The driver for AstroArt (camera control and image processing
software—see the http://www.msb-astroart.com/) allows selection of
active camera from all currently connected G2 cameras. The
configuration dialog box provided by the driver also allows selection
of the target CCD temperature. However, the required temperature is
not set to the camera directly, but the temperature is changed with
the speed of 6°C per minute until it reaches the desired temperature.
Note the CCD User Interface dialog box displays current CCD
temperature and cooling power on the right side of its status line.
Set the target temperature so the cooling power varies around 80 or
90% to provide some room for temperature regulation.
Driver installation is quite easy—AstroArt
scans DLLs (Dynamic Link Libraries), matching particular file name
conventions, in the folder, where it is installed, and checks if the
DLL exports required driver API functions. Only DLLs named 'd_*.dll'
are tested, so every driver file name must begin with 'd_' characters.
When a proper DLL is found, AstroArt offers it as CCD Camera
Plug-in.
To install the G2 CCD driver for AstroArt, just:
Download the package 'd_g2ccd.zip' from the web
site http://ccd.mii.cz/.
Unzip the package into the AstroArt folder (e.g.
'C:\Program Files\Astroart').
AstroArt then offers the G2 CCD driver in the CCD Camera
- Control panel dialog box.
G2 CCD Internal Filter Wheel in AstroArt v4.0
Warning: It is necessary to use the CCD User Interface DLL
(file 'piccdgui.dll') version 4.10 or better. Older versions do
not properly support filter wheel integrated into CCD
cameras.
Each G2 camera can operate without internal filter wheel or can
be equipped with internal filter wheel with 5 or 6 filter
positions. The user can order camera with various filters, or he
or she can change individual filters or the whole filter wheel.
There is no way how to determine the actual filters in the filter
wheel automatically. This is why the G2 CCD camera driver for
AstroArt reads the 'd_g2ccd.ini' file to determine actual
configuration of filters. Number of present filters is then
reported to AstroArt.
The 'd_g2ccd.ini' file is placed in the same folder where the
G2 CCD driver and the AstroArt itself is installed. This file is
ordinary text file following the .INI files conventions. Here is
the example of the 'd_g2ccd.ini' file:
[filters]
Luminance, Gray
Red, LRed
Green, LGreen
Blue, LBlue
Clear, 0
The file should contain just one section '[filters]' (other
sections, if present, are ignored). Every line in this section
defines one filter position.
The first string defines the filter name, which can be used
within the application GUI or will be part of file name of
acquired images (if the user chooses including of filter name to
file name). The second parameter, delimited by comma, represents a
color by which the string can be displayed. The color can be
expressed by a name (White, Red, LRed, etc.) or directly by number
representing the particular color (0 represents black).
While the driver can report filter names and also colours,
which should be used to display these names, AstroArt does not
utilize this feature and asks the driver only to report number of
available filters. Still, the configuration file must be present
and the number of lines must correspond to the actual filter count
else the G2 CCD camera driver reports zero filters available.
For the G2 camera documentation, refer to the 'G2 CCD Camera
Operating Manual'. This manual is supplied with each camera in the
printed form and can be also downloaded as PDF file from the web
site http://ccd.mii.cz/.
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