Tony,

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Part of the answer to your question depends on what you want to do with your equipment. Since you also ask about capture software, I am assuming you want to do astrophotography.

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However, astrophotography can take you in at least two different directions. Do you want to capture “pretty pictures” of the universe, or do you want to contribute to the ever-expanding frontiers of science? Astronomy is one area of science where amateurs can make valuable contributions. The main areas of contribution concern astrometry and photometry; but there are also contributions through the observation of occultations and spectroscopy. I am not making any value judgements here. You might spend all day working in a scientific area and would like to spend your leisure time exploring the aesthetic; or perhaps it is the reverse.

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One of the first advantages of astronomical software is that you can have a visual map of the night sky which is highly accurate, and if you have go-to hardware/firmware such as the Gemini 1 or 2, you can connect the software, click on a target in the software’s visualization of the night sky, and the mount will use the software to point the telescope at that target. Provided you have the mount properly polar-aligned, the target should then appear in the field of view of your camera. The connection between the software and your mount is made with a driver. The best way to go is with the ASCOM Gemini driver which is free.

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There are various offerings of astronomical software ranging from free to paid for. You might start off with the free stuff and then want a paid-for one with greater capability. I use Software Bisque’s TheSkyX software for this click and point task. You can add your own specialized databases to TheSkyX if you want. TheSkyX comes in various levels with the possibility of upgrading at any time.

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If you are doing planetary imaging, you won’t need guiding. You need to take a lot of very fast exposures and pick out the good ones, which are unaffected by transient atmospheric distortion. However, if doing astrophotography of deep space, you will need to guide the mount throughout a time exposure. This requires a guide camera as well as a main imaging camera. That brings us to camera software.

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Most camera software can control both imaging and guiding cameras. A person’s preference may be more subjective, as well as be determined by the extent to which they have read the manual. They may have results the opposite of that of others. Taking all that into account, here is my two-cents worth. I use both Software Bisque’s TheSkyX Camera Add-On and Diffraction Limited’s MaxImDL. TheSkyX Camera Add-On can control a range of different cameras. Working together with the TheSkyX program it has some great features: First, you can take a photo of the sky and do an Image Link which will tell you exactly where the telescope is pointing. This will sync your telescope to the sky so that you will never be “lost in space”. Second, the focusing routine - @Focus3 – is great. While it is always better to begin focusing close to the expected focal point, if you are out a bit, @Focus3 will slide up and down focus positions and find the right spot. MaxImDL can control a range of different cameras. MaxImDL also has some great features: First, you can throw all of your calibration images – darks, flats, biases – into one folder and MaxImDL will automatically select the right calibration frames for the current image and do calibration as you download. Suppose you are exposing frames and you realize you need to change the time-length of the exposure. No hassles, MaxImDL will adjust calibration for you. Second, I think the guiding in MaxImDL is better than all others. You’ll get others who will disagree with this and come up with other software offerings. But hopefully this explains the basics for you.

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If you go the scientific path, I think the best astrometric and photometric software is MPO Canopus. Sometimes I come up with a suggestion for improvement of this software, only to find that it already does what I seek. For pretty pictures, PixInsight seems to be the name of the game these days.

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Hope this helps.

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Greg

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