opening the box, however there are a few useful accessories which are really nice to have. The SeeStar S50 accessories I recommend for your SeeStar…
Background Extraction and Noise Reduction using AI for Free
April 25, 2024GraXpert is a free opensource tool which can use Artificial Intelligence (AI) models to perform background extraction (gradient removal) and denoising (noise removal) on astrophotography images. I have been tinkering with this tool using a FITS image saved from a live stack…