PHD2 Drift Polar Alignment for First Time Users

This video is for beginning astrophotographers who need really good polar alignment and can’t see Polaris from their shooting location
Why I made this video:
I HAD to be able to polar align without Polaris because of my need to photo from my porch during Covid19 “stay the hell at home” period.
Drift Alignment was my only solution if I wanted to get some photos while stuck at home.
Problem was I had tried a number of times before and only had MASSIVE failure! Because I had no idea:
• What the expected result of moving the mount controls would be in both in magnitude and reaction.
• I was totally unaware of how long to expect this process to take in all, and how long to get a result from your adjustments.
This dual layer of uncertainty made it initially impossible to figure out why it wasn’t working.
Well now I HAD to make it work. So I looked on KZbin and found a video “Polar Alignment Without Polaris” in which the guy showed how you could get a good polar alignment using a combination of a smartphone app and the Drift Align routine in PHD2.
Now I had actually seen this work and that was huge but the problem was that this guy’s mount was actually pretty close to polar alignment already, but I didn’t have that luxury. I wanted to make it work from not very closely aligned at all.
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I realize that this video is too freaking long but I wanted to do it in near real-time so one can understand how long it takes to see the results of your adjustments. If you don't feel like sitting through the entire hour and a half, I have posted the script on my website at: www.billtheskyg....
____________________________________
Music List of songs in this video with Links:
1: "The Shadow” composed by Fareed Haque. Original version by Garaj Mahal on the “Blueberry Cave” Album. This version by the CCM Jazz Orchestra featuring Fareed Haque in 2014. Spotify link: open.spotify.c.... Recorded/Mixed/Mastered by Bill Gwynne at the University of Cincinnati Studios.
2: "Danilo’s Descarga" composed by Dan Barger. Local Cincinnati release only in 2009 as performed by Acapulco. Produced, recorded, mixed and mastered by Bill Gwynne at Ultrasuede Studios
3. “Eleuthra" composed by Monty Alexander, featuring Othello Mollineaux-steel drum. Performed by Michelle Gwynne on harp from her “Just Add Wings” CD. Many thanks to the fine Cincinnati musicians for their work on this track: Mark Wolfley-drums; Mike Sharfe-bass; Charlie Schweitzer-percussion and of course to Othello for his mastery of the steel drum. This arrangement by Bob Elkjer. Produced, recorded, mixed and mastered by Bill Gwynne at Group Effort Sound Studios.
4: "Furley’s Comet" composed by Paul Hogan and performed live by Ray’s Music Exchange at “Play by Play” in Silverton, OH in 2015. Recorded live, mixed and mastered by Bill Gwynne at Person to Person Media Studios
open.spotify.c...
5: "Green Electricity” by Eclipse Movement-2012 Recorded, mixed and mastered by Bill Gwynne at Group Effort Studios and Ultrasuede Studios.
open.spotify.c...

[@nullpointerworks4036]

A real-time demonstration is exactly what I need. Thank you for your effort and uploading.

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

Glad you found it useful! There were so many baffling things about this powerful tool that once I had it figured out I thought others might want to know too. Hope you liked the musit!

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

Glad you liked the video. It took a long time to make this video but that was the point wasn't it! This has become a valuable tool in my polar alignment toolkit. It's a great "2nd opinion" after using the pole master.

[@alanrockowitz379]

Great video--pointed out some things that should have been obvious to me but weren't The only thing I could add is that a few times you say to write things down so you'll remember which knob does what, etc, but there's a field on the Drift Align page for notes--designed exactly for what you're talking about.

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

Alan, yeah I noticed that too about the notes area BUT a) if you use more than one computer to shoot with those notes are not transferred from install to install and b) I've had my notes "mysteriously vanish" from there before so I don't trust it anymore. That's why I recommend writing it down. I've done this enough times now that I've got the directions memorized for one of my mounts but am glad I have something that I can refer to. Glad you liked the video!

[@user-st4md8bf4o]

Thank you for guiding ME in drift alignment! Awesome long process you went through!!

[@cdavidhord]

I've spent countless hours this past year educating myself on taking my "astronomy hobby" to the next level. This was the finest and most entertaining educational video available, without exception. Thank You! And yes, the music was fantastic. Can't wait another appearance by the etherial DJ Nebulous!

[@ChoosyMothersVideos]

Thank you very much Dave. I think DJ Nebulous will be making some more ethereal appearances!

[@tbardoni5065]

Thank you for this, Bill. I’ve avoided your video because of the length, but it went by really fast! Entertaining and totally interesting. Glad I watched and FINALLY learned how to drift align.

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

T, yeah I was aghast when I saw the final running time; same as a feature-length film! But I spent 40 hours making it so dammit, I'm putting it out there. I thought it was important to do it 'long form' because one of the things that confused me was I didn't really have any idea what to expect so I thought it would be illustrative to show the entire process unfold in the way it's going to happen to you when you try it. I've been able to get much faster at this by having a better idea as to how much knob turn on the mount corresponds to how many pixels of error which allows me to abort/adjust the early runs much sooner so you get to the tweaky last couple adjustments much sooner and then you just have to tough it out at that point. Glad it wasn't too boring and that it was worth your time invested... Bill

[@tbardoni5065]

@@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy Thank you for responding Bill! I made my comment because I wanted others to know that the length of the video is an asset, not a hinderance. This video HAD to be made exactly the way you did it. It’s perfect. Thank you again! PS, I can’t say it enough: the video doesn’t seem long at all once you start watching. It’s absolutely perfect.

[@nikaxstrophotography]

So glad we now have polemasters. ASIAIR's ipolars NINA etc that makes thing simpler, this also includes polar alignment when you can't see the poles with all sky polar alignment. the amount of time this takes sucks the fun out of the hobby

[@LyngJohn205]

I’ve moved to a location where I can’t face north, so I’ve used your instructions to do a drift align. After my first try, yes, I am reasonably well aligned. Not painful, but just time consuming. Thank you very much for this very informative and, yes, entertaining, instruction video. Thanks for helping me get back into Astrophotography after our move to a new location.

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

John, Very glad you found this useful. I want to encourage you to keep trying this method. Since I posted this video I've done this dozens of times and I can say that for sure, you will get faster as you get to know how your mount responds to the knob tweaks and once you know what you're doing you can very quickly assess when you're off by a lot in which direction and make better guesses about how much knob turn moves the line how much. My times are under a half hour now...

[@MrSoloPaul]

Thank you so much for this great video Bill. I am now a fan ( and subscriber ). Most of all you've taught me the patience and perseverance that you need to develop in order to get decent photos with amateur equipment. In a society that stresses quick rewards these are skills that we have to learn. I'd also like to say that as a budding Jazz guitarist I felt something in common between this process and the Jazz solos following the subtle chord changes in some of your background music. Thank you again.

[@rifleman175]

Great video! I can understand the pain of not being able to see Polaris, since I am shooting at 1 deg N and basically can never rely on the polar plate-solve method to quickly achieve polar alignment. As for the PHD2 drift alignment procedures you had demonstrated, I have a few tips to speed things up a bit: 1) Before doing the drift alignment and mount calibration in PHD2, you may want to roughly align the mount first. First use compass to point one of the tripod legs generally in the north-south direction, then slew the mount to the meridian and manually slew the mount east for 10s and then west for 10s. You should see a V-shaped star trail (unless you are lucky to be already roughly aligned), after which make azimuth adjustments until the V-shaped trail becomes straight. After that, you are ready to proceed to PhD2 for alignment. 2) Whenever you see the magenta circle in the drift alignment window, you would want to adjust the mount azimuth/altitude so that the star you are drifting on touches the circle. This enables you to reach alignment much faster. 3) Lastly, you could record the notes on the PhD2 drift alignment dialogue box haha.

[@stevenadam3730]

Super entertaining and instructional video. I watched the entire thing and really found it useful. Great idea doing it in real time 👍

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

Steve, thanks for your nice comment; I'm glad the length of this thing didn't put you off but I really thought that people should know what they're up against. I've been able to improve my times lately by making decisions much more quickly and I've got a better handle on "how much knob turn affects the red line how much" that allows me to get closer, faster. Those last few runs when you're down to a few pixels of error are always the nail-biters...

[@astrogerard2022]

Very good video. I just moved to a new house and can't see Octans. I will mark out my slab when I do the first drift align to make it quicker next time. Thank you for taking the time for us.

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

Gerard, I'm SO glad you found this useful! When I made it I wasn't thinking about Southern Hemisphere applications but I've heard from a couple of you now and when I think about it, you guys need it MORE than we do! Good luck! I had a new speed record last time out, I got done in 25 minutes! Bill

[@darrengj407]

Now I understand. Great video as it’s full length. I need this as unfortunately I’m moving soon to a place that doesn’t have a view of Polaris . Thank you

[@ohwell2790]

find your magnetic deviation on line for your location and just use a magnetic compass to find true north. Then find your longitude and set the degrees from the equator, use a digital protractor, done. Then you can fine tune at the scope over a few nights. See easy as can be.

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

Does this work if you have to set up your scope each night? Can this method get you accuracy to within 1 arc-second?

[@ranjitgovindaraj]

Great Tutorial Bill. Wish I’d come across this a month sooner. I too have the same problem where Polaris is hidden and used Astrotard’s video to Drift align. It’s a bit daunting but one or two tries and DA becomes second nature. I liked the full length tutorial as it gives newbies a better explanation of the process. I would also suggest you check Jon Rista’s Cloudy Nights post on using Bookmarks to Drift Align in PHD. I tried last week and it made the whole process so much systematic and result oriented. Loved the music. Hope you make more tutorials. Clear skies 🌌

[@ChoosyMothersVideos]

Ranjit, thanks for your positive comments! Took me almost 40 hours of production to make that video so I'm happy that SOMEbody likes it. Thanks for the heads up on the bookmark technique! I went and searched Cloudy Nights and eventually found Jon's layout of the procedure but didn't really understand the procedure well enough to put it into practice I think. Also, I noted a later discussion thread where he said that PHD2 was overriding his star choices all the time which made the bookmark thing not work as apparently you have to use the same star all the time. This was all happening around PHD2 Version 2.41 and we're at 2.67 now; I wonder if they rolled back that "feature" so you could use the bookmark method again or it's just baked in for good now. I'm almost ready to post another video on Motorized Focusing. Be another week, maybe two-just finished the script last night and need to get to the video studio to 'film' it. Carpe Noctem!

[@okeania]

Thats a great video but not only how you give you great tutorial and guidance, its also have a great track that introduces me to great band. As soon as I heard it im in love with that album immediately. Being as an old recording engineer I especially liked it. Thank you.

[@ChoosyMothersVideos]

Asal, glad you found the video educational! Which band? Garaj Mahal?...

[@motovlogf650gs9]

Yes I spent countless hours for this and i say, it's very great Video Tutorial! This was the finest and most entertaining educational video available, without exception. Thank You! And no, the music i'snt fantastic. Can you play by the next Tutorial please Electric light Ochestra? ;-) Thank you for this, Greatings, Andy

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

Thanks for the comment about the video and sorry you didn't like my music. No, I'm not going to play Electric Light Orchestra; when you do that you get a copyright violation notice. I thought by playing non-mainstream music that I myself had recorded would avoid this but no, I still got dinged for 2 of the 4 songs here, which would have demonetized the video (if I was monetized in the first place). I'll pass your comments onto DJ Nebulous though...

[@gcdiscos]

Here in the South (Brazil - Rio) I don't have access to sigma octantis, SCP (there are trees from the neighbors) and this video helped me a lot, very simple and good music. Thanks

[@ChoosyMothersVideos]

Glad you found the video helpful; love hearing from people all over. I love Brazilian music and one of these days I’ll realize my dream of spending New Years in Rio!

[@gcdiscos]

@@ChoosyMothersVideos Yes, come. "Cariocas" ( one who was born in the city of rio de janeiro) love to receive friends from other countries, for sure you will be welcomed.

[@MrBebopbob]

Great video (for me). By not cutting out the tedium, you help me align my expectations (and frustration/uncertainty) of the whole process. Most videos on these subjects do not teach the patience required for many astrophotography processes. And btw, great music. Bob

[@yellowlynx]

I have gone through the same too. My convention of noting the adjustments is a bit different because the knobs can produce different turn direction depending on the mount. So for your case I would write down "Red line points down, adjust mount azimuth westward/eastward" because for Losmandy mounts the azimuth knobs are behind whereas a lot of other mounts the azimuth adjustment knobs are in front.

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

Lynx, yeah the important thing is to make sure you understand turning which knob which direction causes the red line to go up or down and write that down in an unambiguous way you can refer to until you've done it so many times you've got it memorized. I tried to think about it with regards to East/West with the knobs but for me, it just introduced another layer of confusion. On my mount either knob can make the mount turn East or West depending on which way you turn it, but the skywatcher/celestron mounts have a "push-only" adjustment direction so I came to the conclusion that it was really the LINE that mattered and as long as I knew which way to turn the knob I really didn't need to know which way that was-I just know that if I turn the knob on the West side of the mount clockwise, the red line goes up. The altitude knob clockwise makes the red line go down. After that I'm in the process. I got super lucky last time I set up; got a PA error of .1 arc-min after 4 min of drift with the Guiding Assistant.

[@yellowlynx]

@@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy Agreed. As long as the notes are not ambiguous. What I usually wrote down will be something like: if DEC line is down (when adjusting azimuth) my mount should turn to West more (the net result to the mount itself, rather than the action of the mount). The drift align is worth the effort because I have a pier for my mount, and once aligned it won't be that much off the next time I power up the scope, and I proceed to imaging quickly.

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

@@yellowlynx A pier! that's awesome. I have to set up from scratch every time. You could really dial this in perfectly and leave it!; would love to get there someday. Hello Arizona??? LOL

[@bryanb4308]

This was a really great video, thanks for putting it together. I hit a lot of frustration points where an adjustment in the correct direction actually appears to make things worse. In reality like you said the polar alignment error number is really what you should be focusing on and letting it run long enough to get an accurate trend line. I applaud your persistence getting the PA error as low as you did, when Polaris is visible I typically just eyeball my polar alignment through the scope and call it a day. This usually results in a PA error of ~4 arc minutes. That might sound pretty terrible BUT my mount guides it no problem. This will probably be a case by case type of thing but my two cents is that most people can probably call good good enough well before they get down to .1x arc minutes. That is unless you aren’t guiding, then I’d get your PA as dialed in as you possibly can.

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

Green (or should I call you Mr. Flash? ;-) Good comments and I agree, PA error amounts are relative to your application. Of course perfect alignment every single time would be great but the amount of time invested isn't always necessary. That's why the PoleMaster is so great-really accurate AND fast! Guiding Assistant tool in PHD2 scolds you if your PA error is larger than 10 are min so 4 arc min isn't bad. My particular situation is that I want to throw away as few subs as possible since I pretty much have to shoot my targets in a single evening (although I'm learning how to recover framing and camera rotation). Focal length of telescope seems to have a lot of bearing on what you can keep and what you have to toss. One of my rigs is a 550mm 4" refractor which seems easy compared to the 2000mm 10" scope I also use which seems TEN times more demanding so in that environment focus has to be _perfect_, PA has to be _perfect_, and then you only have to throw away 10% instead of 40% whereas I can keep 95% of the refractor shots if I get a good setup that night. I honestly don't see how all these people are taking these 3-5 minute subs when it's "armageddon" for me if I try to get past two minutes! Thanks for watching and your thoughtful comments.

[@bryanb4308]

@@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy I’ve heard good things about the polemaster and sharpcap which is free, is great too as long as you can see the pole. It does something very similar to the pole master where you use either your guide or main scope rotated on the RA axis to plate solve sky in real time and tells you to move up/down left/right until your alignment is perfect. I completely agree that equipment makes all the difference, both with your mounts tracking/guiding ability and your focal length. I’ve always been told the rule of thumb is that if you keep your RMS error at or below your image scale, you should be able to keep all your subs. Obviously good polar alignment plays in to good guiding and a low RMS error so if your image scale is small, it’s good to have really solid PA. My image scale is huge right now at about 2.25 so I can afford to have a bit of a sloppy PA. At 2000mm that number shrinks quite a bit, you can actually calculate it here celestialwonders.com/tools/imageScaleCalc.html Anyway drift aligning has made it so I can move anywhere in my yard and image so I don’t have to compromise on which targets I go after. I did this two nights in a row and got the PA down to 2-2.5 arc minutes with relative ease, so thanks again for the tips.

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

@@bryanb4308 That's a great point about your image scale vs. guiding accuracy. Atmospheric smearing keeps resolution to about 1.5 arc sec too so as long as you can guide constantly below that you're in the zone as well. My 2000mm rig image-scales to about .6 (large format camera with smallish pixels) so it's 'game on' with all of those factors. I've used that calculator before and it's wonderful; I have a note in Evernote I created that has the image scale of every camera with every scope that proves to be useful when you have to type that number into sequence generator pro in order to get plate solving to work. Good luck and Carpe Noctem!

[@southbronxny5727]

Should I do the drift to improve polar alignment or is this for those poeple who can't see Polaris? Great video btw.

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

This is mostly for people who can't see Polaris at all but when done "all the way" is very accurate so if you wanted you could use it as a double-check if you're using another method that involves polaris like the one in SharpCap or other programs. I should point out that another tool in PHD2, the "Guiding Assistant" Tool is great for evaluating your polar alignment accuracy, no matter how you got there. I briefly show this at 1:20:15 on the video. Good luck!

[@universeunlimited1763]

Why must you slew with a planetarium app to the different parts of the guy for PHD2 Drift Alignment? Why not simply slew with the PHD2 slew button or even the hand control or EQASCOM arrow buttons? What makes it mandatory to slew with a planetarium app?

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

This is a good point. For reasons I don't really understand yet, when I let some of these computer programs slew the telescope about 1 time in 10 I'll have some kind of 'runaway' where it's going to go the wrong way and wants to crash into the tripod legs, or spin in DEC in a way that is going to be stressful on the cabling or generally NOT do what I want it to. This happens across a variety of software that can control the scope: Starry Night, SeqGenPro, PHD2, SkySafari and on different mounts that I have so I just do it this way because I KNOW it's safe. If you have to rush over and hit the power button on your mount to avoid a bad accident you're gonna be starting over and this process takes long enough as it is without losing your star-alignment and all that. Once you're polar-aligned that's different because that's a physical adjustment and remains in place regardless of any power or software issues. That said, I HAVE started using the mount control values in the PHD2 drift align box and it's been working well. One thing I've discovered since making this video is that those slew boxes in PHD2 are really helpful because it gets you back to the exact same spot after a mount adjustment and that helps with consistency so I do it a lot more often than I show in the video. I have a Losmandy G-11 mount which is pretty expensive but after a slew I don't believe ANYTHING I see on the graph for 15 seconds to let the backlash clear and generally settle down. The whole 'runaway mount' thing is probably just me being stupid but for the life of me I can't figure out what causes it to choose to do what it does when it "goes off" so since time is precious whenever I slew to a new target I manually move the scope to the general part of the sky my target is in (like within 30°, just eyeballing it) with the cables hanging off the mount the way I want and the counterweights on the proper side. THEN I tell SeqGen to do a FIND or CENTER and I know nothing's gonna go crazy. Good luck and thanks for watching that long-a** video!

[@universeunlimited1763]

@@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy Thanks for the detailed reply and thanks for taking time out to do the video.

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

@@universeunlimited1763 You're most welcome! Happy Shooting!

[@WorkerBee258]

this is fantastic help. thank you!

[@dedskin1]

Maybe things would be easier if you imagined Polaris as a compass center , so left would be West , right would be east , that way your Clockwise motion is West , anticlockwise is East . So to say

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

Yeah, but I've done this a bunch more times now and at least with the Losmandy mount I don't have to think about it anymore; practice makes perfect!

[@dedskin1]

@@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy indeed it does . That is why i take my gear out even if its cloudy . But by the time i did PHD and all clouds set in , and i wasnt able to try the Drift Alignment from the video . Guiding assistant said that my Polar error is 3 Arc minutes , tho Sounds like a lot , again didnt have time to do the drift alignment from the video , but i will next time .

[@fabricecatteau8931]

Sorry but you are missing something important that will save a lot of time, as stated in PHD2 documentation : "Slowly turn your mount's Azimuth adjustment, watching the screen and moving the guide star towards the magenta circle. The magenta circle shows how far the guide star needs to move."

[@fabricecatteau8931]

Same thing for the Altitude

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

To make sure I understand this, you would have to do this after a couple of early 'drifts' for the magenta circle to appear in the first place, and then do what you said to get the circle smaller, faster, thereby saving time in the intermediate stages, correct?

[@rexcao4454]

Thanks for the great video! I am curious that after doing the three-star alignment can improve the polar alignment, plus the auto-guiding further improves the accuracy. Is it still necessary to do an additional drift alignment?

[@ChoosyMothersVideos]

Rex, the star alignment is really more about getting your mount aligned with the stars, and not so much the pole. Yeah, you have to be roughly polar oriented to do your star alignment and that enables your mount to find stuff for you, but you’re not really polar aligned well enough for photography at that point. Drift alignment (or using a polar cam, or software routine like there is in SharpCap) is about getting that error down to nearly zero which is what you need to fire off a bunch of multi-minute exposures and not have the image rotate in your camera frame. Drift alignment will work in any situation but if you can’t see Polaris (or Octans in the S. Hemi) it’s the ONLY tool I know of that’s super accurate. Hope this helps.

[@rexcao4454]

@@ChoosyMothersVideos Thanks Bill!

[@TheHelicapt]

When drifting aligning, are you using then the guide scope camera ?

[@clintkennedy8374]

Thank you for this!! Liked and subscribed

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

Thanks for the sub! Hope you are better aligned than before! ;-)

[@JohnCranberry23]

Thanks for the Video. Can you please clarify something for me. I polar aligned (in Australia) using the PoleMaster for the first time ever! and I wasn't sure what speed to use on the RA Motor when tracking. The star was still drifting out of the cross hair but I wasn't perfectly level (tripod mount) so I will try it again tonight making sure I am spot on level and see if I track perfectly. So Is 2x Normal Speed? Or 4x. What SLEW speed reflects the rotation of the earth? Also, should you not use the fine adjustment knobs when the motor is running because you can damage the motor? Instead use the buttons on the controller to fine adjust / center onto your star after you have moved the telescope using the clutches?

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

The speeds on motors are labeled differently but "Sidereal" is the official name of the rate you want, which also might be referred to as "1x". "Lunar" and "Solar" are essentially the same but with a slight adjustment for their different rates.

[@JohnCranberry23]

@@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy I worked it out thanks. I can polar align in 10 minutes flat using the Pole Master

[@gloubiboulgazeblob]

Nice, but I think the whole process would be faster if you alternatively tuned your azimuth then your altitude knobs. Moreover, a common mistake in the drift alignment for the ALTITUDE is to chose a star the closest to the celestial equator, generally going towards the zenith, or worse on the equator, and that is wrong : one should chose a star that is between the point on the horizon (west or east) and the celestial pole, not the zenith, or worse staying on the celestial equator ! That's the line where the drift SPEED is the biggest ! That line is also where the HOUR ANGLE of stars is 6H (west) or 18H (east), those lines play exactly the same role as the meridian (hour angle = 0H) for the azimuth correction. In a nutshell, when correcting altitude, the tube should point somewhere in the North-west (or North-east) part of the sky, the closest to the celestial equator as possible but not too close to avoid atmospheric dispertion ! What you do at 55:48 is WRONG : not only you'll spend much more time to adjust but it will be less accurate as well...

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

I think you may have missed something in the video or I used a wrong term somewhere because what you are describing is exactly the way I understand it's supposed to be done (and tried to explain) in PHD2: Start with a star very close to the Celestial Equator / Meridian crossing point and get that Azimuth adjustment pretty good. Then go down along the equator down a reasonable amount (West in my case, not too close to the horizon) and do Altitude. I don't ever remember mentioning the zenith. If the drift speed is the biggest here wouldn't that help in that you'd get a quicker read on what's happening and be able to make more adjustments to get it closer faster? This also Then go back to Azimuth (because your Altitude adjustment threw it off some) and keep alternating until you've got it sufficiently under control and then check with Guiding Assistant to verify performance. If what I do at 55:48 is wrong it seems to be working, I've obtained polar alignment error of 0.1 arc min under good conditions. I've had a lot more practice since making this video and my times are improving. Remember I'm a beginner making a video for beginners because I couldn't find one that answered all my questions. I'm sure there are ways to improve on this, I just needed to make it work any way I could. Thanks for watching and hope you liked the music! Bill

[@gloubiboulgazeblob]

@@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy Your polar alignment is good at the end, no doubt about that, 0.1 is pretty good ! "... Then go down along the equator down a reasonable amount (West in my case, not too close to the horizon) and do Altitude..." => you're not at the BEST place. It works (since you're well polar aligned...) but it's not the best place because it's a place where azimuth error still plays a role... Ideally you should rotate 90° from the meridian to get to a place where azimuth error has NO incidence and altitude error has a MAXIMUM incidence. At the meridian, in other words when the hour angle equals 0H, the incdence of azimuth error correction is at its maximum, and at the minimum for altitude. When you rotate 90° from the merdian, the incidence of azimuth correction is MINIMIUM and MAXIMUM for the altitude correction => the hour angle of the star you point at should be 6H (west) or 18H (east) , and your counterweights should be straight down (like in home park position) => that means that, since you're above the horizon, your tube should point somewhere in the North-west or North-east part of the sky. But you "slew reasonnably along the equator..." => you are obviously in the southern part of your sky, far from the best place (a line that goes from the intersection of the celestial equator and the horizon to the celestial pole).

[@Dudleydogg]

LOL who bought new Gear I knew it wasn't me !!!

[@digitalblasphemy1100]

I'm sorry if I missed it but I am wondering why you are choosing what seems to be the dimmest star. What is the thinking there?

[@montygiavelli8125]

Did you have PEC on when you did your Drift Alignment ?? Did you compare PoleMaster and Drift Alignment ? I've been using PoleMaster but I'm wondering how accurate it is. Thanks for the video. Monty

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

Monty, thanks for watching the video. I've only compared PoleMaster and Drift align one time since I feel that pole master is more than "good enough" and even though I'd love it to be perfect, it's more accurate than seeing conditions will permit most of the time here. I really only use drift align when I'm at home and can't see Polaris, but one time when I was out I did my PoleMaster alignment and then ran the Guiding Assistant and of course it could have been better. Guding Assistant on a four minute run will reveal a multitude of sins. ONE time I got 0.1 arc min accuracy. I think PoleMaster followed by Guiding Assistant and a touch up in PHD2 if necessary would get you as close as you could get without having a permanent installation. I don't use PEC, mostly out of superstition. I understand how it can really make things better but every time I use it I'm not sure if it's helping at all, and I even suspect it might make things worse. From what I've been able to gather, if you set up and tear down each time you shoot you have to retrain PEC each time because the tiny difference in mount alignment will throw it off. On my Losmandy G11 a training run is about 4 min 30 sec and I've tried it thinking that if I've got good polar alignment, I'm guiding well and then I train it I'm going to see a notch better performance but I can't see any real improvement. Sometimes I suspect that a wild guiding event might be PEC related although I haven't (and don't know how to) look at the PHD2 logs and then look for the 4 minute (worm gear cycle on the G11) repeating error in my data. I do understand that there is a software tool out there you can get that will make it easier to look through your PHD2 logs, I think it's from the same people who make PEMPro. So I elect not to spend the extra 4.5 minutes (since drift align takes amazingly long anyway) and just try and get polar-aligned as best as possible and get good guiding specs. I can usually achieve .75 to 1.3 arc-sec total RMS error which is "fairly good" as I understand although with the 2000mm telescope you still have about 15% wasted images. Hope this helps! Bill

[@deeber35]

How far above the horizon can a star be to be used to align? My view to the south is blocked from the horizon up to about 30 degrees up. And can a polar alignment be done with only a tracker and DSLR?

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

Well, when using the Drift Align method using PHD2 software presented in the video you're supposed to use stars along the celestial equator which will vary in height depending on how far north/south you are on the Earth. If you''re ON the equator the celestial equator goes overhead at the zenith. If you're in northern Michigan or Canada it's much lower. You can do polar alignment with a tracker & DSLR but you're going to need some software to make calculations for you. My tracker and many others have a little polar scope in them and you sight polaris in there and then a phone app tells you where on the circle to PUT polaris according to the time/location data your phone has access to. The ZWO ASI-AIR has a polar alignment routine built into it as do some other apps. Good luck!

[@deeber35]

@@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy Thanks. I cannot see the northern skies (tho I am in the U.S). Obstructed view. Does PHD2 require being able to see near Polaris?

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

@@deeber35 No you don't; I have the exact same situation as you do-Polaris is blocked by my house. The procedure outlined in the video is designed to solve this problem but it's for a telescope under computer control on an equatorial mount, not a star tracker. But it works well but can sometimes take a while. Good Luck!

[@deeber35]

@@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy Looks like I may need a driver for PHD2 to work with a Nikon DSLR. Any idea where I can download that? Thanks.

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

@@deeber35 All drivers would come from the camera manufacturers themselves. Absent that there might be a generic or 3rd party driver out there but you don't really know what you're getting with that sort of thing.

[@neel3297]

How can I get these orthogonality errors fixed. Is there any tutorial or material to read about

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

Are you talking about the error when PHD2 tells you that "your mount doesn't appear orthagonal"? Well if you are, and your mount is a known quality product that is in good working order, then it's probably actually ok, or at least good enough. In the "Advanced" settings of PHD2 there is a "Guiding" tab amongst the 4 tabs there. About halfway down the tab, in the area labeled "Calibration" in the right column there is a checkbox for "Assume Dec orthagonal to RA". Check it, and PHD2 will not bother to test this or report on it to you. This is good if your mount is actually ok and the warning you were getting is really just a nuisance warning but not truly all that important. However if your mount is truly "not right" in this regard well then you have a maintenance issue with your mount which I can't really help you with from here. So I'd say, check the checkbox, proceed ahead and once you're dialied in on polar alignment see what kind of guiding specs you get. If your mount is ok you should be able to get to within 1 arc-second guiding accuracy. Don't forget to run the guiding assistant tools after you've finished polar aligning with drift as a check on your work. Good luck! Bill

[@neel3297]

Thank you much for a detailed info. I see this option. Once my clear skies are back I will give this a try. I am using a new eq6r which I feel is in good condition

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

@@neel3297 Yes! I have one of these for my "2nd Mount" and recently got it all fully wired up and used it for drift polar alignment and then long term guiding and I got really good accuracy numbers. My refractor with all the extra stuff weighs about 22 pounds (10kg) and the EQ6R-Pro handled it perfectly! You can do really good work with this mount! Good luck to you.

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

@@neel3297 I have an EQ6R-Pro as well and I've tried doing this method with it and it works well. Make sure you've really got that gear on the DEC axis engaged well before turning the handle. The final few adjustments will be really small. It's a really good mount and tracks and guides well!

[@neel3297]

@@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy Thanks Bill. I know it is not with the mount

[@deeber35]

I have the Sky Watcher AZ-GTi mount in EQ mode. Can it track with a 400mm lens on a crop sensor without auto-guiding? I've had success at 300mm.

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

I don’t have one of those mounts so I can’t tell you anything specific but I do know that if you are not autoguiding, as your focal length increases the better your polar alignment needs to be. Good luck!

[@videoman77365]

This must be for beginners with experience and a lot of money. I'm still looking for a video on a beginner with basic knowledge and very little money'

[@ChoosyMothersVideos]

Don’t know what to tell you Freelance, all you need is a telescope, mount, camera and guide camera and you can do astrophotography. Even the simplest of setups is going to set you back some $$$ if you want your pics to look like something. Here’s an idea for you: get one of those camera trackers that will hold 11lbs or so and one of those Williams small refractors. Mount your cam on the back and you don’t need to guide! Can’t be done any simpler than that.

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

​@UCfnCrr6Vtyd_ljtZI4eF1Yg After reading your comment again I think you might have misunderstood the intent of the title of this video. It's intended for astrophotographers that have 'never used the drift align tool in PHD2" before, not 'first-time astrophotographers'; sorry if it was confusing. This video assumes that you have some kind of rig up and running and basically under control but can't use your normal polar alignment methods due to a blocked view to the north. The video explains this 'other way' to get it done which was confusing to me the first few times I tried it so when I figured it out I thought I would pass along the things that made a difference for me. Hope you liked the music at least! LOL

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

Also, check out a KZbin guy called "AstroBackyard" (Trevor Jones). Amongst his MANY videos are a number of "just getting started" videos that might be just what you're looking for.

[@dedskin1]

I stopped Beating around the Bush and i "Rambled this Process in to Submission " :) , but it all failed because "It's raining cats and dogs" :) , i was so pissed wasted all night and i kicked the mount when a voice came out of my PC , says " you are barking at the wrong tree " . you probably dont understand what i am all about , we are not on the same page :)

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

No, I don't have any idea what you're saying but it's entertaining as hell!!! Good luck!

[@dedskin1]

@@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy you're barking at the wrong tree But i am not a Tree and you are not a Dog Im making fun of that aspect of english language .

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

@@dedskin1 Lots to make fun of there!

[@Dudleydogg]

how do you make the green box bigger mine is microscopic

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

Dudley, you know I'm not entirely sure, it's just always been that size. However, you could try clicking on the brain Icon to get to Advanced Settings and then go to the "Guiding" tab and try changing the value of Search region (pixels) to 15 or something a lot larger than what's in there now. If that's not working then I don't know; perhaps it's in the manual somewhere? Bill

[@Dudleydogg]

@@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy i followed your video i have the best guiding in some time now. right in the middle of my calibrations the moon got a little too high I could no longer focus on STAR had to Meridian but I did have it down to 26 pixels. will try again tomorrow

[@Dudleydogg]

@@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy last night i would get Settling and some times it would stay so far I would have to start over, now my settling is .6 and it catches up and starts running the sequences again. thanks for your time to explain all that

[@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy]

@@Dudleydogg Glad it's working for you. It's a process and the more you do it the easier it gets because you KNOW what to expect. Took me about 12 times doing it before I feel I really knew it well and what constituted 'good things' from the 'bad things'.

[@Dudleydogg]

@@BillGwynneTheSkyGuy I stayed Locked on M32 last night for 4 hours with no mount Slews, just phd2 and took a mosiac, the 6 sequences finished on their own, One time I was nagged to rotate the camera 1.2 degrees.. I still struggle with this fork-mount and want a EQ I have so many targets that are off-limits because my max dec is 65 degrees. don't want to snap off the camera. I am progressing, My biggest Learning curve post-processing.