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HandyAvi 5.0 User`s Manual

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1. 181 Scan AVI File for Meteors and Create New Movie 187 Scan AVI File Movie Setup Section ict EEA EA EE NE 183 selecting the first N frames 173 T Telescope COM Port 143 210 Telescope Controls 144 211 The Meteor Trail Display Area 103 The Meteor Trail Movie Setup SSC MOM psistscascesaritiawadinishantianninaspaanicre 98 The Time Lapse Display Area 14 45 The Time Lapse Movie Setup SECON ieee 11 38 Time lapse Video Overview 3 Tools Menu eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees 258 Troubleshooting eeeeeeees 245 263
2. 75 Cancel About Figure 31 Morgan Multimedia MJPG Codec Morgan MJPG allows quality to be set if the Forced quality check box is checked The value in the display box here seen as 75 ALWAYS overrides the value set by the HandyAvi Quality sliders HandyAvi s Quality slider appears but has no effect We ran into a problem with the above version of the Morgan CODEC in Vista when we used image sizes other than 160x120 320x240 or 640x480 Caused a HandyAvi crash that we could not find a work around for We sent Email to the vendor describing the problem Received no answer after several days This CODEC seems to work just fine in Windows XP though In the past we have always used the Morgan Multimedia MJPG Codec but we have now installed the PICVideo MJPG CODEC and are using it instead on Vista 115 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Microsoft MPEG 4 Video Codec V2 Copyright Microsoft Corp 1996 1999 Options Keyframe every seconds Compression Control EE 75 r Data Rate Kilobits per Second 3000 4 ia ET Figure 32 mp42 CODEC We were unable to determine any effect when the Smoothness slider was changed HandyAvi s Quality slider is not visible Microsoft MPEG 4 Video Codec V3 Copyright Microsoft Corp 1996 1999 Options Keyframe every seconds Compression Control 44 75 m Data Rate Kilobits per Second 3000 al ey
3. ok _Cancet_ Figure 33 MP43 CODEC We were unable to determine any effect when the Smoothness slider was changed HandyAvi s Quality slider is not visible 116 Image Capture Modes Configure Microsoft MPEG 4 Video Codec 1 Copyright Microsoft Corp 1996 1999 Options Kepframe every Ei seconds Compression Control Smoothness 75 Crispness 4 Data Rate Kilobits per Second 3000 Figure 34 MP41 CODEC We were unable to determine any effect when the Smoothness slider was changed HandyAvi s Quality slider is not visible XviD Configuration r Main Settings Profile Level as L5 more Encoding type Single pass more Target quantizer 31 00 calc Frame Weight Quant Modifiers 0 W 1 00 Add Remove Zone Options More Advanced Options L J Load Defaults Decoder Options Figure 35 XviD CODEC 117 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual HandyAvi s Quality slider DOES control quality for this CODEC Create an Animation Video Animation Video Overview Animation refers to a sequence of images that when played in order at sufficient speed appear to be a film or video of something that actually happened Nearly everyone is familiar with Disney s animated film techniques where artists draw a series of images each of which is slightly different than the previous image When these
4. Stack Images Make Movie from Still Images Telescope Port Telescope Controls Figure 118 That brings up the Stack Images control window f Stack Images Astronomy Application lt Avi File cA MARS marsCropped 0009 avi Browse Proress MEEN Stack Images Figure 119 Browse Brings up a file selector window Select an AVI file containing the images you want to stack In the above example the marsCropped 0009 avi file was captured using the Create an astronomy Video capture mode Progress If the image stacking process is underway the progress bar will proceed from left to right indicating the progress of the stacking algorithm You can see in the above example that image stacking is about 1 10th finished Stack Images Begin the image stacking operation Stacking can be aborted using the Escape key or the Cancel button Cancel If image stacking was NOT underway this causes the Stack Images window to close If image stacking IS underway a message box pops up asking Would you like to abort image stacking If you answer yes the frames that have already been processed will be averaged and displayed in a Stacked Image Window Stacked Image window After stacking has completed either by normal completion or by Cancel or Escape key a Stacked Image Window will be displayed showing the result of the image stacking operation 205 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Stacked Image F
5. Typically JPEG is run with a quality factor of 75 In Figure 21 above we see that storing an image as a JPEG image with a quality factor of 75 instead of as a bmp file reduces the size of the file from 672 8 Kilobytes to 70 4 Kilobytes We see that it is very difficult if not impossible to see any difference between Figure 21 and Figure 22 so compression did not seem to degrade the image very much and it did reduce the file size from 672 8 Kilobytes to 70 4 Kilobytes We see in Figure 22 that the image has degraded slightly due to the lower quality factor of 50 The degradation is barely noticeable if you look carefully at the side of the horse s face where the white and brown hair join you can see that the boundary is no longer smooth We see in Figure 23 that the image has degraded very noticeably due to the very low quality factor The file is very small however 9 9 Kilobytes instead of the original 672 8 Kilobytes The above merely illustrates the concept of lossy compression Again there are MANY compression schemes that have been invented They all behave a little differently They are all designed to reduce the size of the image file without noticeably degrading the image when it is displayed Why do you care You care because the AVI files that you will be generating consist of a collection of images stored in a file Movies are made up of many images that are displayed rapidly in succession If you do not use compression your AV
6. GS Properties Output 0 Video Decoder Out 0 Video Tuner In 1 Video Composite In 2 Video SVideo In 3 Video Composite In Miden Seo in Related Pin 6 Audio Line In 1 Audio Decoder Out Link Related Streams Figure 9 You can see that we have opened the Input pull down Video Composite In means HandyAvi will see the video stream from a camera plugged into the adapter s Composite Video input port a standard Phono Plug If instead you plug an S Video source into the adapter from a VCR or DVD player etc and choose 2 Video SVideo In then HandyAvi will see the video stream of the S Video device that you have plugged in Note that most surveillance cameras output Video Composite signals i e NTSC signals in many countries PAL in many others We have a Watec 902H2 ULTIMATE camera that we are using for Meteor Detection We plug its Video Composite output into the GA VD204 adapter or other USB Video adapter and then plug the adapter into the USB port HandyAvi sees the video and everything works well Image Capture Modes Note that some adapters check to see if you are using a USB 1 port or a USB 2 port Some of them will NOT allow you to set higher resolutions like 640 x 480 if you are using a USB 1 port This is usually undocumented and can be puzzling which is why we are mentioning it here It should be noted that the Watec 902H2 ULTIMATE is an EXTREMELY sensitive low light camera 0001 Lux suppose
7. Video Format This button causes display of a window provided by the manufacturer of your webcam For a Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000 the window that comes up looks like this Video Format Compression Video Standard None Frame Rate 30 000 a I Frame Interval a 30 00 is Flip Horizontal J P Frame Interval ze Color Space Compression I Re 24 v Output Size Quality 640 x 480 w ok cce ay Figure 4 This window may be used to change the video format settings of your camera In particular the Frame Rate tells how many frames per second your camera will capture although your camera driver will sometimes override this if it is set to an automatic setting The Output Size selection allows you to select the frame size in pixels of the images that the camera will be taking Both the ToUcam and the Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000 for example allow the image sizes shown here 33 andyavi 5 0 User s Manual Output Size 320 x 240 M Figure 5 HandyAvi will automatically save and restore your Video Format settings if possible Video Settings There is also a button called Video Settings This will bring up the webcam manufacturer s video settings window and will allow you to change other types of camera settings such as contrast color brightness sensitivity etc depending on how many items the camera manufacturer allows you to modify The Video Settings window for the Logite
8. C BatchOutput __MARSTEST 0001 avi C BatchOutput WhaleBreath 000 1 avi C BatchOutput volcano 000 Lavi Figure 107 Select Files to Convert Tools Add Files to List This brings up a standard Microsoft file selector You may select as many files as desired After selecting files you may select more files by again using Add Files to List You may select files from different directories on subsequent invocations of Add Files to List Remove Selected Files The file list is a standard Microsoft Multiple Selection Dialog window which means you can select highlight one or more files The selected files will be removed from the list The actual files themselves will not be deleted the selected items will merely be removed from the list 179 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Remove All Files This will remove all files from the list so that you can start over again if necessary Again the actual files themselves will not be deleted all items will merely be removed from the list Select Compression Scheme CODEC Codec list There is a pull down list of compression CODECs that exist on your machine You can select one of them to compress the data so that the Time Lapse movies that you are building are smaller than they would be otherwise The list is numbered for convenience Please note that some CODECs are installed and some are uninstalled We have chosen to use an asterisk to designate uninstalled CODEC
9. Default Cancel Figure 27 DVSD Codec DVSD allow you just two Quality options Either Fastest or not HandyAvi s Quality slider has no effect E intel Indeo Video 4 4 Encoder Configuration Encoder Controls Access Key l Enable Scalability Bidirectional Prediction Load Default Transparency Minimum Viewport Size None bul Width fo Quality Best v Height fo Figure 28 V41 CODEC IV41 allows just two Quality settings Quick Compress or not HandyAvi s Quality slider DOES control quality for this CODEC 113 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual E ndeo video 5 10 Encoder Configuration Encoder Controls Access Key Quick Compress F Enable Scalability Transparency None v Miewport Size Full image X Figure 29 IV50 CODEC IV50 allows just two Quality settings Quick Compress or not HandyAvi s Quality slider DOES control quality for this CODEC Configure PICVideo M JPEG 3 M JPEG Decompressor View Settings r Single User Single CPU Decompressor View License Brightness 0 IV Enable Codec Provided by Pegasus Imaging Corporation S I Adyanced Deblocking Web iran gear pereeweeeeereweteeene Support support com 100 0 100 T Assume Normalized YUV Telephone 813 875 7575 EENE Swap Fields FAX 813 875 7705 ontas Force YUV Output ae eee eee ee ee rie 100 Regstration Code m M JPEG Compressor Settings rSingl
10. Do not close Figure 77 yet Use Figure 77 to select an appropriate sized crop box If you use one of the ones listed compression schemes are more likely to work should you decide to create a compressed cropped AVI file Alternatively you can grab corners or sides of the crop box to adjust its size The crop box can also be dragged Create a crop box of the appropriate size and drag it into position Here is what that should look like 161 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Figure 78 When you are happy with size and placement of the crop box close the Create a Cropped AVI File box Figure 77 A file selector will appear It will want the name of an AVI output file from you Provide a name for your new cropped AVI file and click OK on the file selector A Compression Selection window will appear Choose your compression codec You may wish to use uncompressed if you are working with astronomical images and you do not wish to sacrifice datatoa Click OK after choosing the compression scheme Your new cropped file will now be created If you open it you will see this 162 Tools Untitled avi 0 00 1 37 Sec Fr 0 CRUE Figure 79 A smaller file that will allow a program like RegiStax to run much faster than it would with the larger original images We could of course crop this more if we wished to do so but it looks pretty good as is and can be used as input to a program such as RegiSt
11. Figure 25 Cinepak CVID CODEC CVID has no adjustable quality option HandyAvi s Quality slider has no effect 83 andyavi 5 0 User s Manual DivX Codec Properties Use Divx profiles and watch video on your TV using Divx Cettified devices Main Codec Video r Codec Performance Encoding mode ree ESE Fastest for very high resolution live capture or High performance ates are necessary to retain full quality Balanced Default Better Quality Extreme Quality Insane Qualit m Frame Control Bidirectional coding Adaptive Single Consecutive Max Keyframe interval 300 frames Kepframe threshold 50 untracked blocks Motion Estimation Quarter pixel search Advanced Restore defaults Cancel Figure 26 DivX CODEC DivX allows you to select various Encoding Modes which essentially cause the quality to be higher or lower HandyAvi s Quality slider has no effect 84 Image Capture Modes Configure MainConcept DY Codec Main Concept Ltd 1999 2001 S A Grigoriey 1999 2001 Commercial Edition Release 2 0 4 Encoder l Change Fields Order IV Fastest 16 9 Decoder I Change Field Order P YUY2 disable F Preview Quality M UYVWY disable Default Cancel Figure 27 DVSD Codec DVSD allow you just two Quality options Either Fastest or not HandyAvi s Quality slider has no effect E intel Indeo Video 4
12. Figure 68 Figure 68 shows an enlarged Live Preview Frames window that has been sized with the Size option to the True Image Size of 320x240 which was the size selected in Figure 4 in the Capture Device section There is also a True Aspect Ratio Resize option Size True Aspect Ratio Resize Bigger e amp Smaller S Selection of Bigger will resize the window to a slightly bigger size while keeping the true aspect ratio of your image Pressing the b key will also perform this action Selection of Smaller will resize to a slightly smaller size while keeping the true aspect ratio of your image Pressing the s key will also perform this action If you close an enlarged window the images will again appear in the Live Video Preview window or the other window if it was the one that had been enlarged NOTE There are no blind times All motion is captured for each complete trail no matter how long it takes for the trail to complete This is due to the sophisticated image interleaving method we employ About Video Codecs Note You do not have to learn about codecs to use HandyAvi 105 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual However the purpose of a CODEC is to compress your video data so that your AVI files are smaller So if space on your hard drive is a consideration you will probably want to use a CODEC AVI files can be created either by using no compression uncompressed or by using one of literally hundred
13. MarsSmallTest avi File Capture Tools View Window Help i Toolbar v Status Bar AVI File Info AVI File Frame Time Log i Figure 149 The menu when a movie file is open The View menu offers the following commands Toolbar Shows or hides the toolbar Status Bar Shows or hides the status bar AVI File Info Displays file information for the selected AVI file AVI File Frame Time Log Displays the time log showing the time of each frame of a selected AVIfile Window Menu 259 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Help A New Window 7 Cascade Tile Arrange Icons v 1m 0004 avi Figure 150 The Window menu offers the following commands which enable you to arrange multiple views of multiple documents in the application window NOTE The Window menu is hidden unless at least one AVI movie file is open Cascade Arranges windows in an overlapped fashion Tile Arranges windows in nonoverlapped tiles Arrange Icons Arranges icons of closed windows Help Menu Help Topics About HandyAvi Purchase HandyAvi Install Registration Key Check for New Versions Registered to Figure 151 The Help menu offers the following commands which provide you assistance with this application Help Topics Offers you an index to topics on which you can get help About Displays the version number of HandyAvi Purchase HandyAvi Go to http Awww AZcendant com to purchase a HandyAvi license Install
14. Parameters Select Serial Port Select the serial port from the drop down list If the port says Ready it is available for use If it says Busy it is either being used by another process or somehow locked up and unavailable for use Refresh Port List This will rerun the algorithm to locate all serial ports Currently Selected Port This shows the port that has been selected and that will be used for communications Baud Combo Box allows you to set the baud rate for serial communications The other parameters are assumed to be 8 1 and none The baud rate cannot be set when the port is connected In the image shown above the serial port IS connected so the baud rate is grayed out When the port is disconnected you will be able to set the baud rate Asynchronous This check box allows you to switch from Synchronous Serial I O to Asynchronous Serial I O Some serial devices might need you to choose between Synchronous and Asynchronous Best way to test perhaps is to choose a setting while the port is disconnected then connect the port and issue a few Data Request Strings to see if the returned results are correct Use the setting that gives the best most consistent results When you hit OK then this setting will be Preferences remembered and will be used when we retrieve your data for display on the captured images Enter initialization string if required If not Leave blank If the device on the other end of the serial
15. Telescope Port Telescope Controls Figure 106 Batch Processing allows you to create Time Lapse AVI movie files from regular AVI movie files For example if you have a regular AVI movie file that was shot at 30 frames per second you can convert it to a Time Lapse movie by selecting for example every 30 frame The new movie would show the action at 30 times the speed of the original movie Batch means that you can list a bunch of AVI files and have them all converted without having to start them one at a time and constantly watch to see when one has completed so that you can start the next one HandyAvi will accept a list of AVI files and automatically convert them to Time Lapse files Here is the Batch Processing control panel showing a list of files selected by the user and showing the list of output files created by HandyAvi 178 Select Files to Convert C __MARS 29Dec07 Mars _MARSTEST avi E AAHOMEPAGE baja WhaleBreath avi E AAHOMEPAGE galapagos Videos volcano avi gt Select Compression Scheme CODEC 16 Morgan Multimedia M JPEG V3 codec Quality j 65 Add Files to List Remove Selected Files Remove All Files Select Output Frames Output every 4 4 th frame r Bells and Whistles 7 Sound bell after completion of each file Sound whistle after completion of all files m Set Output Directory for Converted Files V Set C BatchOutput Browse
16. r Tuning Mode i z fi fo l T Status _ Video Standards Locked NTSC_M m Input Figure 12 This window allows you to select the input television channel among other things On this particular board we have found that to input Channel 12 you have to enter 12 then click on Enter or the channel input is ignored Usually we would select Antenna unless we are connected to a cable There is a selection for Video Standards which includes NTSC_M NTSC_JM PAL_M PAL_N and PAL_COMBO The Tuning Mode includes TV and FM The Motion Detect Movie Setup Section Motion Detect Movie Setup Output File C _test MotionDetect avil rae Compression fi mjpg PICVideo M JPEG 3 VfW Cod v con figure Sensitivity H 36 4 Additional frames to capture after motion has stopped 0 Play back frame rate images per second 30 aber __ UREN sor Figure 38 This section of the motion detect video capture window allows you to set up the webcam for making a motion detect video 38 Image Capture Modes Output File Allows you to type in the path name of the new video file you want to create Note The background color of this field will be YELLOW if you have selected File Recycling in the Preferences panel and have the Use file recycling box checked The color is simply to notify you that file recycling is active Browse brings up a standard file selector window so that you can more
17. topic for more details on usage See the Crop and save tutorial for making cropped planetary AVI files for astronomical imaging You MUST have an open AVI file File Open in order to access the Crop and Save menu item This is an example of an open video file containing rather dim images of Saturn 159 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual HandyAvi satdoc avi joj xj Fie Capture Tools View Window Help 387 97 Figure 75 We now bring up the cropping tool available through the main menu 160 Tools View Window Help Play Video Frame Selector a a T Crop and Save N Batch operations Scan a File for Meteors Join AVI Files Stack Images Make Movie from Still Images Telescope Port Telescope Controls Figure 76 When you select Crop and Save from the Tools menu a default crop box will be created on your image A crop box selection window will also come up on top of your image Create a Cropped AVI File Please resize and reposition the crop box that is being displayed over your AVI file image The box is stretchable and moveable Or you may choose one of these preset sizes if you wish m Choose a preset crop box size 60x45 80x60 120x90 160x120 320x240 640x480 800x600 1024x768 Figure 77 Move the Create a Cropped AVI File crop box selection window out of the way so you can see your primary subject Saturn in this case
18. 88 Image Capture Modes Configure Microsoft MPEG 4 Video Codec 1 Copyright Microsoft Corp 1996 1999 Options Kepframe every Ei seconds Compression Control Smoothness 75 Crispness 4 Data Rate Kilobits per Second 3000 Figure 34 MP41 CODEC We were unable to determine any effect when the Smoothness slider was changed HandyAvi s Quality slider is not visible XviD Configuration r Main Settings Profile Level as L5 more Encoding type Single pass more Target quantizer 31 00 calc Frame Weight Quant Modifiers 0 W 1 00 Add Remove Zone Options More Advanced Options L J Load Defaults Decoder Options Figure 35 XviD CODEC 89 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual HandyAvi s Quality slider DOES control quality for this CODEC Create a Meteor Trail Video Meteor Trail Video Overview HandyAvi allows you to easily create meteor trail videos using a webcam HandyAvi employs a sophisticated motion detection algorithm which allows capture of ENTIRE meteor trails Your AVI file after a night of recording will be relatively small and contain only those frames associated with meteor trails or other objects moving across the sky such as airplane trails of course The system will also capture multiple lightning bolts and any other phenomena that trigger the motion detection system No
19. Se Se s P Moon 057 9 Lottude 33 22 Local 05 08 08 Local 08 44 51 Pacan Tracking Get fe0 1 avaiable on Longtude 11154 Sidereat 23 28 50 Some scones Set Figure 58 The above image shows the Location and Time Backlash Tracking Rate controls When one switches from LX200 Controls or Objects or Sky Flats to Location and Time Backlash Tracking Rate the Get operation of the first tab is automatically performed Telescope Location Enter the coordinates of the current location of the telescope into the telescope Type in the Latitude and Longitude then press Set to set the telescope s location into the telescope s internal memory Date Enter the current date Pressing Set then enters the data into the telescope NOTE Whenever Set is pressed the telescope updates the planet positions Mercury s position changes significantly from day to day so if the telescope is left set up for more than one day pressing the Set button in the Date area will cause the planet positions to be updated and will allow Mercury and Venus in particular to be accurately found Time Displays the current time and is updated every second by querying the telescope and displaying the results A new Local time can be entered in the edit box and then when Set is pressed it will be entered into the telescope HandyAvi also computes the corresponding sidereal time and enters that into the telescope also Tools The
20. and DEC will not change Note that the coordinates provided by a Get command are retrieved from the Telescope s data base Halt Immediately stop the telescope s motion 215 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Sync Causes the telescope s internal coordinate system to synchronize with the selected objects If your telescope is aligned and you somehow lost sync due to a power off for example you can locate and object in the sky point the telescope at it use the Object controls to select the object Get its coordinates and then press Sync The telescope will now be able to use its internal coordinate system to go to other objects These catalogs are the ones stored in the Meade LX 200 telescope They are 1 STAR a 2 SAO 3 GCVS 4 Messier a 216 The STAR catalog contains the 250 brightest stars 1 through 250 100 interesting double stars 251 through 350 and Sigma Octantis the southern pole star 351 STAR 901 through 909 are the planets in order from the sun with the moon being 903 instead of the earth i 901 Mercury ii 902 Venus iii 903 Moon iv 904 Mars v 905 Jupiter vi 906 Saturn vii 907 Uranus viii 908 Neptune ix 909 Pluto SAO catalog of stars Meade appears to have placed as many important objects as possible in the other databases then filled up the rest of the space to a total of 64 000 objects in the LX 200 More or fewer in other Meade telescopes with th
21. at the moment you should consider this number only a rough guide It is very unlikely to provide accurate positioning information 213 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Once focus is achieved the counter can be set to zero to provide at least some sense of where the focus position is was There are two other focus types Slow Stepper Motor and Fast Stepper Motor These are designed to accommodate a do it yourself stepper motor that is being used by the author of this section of the HandyAvi system The Meade focus motor port on the LX 200 labeled Focuser puts out 19 Volts or 19 Volts depending upon which direction the Meade standard DC focusing motor should run These voltages can be used instead as signals to control a stepper motor designed to replace the Meade DC motor With a stepper motor the focusing is precise and the counter will be completely accurate Newer Meade telescopes might have different focusing systems DYNAMIC FOCUS SECTION As the temperature drops the telescope will shrink and the focus position will change The Dynamic Focus control allows you to automatically compensate for the shrinkage by stepping the telescope focus any desired number of steps per hour Second Telescope Tab Location and Time 214 LK 200 Telescope Controls eS LX200 Controls Location Time Backlash Tracking Rate Objects Sky Flats Messier Date Dec Backlash Tracking Rate Time po Sidereal 060 7 i
22. etc Setting a sensitivity value essentially sets a noise threshold above which trigger events are recognized HandyAvi employs a sophisticated implicit dark frame algorithm to suppress camera noise and cosmic ray noise This method operates on the fly without interfering with normal frame capture i e no dead time is captured The algorithm allows stars to move slowly across the frame if the camera is unguided without triggering an event It also suppresses triggering on star scintillation twinkling caused by the Earth s atmosphere or triggering on cosmic ray events or on camera noise The sensitivity can be set during capture as well as before or after This allows you to adjust the sensitivity and test it while a video is being made You will be able to see which frames are captured by looking at the Last Captured Composite frame window in the Meteor Trail Create Movie Area Changing the sensitivity while meteor trail capture is underway is not recommended because each trigger event will cause the writing of a whole sequence of frames making it difficult to determine the true sensitivity That is why we allow the sensitivity to be set BEFORE starting the Create Movie function Pre Frames This slider allows you to specify how many image frames preceding the trigger frame will be written to your AVI output file Allowable values are 0 to 250 When a meteor or other motion is detected the system will write out as many frames pr
23. it can override the frame rate and set it to a lower value Under dim lighting the automatic settings for many webcams cause the frame rate to be reduced so that brighter images can be obtained You can see in Figure 7 that the original frame rate of 30 frames per second has been overridden so that the frame rate is now 5 frames per second By switching Full auto off you can manually set the frame rate override to 30 if you wish to capture more frames more quickly This is important because it can be puzzling if you are not aware of it Video Source The user here has selected a USB 2821 Device which is a USB Video Adapter so a Video Source button is now displayed 35 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual 36 Capture Device USB 2821 Device Ad Video Format Video Frame Size 640 X 480 Video Settings Frames per Second 30 Video Source Figure 8 The Video Source button will be displayed ONLY when the capture device you are using supports Video Source options Most webcams do NOT support the Video Source option However many USB video adapters and many video boards do support the Video Source option We have successfully used a USB 2 0 Video Adapter with Audio adapter Model GA VD204 which shows up as a USB 2821 Device with HandyAvi We have also successfully used USB video adapters produced by five other manufacturers Some adapters allow EITHER Video Composite signals to be input or S Video signals to be input Th
24. port The COM port can be selected by using the menu item Tools Telescope Port The following port selection window will come up USB Serial cables may be used but it should be noted that not all types of USB Serial cables are guaranteed to work Testing has shown that some of them do not meet the specifications of the Serial UART chips that they are supposed to substitute for Select Serial Port E x m Select Serial Port COM2 Communications Port COMI Communications Port COM2 Communications Port COM3 ATEN USB to Serial Cable Le Figure 55 Note that we have been using IOGEAR s GUC232A USB Serial cables successfully for several years with the LX 200 out in the field and have had excellent results Also note that for USB webcams we often need longer cables than the standard length of a webcam cable We have very successfully used USB repeater or extension cables such as the Model G2LUB16 IOGEAR s Premium USB Active Extension Booster Cable These cables come in 16 foot lengths and require no separate power supplies We have used 3 of them in series with no difficulty and their sales literature says they will work at distances of up to 75 feet They do seem to fail if they get wet during a rainstorm however They seem to recover when they dry out but we have never been able to dry one out in the field after it gets wet Bring spares Opening the Telescope Controls To open the telescope contro
25. s Manual Turn Light Off allows you to test your settings by attempting to turn the light off This does not test the Duration setting About Video Codecs Note You do not have to learn about codecs to use HandyAvi However the purpose of a CODEC is to compress your video data so that your AVI files are smaller So if space on your hard drive is a consideration you will probably want to use a CODEC AVI files can be created either by using no compression uncompressed or by using one of literally hundreds of compression schemes codecs is short for Coder decoder that have been created by various companies Uncompressed files are generally MUCH larger than compressed files In order for HandyAvi to use a particular compression schemes it must have been installed on your computer Many AVI codecs probably already have been installed on your machine Some come from Microsoft as part of your operating system Some come from the manufacturers of webcams that you might have installed You can even download and install codecs from the Internet Some are free and others are not http Awww fourcc org is a site that lists and describes almost all known codecs If you surf to that site you will want to click on codec list to see all of the codecs Codecs have four character names known as Four Character Codes or FOURCC names This is how they are identified internally so that software applications such as HandyAvi can know which codec
26. then painted the lines skipped the first time the even lines for example that the flickering would be minimized i e the viewer wouldn t notice any flickering So one full television frame then consisted of all the odd lines of a scene followed by the even lines of the scene Basically two images taken at slightly different times interlaced together That works great for television However for digital images it doesn t work so well The two frames images are taken at slightly different times and the scene might change slightly during the time interval Also the two frames can be slightly out of alignment This leads to noticeable scan lines within the images Certain cameras produce interlaced video NTSC cameras for example You can see scan lines in the video images produced by such cameras Deinterlacing will make the images look better generally Deinterlacing options are as follows 1 Even Fields Only Replaces each odd numbered line in the image with the immediately succeeding even numbered line 2 Odd Fields Only Replaces each even numbered line in the image with the immediately preceding odd numbered line 3 Blending Replaces each pixel of each line of the image with the average value of that pixel and the corresponding pixel of the immediately succeeding line The deinterlacing options were added to HandyAvi to accommodate people who have cameras that are producing files containing interlaced images If your files
27. 08 08 15 20 2008 Frame 9 Thu May 08 08 15 20 2008 Frame 10 Thu May 08 08 15 20 2008 Frame 11 Thu May 08 08 15 20 2008 Frame 12 Thu May 08 08 15 20 2008 Frame 13 Thu May 08 08 15 20 2008 Frame 14 Thu May 08 08 15 20 2008 Frame 15 Thu May 08 08 15 20 2008 Frame 16 Thu May 08 08 15 20 2008 Figure 134 When an AVI file is open and when it is the active window then the View AVI File Frame Time Log menu item will bring up the above window showing the time of each frame in the AVI file This is handy when the motion detect mode is being used for surveillance The above data can be copied to a text file by selecting the text then doing CTRL c CTRL v into a text file pane You can correlate frames and times by opening the Tools Frame Selector menu item and looking at individual frames The frame time logs can be eliminated by unchecking the Allow log files date time of each image to be generated option in the Preferences panel 234 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Command Line Parameters Command Line Parameters HandyAvi has several command line parameters that you might want to use NOTE You cannot use two or more of these at the same time Only one is allowed at a time The first one encountered on a command line will be used and others will be ignored runtimelapsecapture When HandyAvi starts up with this parameter it will bring up the Time Lapse Capture control window and begin making a movie The new movie w
28. 147 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Third Telescope Tab Objects 148 LX200 Controls Location Time Backlash Tracking Rate Objects Sky Flats Messer Object STAR 304 R A 08 09 36 Go To ar Figure 59 The above image shows the Objects tab Objects Choose a catalog LX 200 Telescope Controls LX200 Controls Location Time Bac Figure 60 You can then enter an object number and either Get the coordinates of the object and display them or Go To the object which will cause the telescope to display the coordinates of the object and begin slewing to the object Note that if you type in a number for an object that does not exist the only indication will be that the RA and DEC will not change Note that the coordinates provided by a Get command are retrieved from the Telescope s data base Halt Immediately stop the telescope s motion Sync Causes the telescope s internal coordinate system to synchronize with the selected objects If your telescope is aligned and you somehow lost sync due to a power off for example you can locate and object in the sky point the telescope at it use the Object controls to select the object Get its coordinates and then press Sync The telescope will now be able to use its internal coordinate system to go to other objects These catalogs are the ones stored in the Meade LX 200 telescope They are 1 STAR a The STAR catalog contai
29. 166 Tools Figure 87 Quality 50 Figure 88 Quality 100 Note that the noise in the image shows up very well with quality set to 50 and 100 but is not so evident with quality set to 25 What is usually done is to start with high quality settings and then reduce the setting until the noise no longer predominates We then invoke the sort algorithm by 167 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual clicking on sort All features bigger than the noise features participate in the sorting process and we sort on actual planetary features instead of noise Note that the images are displayed as they are processed Various counters display which frame is being worked on as the sorting process is carried out NOTE that the button labeled View when depressed causes the JPEG compressed decompressed image to be displayed instead of the original AVI frame It comes on automatically when you are adjusting the sort quality Turn it off when you want to see the actual AVI images as they are in your AVI file Here is the result of sorting on two different Adjust sort quality values 25 and 26 Frame Selection Options Select every 2 nd frame Select Al Unselect Al Sort by IPEG size for Astronomy Se en J0 Original Frame Number 18 Original Frame Number 32 02 Original Frame Number 19 O3 Original Frame Number 13 4 Original Frame Number 27 D5 Original Frame Number 25 D6 Original Frame Number 31 O7 Original Fra
30. 2257 44 29 37 00 12 247 Maikab 230048 51200 25 249 NGcoon 00 07 18 27 4300 130 19 p Ge Peg NGCO0TZ 00 07 18 2741 00 150 14 p Ge Peg NGCOOIG 000778 0170 140 00 p Gs Psc NGC0004 00 07 25 82200 a0 Q0 Gx Pec NGCO0OS 00 0748 S2100 140 QO p Gx And NGCO0IS Oboes 32300 Q0 Q0 And NGCO0O7 00 08 24 2955 00 QO 25 Gx Sd 2 os NNR AR 72 O T nn nn Nt Pen i Figure 61 This list is merely for convenience Selection of an item does not currently drive the telescope Other Data includes the Meade Star number e g Alphekka is 165 Altair is 226 Fourth Telescope Tab Sky Flats 150 LX 200 Telescope Controls LX200 Controls Location Time Backlash Tracking Rate Objects Sky Flats Messer RA AE o sDD MM SS DEC 00 01 56 Stat Stop Figure 62 Astronomers using CCD cameras designed for deep space work often require frames called Flats which can be used to counteract tiny imperfections and dust particles within the optics train There are several methods of making flats including constructing a light box covering the scope with a tee shirt etc One method is to take a sky flat This is done typically during twilight Frames are taken of empty sky and the background sky brightness is captured and the dust particles become visible in the captured frame The captured frame can be used later to subtract out the dust particle contribution to images of deep space objects The difficult part
31. 4 Encoder Configuration Encoder Controls Access Key l Enable Scalability Bidirectional Prediction Load Default Transparency Minimum Viewport Size None bul Width fo Quality Best v Height fo Figure 28 V41 CODEC IV41 allows just two Quality settings Quick Compress or not HandyAvi s Quality slider DOES control quality for this CODEC 85 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual E ndeo video 5 10 Encoder Configuration Encoder Controls Access Key Quick Compress F Enable Scalability Transparency None v Miewport Size Full image X Figure 29 IV50 CODEC IV50 allows just two Quality settings Quick Compress or not HandyAvi s Quality slider DOES control quality for this CODEC Configure PICVideo M JPEG 3 M JPEG Decompressor View Settings r Single User Single CPU Decompressor View License Brightness 0 IV Enable Codec Provided by Pegasus Imaging Corporation S I Adyanced Deblocking Web iran gear pereeweeeeereweteeene Support support com 100 0 100 T Assume Normalized YUV Telephone 813 875 7575 EENE Swap Fields FAX 813 875 7705 ontas Force YUV Output ae eee eee ee ee rie 100 Regstration Code m M JPEG Compressor Settings rSingle User Sngle CPU Compressor License Compression Quality Encode Normalized YUV Provided by Pegasus Imaging Corporation LT Lear 16 Web http wiew p
32. Capture Modes Create a new output file for each group sequentially numbered This check box tells HandyAvi to use the Output file field as a base name for generating sequentially numbered files For example if the file name you entered in the Output file field was C Astronomy avi then HandyAvi will first generate a file named C Astronomy 0001 avi and place the first group of frames into that file It will then generate the name C Astronomy 0002 avi and place the second group of frames into that file The third group of frames will be written to C Astronomy 0003 avi and so on Why is this useful Say you plan to make AVI files of Jupiter and you decide to create groups of 1000 frames every 10 minutes 600 seconds for the purpose of making a movie of Jupiter rotating If all of the frames go into one file then you would have to edit the file by hand to create an AVI file for each group of 1000 frames for subsequent submission to a stacking program such as RegiStax If you use the Create a new output file for each group sequentially numbered feature then each of the groups of 1000 images goes into a separate file thus eliminating a LOT of hand editing Each individual file can then be sorted for best images using HandyAvi s Crop and Save and Frame Selector tools and the best images for each group can then be submitted to a stacking program HandyAvi s Stack Images system or an external program such as RegiStax in or
33. Change List Times panel runs to adjust the times at which objects are scheduled for shooting Delete Selected Line This will delete the line you selected in the Go To List window Delete All Lines This will delete all the line in the Go To List window so you can start over OK This will apply all of your changes Cancel This will cancel all of your changes View the List This will bring up the list in a NotePad editor so you can hand edit it if you wish to do so Change List Times This will bring up the following panel Tools a Enter start and stop times and increment See http aa usno navy mil data docs RS_OneYear php for twilight tables Start time 12 Mar 2013 20 06 00 Usually the start of Nautical Twilight Stop time 13 Mar 2013 06 30 00 Usually the end of Nautical Twilight Padding 87 seconds calculated during GENERATE operation SE Apply to C MyProjects HandyAvi Telescope ExampleGoToF older 12Mar201 Browse 13 Mar 2013 05 07 58 a 13 Mar 2013 05 12 57 13 Mar 2013 05 17 56 13 Mar 2013 05 22 54 13 Mar 2013 05 27 58 13 Mar 2013 05 32 56 13 Mar 2013 05 37 56 13 Mar 2013 05 43 08 13 Mar 2013 05 48 18 13 Mar 2013 05 53 15 13 Mar 2013 05 58 12 13 Mar 2013 06 03 09 13 Mar 2013 06 08 06 13 Mar 2013 06 13 03 13 Mar 2013 06 18 00 Zz 13 Mar 2013 06 22 57 13 Mar 2013 06 27 54 Start time The time at which the FIRST image in the Go To list is to be started
34. Compression Scheme mjpg Rate 25000 Scale 1000 Figure 19 Figure 19 shows that the compression scheme used to compress the file MarsSmallTest avi was mjpg which is the FOURCC code for the Morgan Multimedia MJPG codec HandyAvi will also attempt to open files compressed with codecs that are NOT installed on your machine If the required codec is not installed HandyAvi will of course be unable to PLAY the file but it will try to produce an AVI File Info report as shown in Figure 19 so that you will be able to identify the missing codec If you know which codec was used you might be able to locate an installable version of the codec via the Internet and install it Then you would be able to play the file using HandyAvi If you can play the file using HandyAvi then you can also use HandyAvi s editing features to create a new file using the same or a different codec and include or exclude selected frames from the new AVI file Many CODECs allow you to have control over the Quality factor or Compression factor that will let you make your files smaller Learn more about Compression Quality Learn more about Configure windows About Compression Quality There are many video compression schemes The purpose of a video compression scheme is to make a smaller file without sacrificing too much detail in the images An uncompressed AVI file is comprised of a series of bmp image files There are actually many different bmp
35. Motion Detect Settings window rectangles are active immediately i e as soon as they are created they will begin operating This will allow you to tune the sensitivity if necessary During capture of an AVI file when one or more of these sensitive regions have been created image frames will be captured to the output file ONLY when motion occurs within one or more of the rectangles This will allow you to ignore trees blowing in the wind for example but capture frames when motion occurs in the areas of interest Three sensitive rectangles are shown above One would show any movement around the table at the other end of the pool one would show any movement on a small portion of the path to the left of the pool and the third smaller window covers a small region of the pool deck Any movement in any or all of these areas subject to the sensitivity setting of course would cause frames to be captured Motion in all other areas of the image is ignored Save Saves the rectangles in a file for future use Restore Restores the rectangles stored in a file so that they will be used Notes Frames taken by the camera will appear in the current Live Video Preview frame visible in the Meteor Trail Create Movie Area Frames being written out in response to a trigger event and being sent to your video output file will appear briefly rapidly in the Last Motion Detect frame area visible in the Meteor Trail Create Movie Area After completion of a trail
36. Options Keyframe every seconds Compression Control 44 75 m Data Rate Kilobits per Second 3000 al ey ok _Cancet_ Figure 33 MP43 CODEC We were unable to determine any effect when the Smoothness slider was changed HandyAvi s Quality slider is not visible 140 Image Capture Modes Configure Microsoft MPEG 4 Video Codec 1 Copyright Microsoft Corp 1996 1999 Options Kepframe every Ei seconds Compression Control Smoothness 75 Crispness 4 Data Rate Kilobits per Second 3000 Figure 34 MP41 CODEC We were unable to determine any effect when the Smoothness slider was changed HandyAvi s Quality slider is not visible XviD Configuration r Main Settings Profile Level as L5 more Encoding type Single pass more Target quantizer 31 00 calc Frame Weight Quant Modifiers 0 W 1 00 Add Remove Zone Options More Advanced Options L J Load Defaults Decoder Options Figure 35 XviD CODEC 141 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual HandyAvi s Quality slider DOES control quality for this CODEC 142 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Telescope Controls Telescope COM Port In order to communicate with the telescope the telescope must be powered up have its RS232 port connected by a serial cable to your PC and HandyAvi must be talking to the correct COM
37. Original Frame Number 65 Original Frame Number 66 Original Frame Number 67 Original Frame Number 68 Figure 104 NOTE however that the check marks within the new part of the selected area are not checked This is easily remedied by clicking the check box of one of the unchecked items in the selected region Original Frame Number 55 Original Frame Number 56 Original Frame Number 57 Original Frame Number 58 Original Frame Number 59 Original Frame Number 60 Original Frame Number 61 Original Frame Number 62 Original Frame Number 63 Original Frame Number 64 Original Frame Number 65 Original Frame Number 66 Original Frame Number 67 Original Frame Number 68 Figure 105 Note that the above procedure can be used to select ALL of the items and then either set or clear all of their check boxes So now you should be able to select any block of items for inclusion in a new AVI file produced by HandyAvi Typically you will sort the images then select the first one or two hundred items and create a new AVI file from them Create Time Lapse movies from regular movies Batch Processing Create Time Lapse Movies from Regular Movies 177 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual HandyAvi has a batch processing mode that can be found under the Tools menu where it is shown as Batch Operations View Help l Play Video Batch operations Scan a File for Meteors Join AVI Files Stack Images Make Movie from Still Images
38. Registration Key Install registration key A key is obtained via Email when you purchase HandyAvi Check for New Versions Check for new versions of HandyAvi via the internet Registered To Displays registration data for current user ToolBar window 260 MANA Figure 152 Menus The toolbar window shown above allows rapid selection of AVI File open Time Lapse capture Motion Detect capture Astronomical Image Capture Meteor Detect capture and Animation capture 261 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Index A AVI File Frame Time Log 233 B Batch Processing 2 0 00 177 c Capture Menu eeeeeeeeeeees 257 Crop and Save 159 D Deinterlace 223 Displaying AVI Movies 157 F files managing ceeeceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeteees 257 Frame Selector ccccceeeee 170 H HandyAvi OVervieW cccceeeeeeeees 1 How to get to the time lapse video Control WINKOW eeeeeeeeeeeeeeees 4 How to Open the Meteor Trail Video Controles 91 How to open the motion detect video control WINdOW eeeeeeees 31 l Install Key ssesseesesssereesesssrrene 239 J Join AVI Files s 202 L Light GOMMON ssa ecicnntveeteeevecatabcieeecte 15 M Make an AVI Clip of the Best Frames R EE A E AA AAE 163 Meteor Trail Overview 0 90 Motion detect Video Overview 30 O Opening Telescope Controls 143 211 S Scan A File For Meteors
39. Second 30 Figure 8 The Video Source button will be displayed ONLY when the capture device you are using supports Video Source options Most webcams do NOT support the Video Source option However many USB video adapters and many video boards do support the Video Source option We have successfully used a USB 2 0 Video Adapter with Audio adapter Model GA VD204 which shows up as a USB 2821 Device with HandyAvi We have also successfully used USB video adapters produced by five other manufacturers Some adapters allow EITHER Video Composite signals to be input or S Video signals to be input The Video Source window will allow you to choose which one will be seen by HandyAvi Here is what the USB 2821 s Video Source windows looks like ta Crossbar Input Output 1 Video Composite In fo Video Decoder Out 0 Video Tuner In 2 Video SVideo In 3 Video Composite In 4 SVideo In Related Pin 6 Audio Line In 1 Audio Decoder Out Figure 9 You can see that we have opened the Input pull down Video Composite In means HandyAvi will see the video stream from a camera plugged into the adapter s Composite Video input port a standard Phono Plug If instead you plug an S Video source into the adapter from a VCR or DVD player etc and choose 2 Video SVideo In then HandyAvi will see the video stream of the S Video device that you have plugged in Note that most surveillance
40. The video produced by this board looks exceptionally clean Very sharp images This board allows selection of output image sizes of 80x60 88x72 128x96 160x120 176x144 240x176 240x180 320x240 352x240 352x288 640x240 640x288 640x480 720x240 720x288 or 720x480 Things that didn t work 254 We bought an InstantDVD MP3 device from ADS Tech because it looked like it might work with HandyAvi We tried to make it work with HandyAvi then finally wrote the manufacturer We received the following reply Unfortunately because this device is hardware encoded it requires specific software for its video capture correctly So basically it will only be compatible with the software that it is bundled with for the video capture aspect of the device We still think that with enough research we might get it to work but we are not devoting time to that at the moment given that good USB video adapters work well with HandyAvi We tried again more recently but the device doesn t even show up in the USB device list shown by Microsoft s Device Manager Very puzzling Very non standard Tips 255 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Menus File Menu Commands amp HandyAvi Capture Tools View Help Open Ctril O Preferences 1 m 0004 avi 2 m 0003 avi 3 m 0002 avi 4 m 0001 avi Exit Figure 144 The File menu offers the following commands Open Opens an AVI file Close Closes an opened AVI file Preferenc
41. To file that either already has data in it or create an empty file to start from scratch We provide a complete Messier Marathon file that can be used as a Starting point We call that file a Go To List When HandyAvi is installed you can find our example GoToList txt file in the same directory where HandyAvi was installed For example C Program Files HandyAvi MessierGoToList In the MessierGoToList directory there are two files gotolist txt and ProcessMessierlmages vbs You can consider these to be backup files in case you need them We have also copied these files C HandyAvi MessierGoToList As shown above we chose to work in the c HandyAv MessierGotoListi directory and use the GoToList txt file that we copied to that directory You could of course create some new directory and copy the GoToList txt file to that directory then work in that new directory All images captured will go to the directory that you choose to work in Gotolist txt is the file we used to automatically shoot the Messier marathon in 2013 You will probably want to use it as a starting point There are instructions in the file that will help you setup data for the year and day you plan to shoot and the Latitude and Longitude of your shooting site Please read the instructions in the file 219 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual 220 The Change List Times button will greatly simplify changing the times at which each shot will begin ProcessMessierlmages vbs i
42. a composite image will appear in the Last Motion Detect frame area If you were capturing a meteor for example the entire meteor track would be shown in this one frame The Meteor Trail Create Movie Area 103 tanayavi 5 0 User s Manual Create Movie TART see Live Video Preview Enlarge Adjust Sensitivity Enlarge Output File Size 2690 KB Frame number 28 Status Monitoring sensitivity adjustments Next FTP upload 7 5 2008 0910 Last FTP upload 7 4 2008 1650 Figure 67 START Starts the meteor trail movie recording process NOTE Output files will automatically be limited to less than 2 Gigabytes the AVI file size limit A new file with a unique new name will be generated and used automatically whenever the limit is about to be exceeded See Preferences for more information about Maximum AVI File Size STOP Stops the meteor trail movie making process Enlarge If you use one of the Enlarge buttons a new window will be created containing the video image This new window can be resized to any size by clicking and dragging an edge or corner of the window This new window also contains a Size option that will allow you to select a True Image Size option which will resize the window to show the actual size of the captured video images Pressing the t key will also perform the True Image Size function True Aspect Ratio Resize True Image Size T 104 Image Capture Modes E Live Preview Frames SE
43. a new recording file Recording will continue with no intervention required on the part of you the user What this means is that you don t have to worry about creating files that are unreadable because they exceed the AVI file size limit If you are using HandyAvi for surveillance it means that you can record data without worry Up until your hard drive fills up of course Why is there a 2 Gigabyte limit It is because of the internal structure of AVI files AVI files are composed of images but they also contain pointers that allow software systems to rapidly locate various pieces of data One of the data areas is at the end of the file and is an index to all of the image frames Near the beginning of the file there is a pointer to the beginning of the index The amount of space provided for that pointer is just big enough to hold the number that represents 2 Gigabytes If your file exceeds the limit the pointer will not point to the index and the file will be useless So it is important that file not be allowed to exceed the size limit HandyAvi handles this for you automatically AVI File Frame Time Log 233 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Frame 0 Thu May 08 08 15 19 2008 Frame 1 Thu May 08 08 15 19 2008 Frame 2 Thu May 08 08 15 19 2008 Frame 3 Thu May 08 08 15 19 2008 Frame 4 Thu May 08 08 15 19 2008 Frame 5 Thu May 08 08 15 19 2008 Frame 6 Thu May 08 08 15 20 2008 Frame 7 Thu May 08 08 15 20 2008 Frame 8 Thu May
44. are followed by how many black pixels are followed by how many white pixels etc across the row If you are sending a printed text document there are usually a LOT of white pixels then a few black pixels then a LOT of white pixels etc in a row You can actually get very good compression for most faxed documents using this strategy AND it is lossless i e the document that shows up at the other end is essentially identical to the original document Unfortunately lossless compression cannot be done for most images That is why lossy compression is used Lossy compression Lossy compression refers to a compression scheme that compresses the data but loses some of the data If you compress an image using a lossy compression scheme the restored image when decompressed is NOT identical to the original image However if the scheme is a good one the images will look almost identical There are MANY lossy compression schemes some of which are very well known such as JPEG We can use JPEG to illustrate Lossy compression 107 andy avi 5 0 User s Manual igh quality 358 Kilobytes Figure 20 JPEG Quality Factor 99 Very h 108 Image Capture Modes tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Figure 22 JPEG Quality Factor 50 reduced quality 23 4 Kilobytes 4 j a TA Figure 23 JPEG Quality Factor 10 notice ably reduced quality 9 9 Kilobytes Each of the above images when stored as a bmp file requ
45. at the beginning of the Compression line Note that HandyAvi will also allow you to read work with and display AVI files produced by other software or cameras and will select the proper decompression scheme automatically IF the required decompression scheme has been installed on your computer HandyAvi will also allow you to read a file that was written using one compression scheme and write a new AVI file using a new compression scheme So you can convert AVI files from one compression scheme to another if the required codecs have been installed on your machine Configure Brings up the compression CODEC s configuration window This button only appears if the selected compression scheme HAS a configuration window Note that the Quality slider and the quality settings in some CODECs do not cooperate In the case of the mjpg CODEC the Forced quality slider determines the degree of JPEG compression and the Quality slider in the Animation Movie Setup window has absolutely no effect Other CODECs we have tested do not override our Quality slider When in doubt you should test by setting the quality and capturing for example three frames of the same scene use Time Lapse and take one frame every 3 seconds or so Then change the quality factor and make another movie The size of the two resultant AVI movie files should be different See Configure Window Examples for information on the Configure options of various CODECs Lear
46. be displayed in the current Live Video Preview frame visible in the Meteor Trail Create Movie Area Each frame that is selected for inclusion in the AVI output file is displayed in the Last Captured Frame area when it is sent to the AVI output file HandyAvi can be used to take groups of frames as fast as your webcam can capture images spaced by any time interval desired For example if you specify 20 frames every 45 seconds then every 45 seconds 20 frames will be captured at the camera s frame rate Most cameras allow their frame rate to be set to some desired value The fame rate of a Philips ToUcam for example can be set to 5 10 15 20 25 or 30 frames per second This group of frames feature is very useful for capturing planetary rotation Important Please note that the Seconds field will accept floating point values if you wish to use them Take group of 500 frames every 600 000 seconds Figure 51 A setting of Take group of 1 frames every 01 seconds would allow frames to be captured continuously at a rate of 100 frames per second IF the camera could deliver frames that fast If the camera only delivers frames at a rate of 30 frames per second then Take group of 1 frames every 01 seconds would cause frames to be captured continuously at the rate of 30 frames per second assuming your machine is fast enough to support frame storage and any compression operations if you chose to compress your images 74 Image
47. cameras output Video Composite signals i e NTSC signals in many countries PAL in many others We have a Watec 902H2 ULTIMATE camera that we are using for Meteor Detection We plug its Video Composite output into the GA VD204 adapter or other USB Video adapter and then plug the adapter into the USB port HandyAvi sees the video and everything works well tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Note that some adapters check to see if you are using a USB 1 port or a USB 2 port Some of them will NOT allow you to set higher resolutions like 640 x 480 if you are using a USB 1 port This is usually undocumented and can be puzzling which is why we are mentioning it here It should be noted that the Watec 902H2 ULTIMATE is an EXTREMELY sensitive low light camera 0001 Lux supposedly and is more expensive than most cameras used for surveillance work We needed the sensitivity for meteor detection There are of course MANY cheaper cameras that output NTSC Video Composite signals that can be used with HandyAvi via a USB Video adapter The user here has now selected a Hauppauge WinTV 885 Video Capture board Capture Device Hauppauge WinTV 885 Video Capture v Video Format Video Frame Size 720 X 480 Video Settings Frames per Second 30 Video Source Figure 10 The Video Source button now exposes this manufacturer s window a Output 0 Video Decoder Out 0 Video Tuner In 1 Video Composite In 2 Video SVideo
48. catalog or Computerized New General Catalog appears to be another designation for the NGC catalog within the Meade database a The IC or Index Catalog contains 5386 objects One of them IC 434 contains the Horse head Nebula 8 UGC a The Uppsala General Catalog contains 12 921 Galaxies numbered apparently from 1 to 12921 List Brings up an object list consisting of the Meade LX 200 guide stars followed by the NGC object catalog 14 03 56 60 23 00 14 15 40 1 amp 10 00 1534 44 26 42 00 16 29 28 26 27 00 18 37 00 33 47 00 19 30 44 19 50 48 20 41 28 21 44 12 22 57 44 23 04 48 00 07 18 00 07 18 00 07 18 00 07 25 00 07 48 00 08 18 00 08 24 None AR Figure 61 This list is merely for convenience Selection of an item does not currently drive the telescope Other Data includes the Meade Star number e g Alohekka is 165 Altair is 226 Fourth Telescope Tab Sky Flats LX200 Controls Location Time Backlash Tracking Rate Objects Sky Flats i Messier RA AEE 35 19 fo sDD MM SS DEC 00 01 56 _ Stat Stop Figure 62 Astronomers using CCD cameras designed for deep space work often require frames called Flats which can be used to counteract tiny imperfections and dust particles within the optics train There are several methods of making flats including constructing a light box covering the scope with a tee shirt etc One method is to take a sky flat This is done typically du
49. do not contain interlaced images then you will probably NOT want to use the deinterlace option Deinterlacing is supported only if you have DirectX installed IMPORTANT You normally would not use deinterlacing on images that were not interlaced to begin with When working with non interlaced files your Preferences window should have the Do not user deinterlacing Default option checked as shown above Note HandyAvi will output images as they appear when you display them within HandyAvi If you choose to deinterlace input images the HandyAvi output will consist of deinterlaced images If you do not check the deinterlacing check box in the preferences window then no deinterlacing operations will occur Examples Figure 129 Interlaced Figure 130 Deinterlaced Note The above images are 2x their original size to better show the interlacing artifacts Preferences From the Paint Shop Pro manual Video images can contain visible scan lines caused by television signals that update every second set of scan lines in each frame In these images every second set of lines can be missing or can be out of alignment with other lines Use the Deinterlace feature to eliminate missing or misaligned lines from your image and to reconstruct missing information If the image contains any noise it may become more visible after removing the scan lines NTSC National TV Standards Committee A color TV standard developed in the U S and
50. feature which allows use of PowerLinc USB 1132U X 10 PowerLinc USB 1132CU X 10 and PowerLinc USB 2414U X 10control devices which plug in to your computer via a USB port NOTE The PowerLinc USB 1132U has been discontinued by the manufacturer Its replacement is the PowerLinc USB 1132CU There is also a PowerLinc 2414U HandyAvi now handles each of these devices The 1132U 1132CU and 2414U devices also plug into your house wiring These devices are sold by SmartHome do a Google search They also sell a line of X 10 Appliance Modules X 10 is a method for sending control signals through your house wiring extension cords etc The control signals can turn a relay on and off within an Appliance Module If a lamp is plugged into an Appliance Module the lamp will turn on and off when the appropriate control signals are sent through the house wiring HandyAvi also supports a NetPower 8800 device which can also control a light The 8800 does not use X 10 It is however one of the most inexpensive ways to control a light with HandyAvi There is a Light Controls button on the Time Lapse Capture window that will bring up the Light Controls panel 16 Image Capture Modes Light Controls Choose Light Contol Device PowerLinc 1132U 1132CU or 2414U goseossceoososooooscesesoesesesoseeseg Necenseneessensensensensconsensenseees Setup NetPower 8800 Device Select Serial Port Currently selected port COM8 Test Turn li
51. for this CODEC 197 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual E ndeo video 5 10 Encoder Configuration Encoder Controls Access Key Quick Compress F Enable Scalability Transparency None v Miewport Size Full image X Figure 29 IV50 CODEC IV50 allows just two Quality settings Quick Compress or not HandyAvi s Quality slider DOES control quality for this CODEC Configure PICVideo M JPEG 3 M JPEG Decompressor View Settings r Single User Single CPU Decompressor View License Brightness 0 IV Enable Codec Provided by Pegasus Imaging Corporation S I Adyanced Deblocking Web iran gear pereeweeeeereweteeene Support support com 100 0 100 T Assume Normalized YUV Telephone 813 875 7575 EENE Swap Fields FAX 813 875 7705 ontas Force YUV Output ae eee eee ee ee rie 100 Regstration Code m M JPEG Compressor Settings rSingle User Sngle CPU Compressor License Compression Quality Encode Normalized YUV Provided by Pegasus Imaging Corporation LT Lear 16 Web http wiew pegasusimaging com GUME TAA ee BO et sue t t corn Luminance Qualty 2 Subsameling Telephone 813 875 7575 FAX 813 875 7705 Chrominance Quatty 22 aa C phi 17 2Filds If More Than 240 Lines z R m 4 Make Primary M JPEG Codec Figure 30 PICVideo MJPG CODEC There are at least two MJPG CODEC vendors out there As far as we know you hav
52. from the new AVI file Many CODECs allow you to have control over the Quality factor or Compression factor that will let you make your files smaller Learn more about Compression Quality Learn more about Configure windows About Compression Quality There are many video compression schemes The purpose of a video compression scheme is to make a smaller file without sacrificing too much detail in the images An uncompressed AVI file is comprised of a series of bmp image files There are actually many different bmp file formats Each of the formats is designed to reconstruct an image pixel by pixel Typically AVI files are made up of bmp files which have 3 Bytes for each pixel The three bytes contain the Red Green and Blue values for a pixel Thus a 640x480 uncompressed image requires approximately 3 x 640 x 480 bytes approximately because there may be some pad bytes at the end of each line There is also a small amount of header data describing the size color content length and width of the images etc 3 x 640 x 480 Bytes is 921600 bytes or almost 1 Megabyte If your AVI video camera is running at 30 frames images per second then you will be storing 30 x 921600 Bytes per second or 27 6 Megabytes per second 10 minutes of video would require 16 588 800 000 bytes or 16 5 Gigabytes That is why video compression is usually a good idea You would like to make the file smaller without messing up the images too much Lossless Comp
53. if the required codecs have been installed on your machine Configure Brings up the compression CODEC s configuration window This button only appears if the selected compression scheme HAS a configuration window Note that the Quality slider and the quality settings in some CODECs do not cooperate In the case of the mjpg CODEC the Forced quality slider determines the degree of JPEG compression and the Quality slider in the motion detect Movie Setup window has absolutely no effect Other CODECs we have tested do not override our Quality slider When in doubt you should test by setting the quality and capturing for example three frames of the same scene use Time Lapse and take one frame every 3 seconds or so Then change the quality factor and make another movie The size of the two resultant AVI movie files should be different See Configure Window Examples for information on the Configure options of various CODECs Learn more about video codecs here Quality Adjust the quality of the compression scheme Most compression schemes create smaller files because they are actually discarding tiny image details By discarding more and larger image details you can produce a smaller AVI file If the Quality is set to 100 then little or no image data is discarded and the resultant AVI file will be large If the Quality is set to 0 then theoretically all image data is discarded and the resultant AVI file will contain blank images
54. in the display box here seen as 75 ALWAYS overrides the value set by the HandyAvi Quality sliders HandyAvi s Quality slider appears but has no effect We ran into a problem with the above version of the Morgan CODEC in Vista when we used image sizes other than 160x120 320x240 or 640x480 Caused a HandyAvi crash that we could not find a work around for We sent Email to the vendor describing the problem Received no answer after several days This CODEC seems to work just fine in Windows XP though In the past we have always used the Morgan Multimedia MJPG Codec but we have now installed the PICVideo MJPG CODEC and are using it instead on Vista 87 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Microsoft MPEG 4 Video Codec V2 Copyright Microsoft Corp 1996 1999 Options Keyframe every seconds Compression Control EE 75 r Data Rate Kilobits per Second 3000 4 ia ET Figure 32 mp42 CODEC We were unable to determine any effect when the Smoothness slider was changed HandyAvi s Quality slider is not visible Microsoft MPEG 4 Video Codec V3 Copyright Microsoft Corp 1996 1999 Options Keyframe every seconds Compression Control 44 75 m Data Rate Kilobits per Second 3000 al ey ok _Cancet_ Figure 33 MP43 CODEC We were unable to determine any effect when the Smoothness slider was changed HandyAvi s Quality slider is not visible
55. in concert with the camera controls Also Note that we currently have the telescope in park mode as described below COORDINATES SECTION GET gets the current RA and DEC from the telescope and displays them GO goes to the RA and DEC that are shown in the RA and DEC edit boxes NOTE that the formats must be exactly as shown You can enter any valid RA and DEC and then press GO and the telescope will slew to that position HALT stops the telescope motion immediately in case you notice that your camera is going to be crunched by the fork arms or your cables are stretching too much or you simply change your mind about slewing to the selected coordinates MOTION SECTION The speed can be set to any of the four indicated Meade telescope slewing speeds The NORTH SOUTH EAST and WEST push buttons are operated by using the left mouse button These buttons work just like the buttons on the Meade keypad i e 144 Telescope Controls the telescope will move in the direction indicated while the button is held down Motion will stop when the button is released After motion has been completed the coordinates are updated and displayed PARK SECTION The Park feature allows you to park the telescope i e holds it motionless It does this by turning on guide mode then automatically holding the East button down This stops the guide motor completely so that the telescope stops tracking the sky Why use park If you want to leave the telesc
56. input devices There are LOTS of them out there We have followed Microsoft standards however so this greatly increases the likelihood that a particular device will work with HandyAvi e We have tested many webcams All of them we have tried work well with HandyAvi e We have tested many USB Video adapter cables All of them we have tried work well with HandyAvi e We have tested some video boards such as the WinTV boards sold by Hauppauge and have obtained good results When in doubt though we recommend that you try your video device with a trial version of HandyAvi before purchasing HandyAvi Camera Tips Tips regarding various cameras adapters and video boards we have actually used and how we have connected them to our computer We are currently running Windows Vista on our development machines We also test HandyAvi on Windows 2000 and Windows XP of course Definitions We define some terms here so that you will know for sure what we are talking about further down this page 249 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual 1 Webcams Webcam small camera that plugs directly into the USB port on a PC computer Manufacturers include Philips Logitech Labtec Creative Labs Microsoft and others Webcam chips come in two varieties CCD Preferred by astronomers because of better performance in low light conditions i e they tend to be more sensitive CMOS Cheaper NTSC the output signal produced by most hand held vid
57. it will now display a Video Source button in the Capture Device panel allowing you to bring up the manufacturer s source selection window Video Boards We have two video boards WinTV PVR 250 This board is normally used to watch television on a PC The PVR 250 board has 1 ATV input Phono jack 2 An S Video composite video input jack 253 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual 3 An audio input jack Line in 4 Aremote control IR receiver socket The TV input Phono jack can be used to input an NTSC signal from a camera or a VCR The board will also deliver video signals from an S Video device such as a VCR or DVD player HandyAvi now has a Video Source button that accesses this board s Crossbar properties allowing you to select the input and output modes WinTV HVR 1800 This board came with our HP Media Center PC This board displays in the Capture Device area as a WinTV 885 board HandyAvi now exposes the manufacturer s TV Tuner window if their driver supports this feature This board s driver does support this feature We can change channels and view Television from within HandyAvi using this board We have also successfully fed the NTSC signal from our NTSC cameras into the Composite Video port of the WinTV device and have successfully accessed the camera s video using HandyAvi There were two different Composite Video choices and we had to try each one to see which one would deliver a signal
58. manually set the frame rate override to 30 if you wish to capture more frames more quickly This is important because it can be puzzling if you are not aware of it Video Source The user here has selected a USB 2821 Device which is a USB Video Adapter so a Video Source button is now displayed 67 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual 68 Capture Device USB 2821 Device Ad Video Format Video Frame Size 640 X 480 Video Settings Frames per Second 30 Video Source Figure 8 The Video Source button will be displayed ONLY when the capture device you are using supports Video Source options Most webcams do NOT support the Video Source option However many USB video adapters and many video boards do support the Video Source option We have successfully used a USB 2 0 Video Adapter with Audio adapter Model GA VD204 which shows up as a USB 2821 Device with HandyAvi We have also successfully used USB video adapters produced by five other manufacturers Some adapters allow EITHER Video Composite signals to be input or S Video signals to be input The Video Source window will allow you to choose which one will be seen by HandyAvi Here is what the USB 2821 s Video Source windows looks like GS Properties Output 0 Video Decoder Out 0 Video Tuner In 1 Video Composite In 2 Video SVideo In 3 Video Composite In Miden Seo in Related Pin 6 Audio Line In 1 Audio Decoder Out Link Related Stre
59. may install 183 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual one or more You may download and install compression schemes from the internet At the time of this writing there are over 280 CODECs listed at http Awww fourcc org Note that one of the selection items is called Uncompressed If you select Uncompressed the image data in your files will not be compressed Your files will be LARGE However each image in an Uncompressed file will be exactly what the camera captured This is important for some applications Learn more about video CODECs here HandyAvi displays the FOURCC value for the compressor in brackets at the beginning of the Compression line Note that HandyAvi will also allow you to read a foreign AVI file and will select the proper decompression scheme automatically IF the required decompression scheme has been installed on your computer HandyAvi will also allow you to read a file that used one compression scheme and write a new AVI file using a new compression scheme So you can convert AVI files from one compression scheme to another if the required CODECs have been installed on your machine Quality The Quality slider lets you adjust the quality of the compression scheme Most compression schemes create smaller files because they are actually discarding tiny image details By discarding more and larger image details you can produce a smaller AVI file If the Quality is set to 100 then little or no image data is disc
60. myFile avi 0001 avi already existed then the new file would be named C directory1 myFile avi O002 avi The suffix will count up until there is no pre existing file of the same name This way no files are ever overwritten and the conversion process can run unattended Esc Escape key If you have started a long conversion process and then decide you wish to quit the conversion operations press the Esc key This will bring up a dialog requester window asking you Would you like to terminate batch processing Yes will terminate No will continue processing Scan an AVI File for Meteors Scan an AVI File for Meteors Overview This HandyAvi feature allows you to scan an existing AVI file for meteors 181 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual View _Help Batch operations Scan a File for Meteors Join AVI Files Ly Stack Images Make Movie from Still Images Telescope Port Telescope Controls Figure 108 Instead of getting the input from a webcam this method gets its input from an AVI file When the AVI File has been entered and the file has been opened successfully the frames are automatically displayed in the Live Video Preview window just as if they had been coming from a live webcam All frames are sent After the last frame is sent the program starts over with the first frame and again sends all frames During this time the system is in the Monitoring sensitivity adjustments mode This mode is actually
61. new capture sequence Help V Email the first 5 thumbnail images of each new capture sequence V Enable EMail Transmission Figure 40 This feature of HandyAvi allows you to send an Email message whenever motion is detected SMTP This field must contain the address or TCP IP address of a valid SMTP server If you are successfully sending Email using Outlook or Netscape then you have an SMTP server Your Internet Service Provider ISP supplied you with one when you signed up with them If you know what it is use it If not you could call your ISP or look on line to find the name of your SMTP server Or you could display it via your Email program In Netscape 1 On the Edit menu click Mail and Newsgroup Account Settings 2 Inthe window that comes up click Server Settings 3 In the window that then comes up click Advanced 4 The name of your SMTP server shows up in the Server field Write it down 5 Close the Netscape windows without changing anything Enter the SMTP address you wrote down into the HandyAvi SMTP field in Figure 40 In Outlook 1 On the Tools menu click E mail Accounts 43 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Select View or change existing e mail accounts and then click Next Select your ISP account and then click Change A panel will come up One of the fields says Outgoing mail server SMTP Your SMTP server will show up in that field Write it down Close the Outlook panels
62. of taking sky flats is that the sky is not empty of stars and twilight may not last long enough HandyAvi contains an algorithm for making sky flats First use the first tab LX 200 Controls to point the telescope at a region of the sky containing as few bright stars as possible Set the Milliseconds field to the length of time that the telescope should move in Center mode Start Sends a command to the telescope to set its speed to Center as opposed to Guide Find or Slew speed Telescope Controls The telescope will then move North then East then South then West then North etc Each move will be for the number of milliseconds that were entered in the Milliseconds field This will trace a square in the sky The purpose is to cause the star background to move quickly so that the stars if they are dim enough will not leave visible trails This will allow a sky flat to be taken either during twilight or anytime from light polluted skies Stop Stops the telescope s motion and returns its speed to Guide mode Fifth Telescope Tab Messier Marathon Telescope Controls Location Time Backlash Tracking Rete Objects Sky Rats Messer Automatic Go To and Shoot mage List This tab can be used with an LX 200 telescope and a version of Maxim DL that supports scripting every version except the Basic version last time we checked We used this tab to automatically capture Messier Marathon objec
63. per second your camera will capture although your camera driver will sometimes override this if it is set to an automatic setting The Output Size selection allows you to select the frame size in pixels of the images that the camera will be taking Both the ToUcam and the Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000 for example allow the image sizes shown here 120 Image Capture Modes Output Size 320 x 240 M 320 x 240 default Figure 5 HandyAvi will automatically save and restore your Video Format settings if possible Video Settings There is also a button called Video Settings This will bring up the webcam manufacturer s video settings window and will allow you to change other types of camera settings such as contrast color brightness sensitivity etc depending on how many items the camera manufacturer allows you to modify The Video Settings window for the Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000 webcam looks like this Camera controls Zoom Face Tracking Figure 6 The image in Figure 6 shows that the camera is in Full Auto Mode which means that the camera will automatically adjust for changes in light levels It will sometimes change the frame rate automatically when in this mode The Video Settings window for the Philips ToUcam webcam looks like this 121 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Properties Ex Image controls Camera controls Audio controls Perfomance Control D me is OK aj V amp x Full aut
64. port needs to receive some sort of initialization string before it can begin receiving data requests enter it here The system will not try to read the serial port to see if the initialization string responded with a text message Enter Data Request String Enter data request strings here You can enter more than one data request They must be separated by semicolons For example if you have a device that gets temperature humidity and air pressure and the commands to provide the data are getTemp getHum and getAP then you would enter getTemp getHum getAP Test Connect Serial Port If the port is disconnected this button will say Connect Serial Port Click on this button to connect the serial port Disconnect Serial Port If the port is connected this button will say Disconnect Serial Port Click on this button to disconnect the serial port Port Status The port status will give the current status of the serial port either Connected or Disconnected Send Initialization String This will transmit the initialization string to the serial port If you are testing and your device requires and initialization string click on this button to send the initialization string Send Data Request String Click on this button to send the data request s Returned Data This box will contain the returned data from the device in response to the data request string s Each returned string will have an additional blank space place in f
65. quality slider determines the degree of JPEG compression and the Quality slider in the Meteor Detect Movie Setup window has absolutely no effect Other CODECs we have tested do not override our Quality slider When in doubt you should test by setting the quality and capturing for example three frames of the same scene use Time Lapse and take one frame every 3 seconds or so Then change the quality factor and make another movie The size of the two resultant AVI movie files should be different See Configure Window Examples for information on the Configure options of various CODECs Learn more about video codecs here Quality Adjust the quality of the compression scheme Most compression schemes create smaller files because they are actually discarding tiny image details By discarding more and larger image details you can produce a smaller AVI file If the Quality is set to 100 then little or no image data is discarded and the resultant AVI file will be large If the Quality is set to 0 then theoretically all image data is discarded and the resultant AVI file will contain blank images Of course each codec is created by software people who may have thought about this and limited it so they do not throw away all of the image data even if the Quality is zero Note that each codec is different and some may even ignore the Quality setting or not allow it to be set Also note that lossy compression schemes are used in many application
66. resize the window to a slightly bigger size while keeping the true aspect ratio of your image Pressing the b key will also perform this action Selection of Smaller will resize to a slightly smaller size while keeping the true aspect ratio of your image Pressing the s key will also perform this action If you close an enlarged window the images will again appear in the Live Video Preview window or the other window if it was the one that had been enlarged Light Control We wanted to make a time lapse video of a Night Blooming Cereus cactus The Night Blooming Cereus flowers open up at dusk and stay open all night In the morning the flowers react to sunlight and close up and wilt usually by 10 00 AM We illuminated the cactus with a 100 Watt light and made a time lapse movie The result was tremendously disappointing The Night Blooming Cereus flowers were much more sensitive to light than we had expected The 100 Watt light was enough to trigger the wilt response even before the flowers opened We then had to wait a year to try it again When the cactus was again ready to bloom we made our next attempt by taking one frame every 60 seconds and turning on the light for 2 seconds and taking each frame just before turning the 15 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual light off This allowed the camera to adjust to the light and the cactus did not respond adversely to the brief 2 second light flashes To accomplish the above we added a
67. results making movies of Jupiter etc The driver for this camera does a better job of removing itself when the camera is unplugged than does the Quickcam VC USB Video Adapters USB Video Adapters allow NTSC and PAL cameras to be connected to the computer s USB port In order to connect a typical surveillance camera to HandyAvi you need an adapter that converts NTSC to USB These adapters are readily available and many companies are selling them There is a lot of variation however and each type of adapter has it own features Some have quirks We wonder why different adapters have different restrictions on image sizes supported 250 Tips USB 2 0 Video Adapter with Audio We have successfully used a USB 2 0 Video Adapter with Audio device with HandyAvi This adapter seems to work well and we ve used it during the Geminid meteor shower to capture meteor trails with a Watec WAT 902H2 Ultimate camera This adapter allows selection of image sizes of 160x120 176x144 320x240 352x240 640x240 640x480 720x240 720x480 352x480 or 360x480 Powers itself from the USB port No external power supply is required EasyCAP Video Adapter with Audio We have also successfully used the EasyCAP Video Adapter with Audio Model Number DC60 device with HandyAvi It has some peculiarities though that you should be aware of USE CAUTION WHEN USING THIS DEVICE DO NOT UNPLUG IT FROM THE USB PORT IF IT IS SELECTED FOR CAPTURE
68. right arrow key on the keyboard whenever the movie is not playing The arrow keys should be used to control the display when in full screen mode K Display the previous frame You can step backwards through the movie a frame at a time You can also step backward by pressing the left arrow key on the keyboard whenever the movie is not playing The arrow keys should be used to control the display when in full screen mode Slider There is also a slider that will let you move quickly to any section of the movie There is no keyboard equivalent for this function so it cannot be done in full screen mode There is a time field that shows the time from the beginning of the movie The total time length of the movie is also displayed after the The number of the frame being displayed is shown in Fr In the above image we see that we have paused the movie it is displaying frame number 56 and we are 2 28 seconds into a movie whose total time length is 8 04 seconds Note that additional Tools menu items and View menu items become available in HandyAvi main window when a movie file is open The Tools items allow frame selection and editing of the AVI movie The View items allow you to view AVI information stored in the AVI file such as the compression codec used to create the file There is also a View item to display the frame time log the time at which each frame was captured when you made your video if you have not switched this feature off i
69. seconds then every 45 seconds 20 frames will be captured at the camera s frame rate Most cameras allow their frame rate to be set to some desired value The frame rate of a Philips ToUcam for example can be set to 5 10 15 20 25 or 30 frames per second The group of frames feature is very useful for capturing planetary rotation HandyAvi also has a centering feature that will send Meade LX 200 type commands to a telescope to automatically keep the planetary image centered in the webcam s view field This allows unattended capture of planetary images After capturing images HandyAvi s AVI file editing features can be used to select the best 200 frames from for example a file containing 1000 frames and make a new 200 frame AVI video file Then by using HandyAvi s Stack Images tool or a freeware program like RegiStax to process the 200 frame AVI file the result would be one relatively excellent still frame image The processed result will typically be FAR better than any of the original video frames Here is an example 60 Image Capture Modes Figure 44 Best frame out of 1000 frames in an AVI file Figure 45 200 best frames stacked in HandyAvi 61 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Figure 46 200 best frames stacked in RegiStax V4 HandyAvi uses Phase Correlation for image registration That is presumably the algorithm also used in RegiStax But RegiStax in addition has an optimization subs
70. selected a USB 2821 Device which is a USB Video Adapter so a Video Source button is now displayed 122 Image Capture Modes Capture Device USB 2821 Device v Video Format Video Frame Size 640 X 480 Video Settings Frames per Second 30 Figure 8 The Video Source button will be displayed ONLY when the capture device you are using supports Video Source options Most webcams do NOT support the Video Source option However many USB video adapters and many video boards do support the Video Source option We have successfully used a USB 2 0 Video Adapter with Audio adapter Model GA VD204 which shows up as a USB 2821 Device with HandyAvi We have also successfully used USB video adapters produced by five other manufacturers Some adapters allow EITHER Video Composite signals to be input or S Video signals to be input The Video Source window will allow you to choose which one will be seen by HandyAvi Here is what the USB 2821 s Video Source windows looks like ta Crossbar Input Output 1 Video Composite In fo Video Decoder Out 0 Video Tuner In 2 Video SVideo In 3 Video Composite In 4 SVideo In Related Pin 6 Audio Line In 1 Audio Decoder Out Figure 9 You can see that we have opened the Input pull down Video Composite In means HandyAvi will see the video stream from a camera plugged into the adapter s Composite Video input port a standard Phono
71. sent to the video output file The first frame of course is always sent to the video output file when the capture session is START ed The sensitivity can be set during capture as well as before or after This allows you to adjust the sensitivity and test it while a video is being made You will be able to see which frames are captured by looking at the Last Motion Detect frame window in the Motion Detect Display Area Each frame taken by the camera will appear the current Live Video Preview frame visible in the Motion Detect Display Area Each frame captured and sent to your video output file will appear in the Last Motion Detect frame area visible in the Motion Detect Display Area Additional frames to capture after motion has stopped Enter the number of frames to add continue recording after motion detection is no longer being triggered This was added for wildlife photography where for example a cougar triggers motion detection as he approaches a lake for a drink While he is drinking not much motion occurs so the motion detection triggering ceases but the cougar is still there drinking so you want to continue recording If your camera is operating at 30 frames per second and you want to continue recording for 1 minute you would want to enter the number 1800 30 times 60 seconds Play back frame rate images per second Determines how fast your frames will be displayed when you play the AVI movie that you have recorded If y
72. so that brighter images can be obtained You can see in Figure 7 that the original frame rate of 30 frames per second has been overridden so that the frame rate is now 5 frames per second By switching Full auto off you can manually set the frame rate override to 30 if you wish to capture more frames more quickly This is important because it can be puzzling if you are not aware of it Video Source The user here has selected a USB 2821 Device which is a USB Video Adapter so a Video Source button is now displayed 95 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual 96 Capture Device USB 2821 Device Ad Video Format Video Frame Size 640 X 480 Video Settings Frames per Second 30 Video Source Figure 8 The Video Source button will be displayed ONLY when the capture device you are using supports Video Source options Most webcams do NOT support the Video Source option However many USB video adapters and many video boards do support the Video Source option We have successfully used a USB 2 0 Video Adapter with Audio adapter Model GA VD204 which shows up as a USB 2821 Device with HandyAvi We have also successfully used USB video adapters produced by five other manufacturers Some adapters allow EITHER Video Composite signals to be input or S Video signals to be input The Video Source window will allow you to choose which one will be seen by HandyAvi Here is what the USB 2821 s Video Source windows looks like
73. the movie viewer The Time Lapse Display Area Live Video Preview Enlarge Last Time Lapse Frame Enlarge Status Previewing Live Video Figure 17 This area of the Time Lapse Capture window contains two video display areas The left one is a live video preview window showing what the camera is actually seeing at the frame rate at which it is currently running The right window shows the last frame that was captured to your new video file If nothing has yet been captured it shows a blank as seen in the above image Enlarge If you use one of the Enlarge buttons a new window will be created containing the video image This new window can be resized to any size by clicking and dragging an edge or corner of the window This new window also contains a Size option that will allow you to select a True Image Size option which will resize the window to show the actual size of the captured video images Pressing the t key will also perform the True Image Size function Size True Aspect Ratio Resize _ True Image Size T 14 Image Capture Modes Live Preview Frames Figure 18 Figure 18 shows an enlarged Live Preview Frames window that has been sized with the Size option to the True Image Size of 320x240 which was the size selected in Figure 3 in the Capture Device section There is also a True Aspect Ratio Resize option Size True Aspect Ratio Resize Bigger B a Smaller S Selection of Bigger will
74. the slew rate when auto centering is active Our calibration algorithm will calibrate successfully IF reasonable motion actually occurs within 20 seconds in the Dec direction and within 20 seconds in the RA direction Calibration is usually achieved within 2 seconds You should use the telescope controls N S E W buttons with Guide mode set to see what your telescope is doing If everything is working perfectly pressing one of these buttons should result in slow motion in the selected direction within a second or so of pressing the button Our experience with the ETX 120 has been that Dec motion reversal often takes 10 or 20 seconds RA motion reversal has occurred generally within 3 to 5 seconds Supposedly setting Az RA Percent and Alt Dec Percent should make the responses faster We currently have Az RA set to 10 and Alt Dec set to 75 This will vary greatly depending on the behavior of a particular telescope Make sure that no jumps or fast motion followed by slower motion occurs when you set these What is needed for auto centering is uniform motion in each direction hopefully with very little delay when a direction is reversed We have used many types of webcams and astronomy cams such as ones made by Meade and Orion and have used Barlow lenses and have achieved auto centering functionality for the ETX scopes Auto centering should work for other types of Meade scopes but we have not tested them If auto centering is active the Cre
75. to Open the Animation Control Window B A HandyAvi File Tools View Help Da Time Lapse Images Motion Detect Images zl HandyAvi File Capture Tools View Help Astronomy Images Meteor Trail Images Animation Images N Or Figure 69 From the main HandyAvi window select the Animation Images menu item to bring up the Animation Capture window 118 Image Capture Modes r Capture Device Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000 7 Video Frame Size 640 X 480 Frames per Second 30 Animation Movie Setup Output File C TEST Animation avi _Browse Compression mjpg Morgan Multimedia M JPEG V3 codec Quality Play back rate images per second 30 Capture Current Frame Close Output File Status Previewing Live Video f E Onion tast ihe Review frames 50 Cr Bik 3 Review Lig bi gt j Figure 70 This window controls all of the Animation photography functions of HandyAvi The Capture Device Section Hauppauge WinTV 885 Video Capture 7 Video Format Video Frame Size 720 X 480 Video Settings Frames per Second 30 TV Tuner i Figure 3 Capture Device This section of the Capture window allows you to choose a webcam i e a capture device If you have several webcams plugged in they will all be listed here if you click on the pull down arrow In addition some other types of video capture dev
76. v Configure Quality 1 65 Play back frame rate images per second 25 ext Status Figure 116 Above is the window that controls the AVI file joining process Select Files to Join Add Files to List This button bring up a file selector allowing you to select AVI files to include in the list This may be used multiple times to list as many files as desired Remove Selected Files This button will remove files that are highlighted Files may be highlighted by clicking on them Normal Microsoft conventions apply i e control left mouse click to select files one at a time or shift left click and drag to select multiple files Remove All Files This will remove all files from the list so you can start over Select Compression Scheme Pull down window Allow you to select the compression scheme that will be used in the new movie Quality If the compression scheme allows a quality setting this field will be shown and you can set the quality Quality determines the size of the output file It also determines the quality of the images in the output file High quality images are larger than low quality images However images of very low quality typically look awful Most people use qualities of at least 65 or better Play back frame rate This determines how many images are played back per second when the new movie is viewed A setting of 1 would look like a slide show with one second between each frame You might
77. very noticeably due to the very low quality factor The file is very small however 9 9 Kilobytes instead of the original 672 8 Kilobytes The above merely illustrates the concept of lossy compression Again there are MANY compression schemes that have been invented They all behave a little differently They are all designed to reduce the size of the image file without noticeably degrading the image when it is displayed Why do you care You care because the AVI files that you will be generating consist of a collection of images stored in a file Movies are made up of many images that are displayed rapidly in succession If you do not use compression your AVI files will be HUGE See also Video CODECs Configure Window Examples Configure Window Examples The following images show configuration windows associated with various CODECs that might be available on your machine These are accessible through the Configure button that appears on the movie setup windows IF the selected Compression scheme has a configuration window associated with it This shows the Movie Setup window for Time Lapse captures so you can see where the Configure button and Quality slider are 134 Image Capture Modes r Time Lapse Movie Setup Output File C _test timelapse avi Browse Compression Impa PICVideo M JPEG 3 VAW Cod Configure Take one frame every 1 000 seconds Play back rate images per second 30 Light Control
78. video format settings of your camera In particular the Frame Rate tells how many frames per second your camera will capture although your camera driver will sometimes override this if it is set to an automatic setting The Output Size selection allows you to select the frame size in pixels of the images that the camera will be taking Both the ToUcam and the Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000 for example allow the image sizes shown here Output Size 320 x 240 320 x 240 default Figure 5 HandyAvi will automatically save and restore your Video Format settings if possible Video Settings There is also a button called Video Settings This will bring up the webcam manufacturer s video settings window and will allow you to change other types of camera settings such as contrast color brightness sensitivity etc depending on how many items the camera manufacturer allows you to modify The Video Settings window for the Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000 webcam looks like this 93 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual pate Camera controls Zoom Face Tracking V Full Auto Mode m Image Modes Black and White Miror Horizontal Mirror Vertical Mii Compensation ite balance 4 Shutter Speed Gain Incandescent m User Defaults i Ci cchioreecent Save Restore Restore 3 Daylight Flickerless Of C On Figure 6 The image in Figure 6 shows t
79. 00 Controls Location Time Backlash Tracking Rate Objects Sky Flats Messier ve Park Focus Dynamic Focus HHMMsS C Slo akn e RA 331 Er no WEST T pec 00 07 56 HALT E cude Pon eae amp oes Figure 56 The above image shows what you will see if the telescope port is working and the telescope is communicating properly with HandyAvi If everything is well the RA and DEC fields will contain numbers If the telescope is not responding for any reason the RA and DEC fields will be blank Note that the telescope control window is a modeless dialog window so it can be left up and operated in concert with the camera controls Also Note that we currently have the telescope in park mode as described below COORDINATES SECTION GET gets the current RA and DEC from the telescope and displays them GO goes to the RA and DEC that are shown in the RA and DEC edit boxes NOTE that the formats must be exactly as shown You can enter any valid RA and DEC and then press GO and the telescope will slew to that position 211 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual 212 HALT stops the telescope motion immediately in case you notice that your camera is going to be crunched by the fork arms or your cables are stretching too much or you simply change your mind about slewing to the selected coordinates MOTION SECTION The speed can be set to any of the four indicated Meade telescope slewing speeds The NORTH SOUTH
80. 08 0910 Last FTP upload 7 2 2008 1142 Figure 42 This area of the Motion Detect Capture window contains two video display areas The left one is a live video preview window showing what the camera is actually seeing at the frame rate at which it is currently running The right window shows the last frame that was captured to your new video file If nothing has yet been captured it shows a blank as seen in the above image Enlarge If you use one of the Enlarge buttons a new window will be created containing the video image This new window can be resized to any size by clicking and dragging an edge or corner of the window This new window also contains a Size option that will allow you to select a True Image Size option which will resize the window to show the actual size of the captured video images Pressing the t key will also perform the True Image Size function True Aspect Ratio Resize _ True Image Size L Live Preview Frames Size True Aspect Ratio Resize Figure 43 46 Image Capture Modes Figure 43 shows an enlarged Live Preview Frames window that has been sized with the Size option set to the True Image Size of 320x240 which was the size selected in Figure 5 in the Capture Device section There is also a True Aspect Ratio Resize option Size True Aspect Ratio Resize Bigger B Smaller S k Selection of Bigger will resize the window to a slightly bigger size while keeping the true as
81. 1 and Figure 22 so compression did not seem to degrade the image very much and it did reduce the file size from 672 8 Kilobytes to 70 4 Kilobytes We see in Figure 22 that the image has degraded slightly due to the lower quality factor of 50 The degradation is barely noticeable if you look carefully at the side of the horse s face where the white and brown hair join you can see that the boundary is no longer smooth 22 Image Capture Modes We see in Figure 23 that the image has degraded very noticeably due to the very low quality factor The file is very small however 9 9 Kilobytes instead of the original 672 8 Kilobytes The above merely illustrates the concept of lossy compression Again there are MANY compression schemes that have been invented They all behave a little differently They are all designed to reduce the size of the image file without noticeably degrading the image when it is displayed Why do you care You care because the AVI files that you will be generating consist of a collection of images stored in a file Movies are made up of many images that are displayed rapidly in succession If you do not use compression your AVI files will be HUGE See also Video CODECs Configure Window Examples Configure Window Examples The following images show configuration windows associated with various CODEGs that might be available on your machine These are accessible through the Configure button that appears on the movi
82. 21600 Bytes per second or 27 6 Megabytes per second 10 minutes of video would require 16 588 800 000 bytes or 16 5 Gigabytes That is why video compression is usually a good idea You would like to make the file smaller without messing up the images too much 48 Image Capture Modes Lossless Compression Lossless compression refers to a compression scheme that compresses the data without losing any of the information in the picture If you compress an image using a lossless compression scheme the restored image when decompressed is IDENTICAL to the original image An example of lossless compression is Run Length Encoding used in FAX machines Run length encoding for a black and white image consists of looking at each row of pixels in the original image and creating a file that tells how many white pixels are followed by how many black pixels are followed by how many white pixels etc across the row If you are sending a printed text document there are usually a LOT of white pixels then a few black pixels then a LOT of white pixels etc in a row You can actually get very good compression for most faxed documents using this strategy AND it is lossless i e the document that shows up at the other end is essentially identical to the original document Unfortunately lossless compression cannot be done for most images That is why lossy compression is used Lossy compression Lossy compression refers to a compression scheme that compress
83. 3 Original Frame Number 53 54 Original Frame Number 54 55 Original Frame Number 55 56 Original Frame Number 56 57 Original Frame Number 57 58 Original Frame Number 58 59 Original Frame Number 59 60 Original Frame Number 60 O Original Frame Number 61 a an 1 fs sk a ft a st Figure 97 We have moved the vertical slider so that item 48 through 61 are visible in the list control window 173 tanayavi 5 0 User s Manual 48 Original Frame Number 48 aj 49 Original Frame Number 49 Original Frame Number 50 51 Original Frame Number 51 52 Original Frame Number 52 E 53 Original Frame Number 53 54 Original Frame Number 54 55 Original Frame Number 55 56 Original Frame Number 56 57 Original Frame Number 57 58 Original Frame Number 58 59 Original Frame Number 59 Original Frame Number 60 Original Frame Number 61 D Figure 98 Now we have placed the cursor over item 50 s text that is to the right of the check box and clicked the left mouse button This highlights selects item 50 but does NOT cause the item to be checked NOTE that clicking on the text to the right of a check box selects the list item and highlights it but the check box state remains unchanged 148 Original Frame Number 48 a Original Frame Number 49 iginal Frame Number 50 51 Original Frame Number 51 Original Frame Nu
84. 7705 ontas Force YUV Output ae eee eee ee ee rie 100 Regstration Code m M JPEG Compressor Settings rSingle User Sngle CPU Compressor License Compression Quality Encode Normalized YUV Provided by Pegasus Imaging Corporation LT Lear 16 Web http wiew pegasusimaging com GUME TAA ee BO et sue t t corn Luminance Qualty 2 Subsameling Telephone 813 875 7575 FAX 813 875 7705 Chrominance Quatty 22 aa C phi 17 2Filds If More Than 240 Lines z R m 4 Make Primary M JPEG Codec Figure 30 PICVideo MJPG CODEC There are at least two MJPG CODEC vendors out there As far as we know you have to buy an MJPG CODEC if you want to use one The PICVideo MJPG CODEC has a Compression Quality slider that you can adjust to set your desired trade off between image size and image quality HandyAvi s Quality slider does not appear when the PICVideo MJPG compression scheme is selected so the above panel is the only way to adjust Quality Compression 138 Image Capture Modes Morgan Multimedia M JPEG codec registered 3 0 0 3 Copyright Morgan Multimedia 1990 2001 V Enable codec V User FourCC mipg Decompression V Enabled M Support interleave C Fastinteger Invert field order Integer Fancy upsampling C Float Iv MMX V SSE i M SSE2 l WGCoe F SMP Compression V Enabled V Support interleave C Fastinteger Invert field order Inte
85. 80 Video Settings Frames per Second 30 Video Source Figure 10 The Video Source button now exposes this manufacturer s window a Output 0 Video Decoder Out 0 Video Tuner In 1 Video Composite In 2 Video SVideo In 3 Video Composite In Ban Bod Related Pin 6 Audio Line In 1 Audio Decoder Out Link Related Streams Figure 11 Video Tuner In means that the board is going to receive input from the TV tuner S Video and Composite inputs can also be selected as input sources We don t know why this board has two Video SVideo In selections TV Tuner The Capture Device section also now includes a TV Tuner button which provides access to the board manufacturer s TV Tuner settings window 124 Image Capture Modes Figure 12 This window allows you to select the input television channel among other things On this particular board we have found that to input Channel 12 you have to enter 12 then click on Enter or the channel input is ignored Usually we would select Antenna unless we are connected to acable There is a selection for Video Standards which includes NTSC_M NTSC_JM PAL_M PAL_N and PAL_COMBO The Tuning Mode includes TV and FM Animation Setup and Create Movie Area Animation Movie Setup Output File C _TEST Animation avi Browse Compression mjpg Morgan Multimedia M JPEG V3 codec hd Quality Play back rate image
86. Administered by the FCC NTSC broadcasts 30 interlaced frames per second 60 half frames per second or 60 fields per second in TV jargon at 525 vertical lines of resolution Deinterlacing improvements were added to HandyAvi 2 09 and later versions Previous versions of the software only performed the deinterlacing during Frame Selector or Crop and Save movie building Deinterlacing if selected now occurs immediately whenever an image is received from the camera The screen display also shows deinterlacing effects immediately in the image preview panes Date and or time stamp each captured image This section controls whether capture images are date and or time stamped It also determines whether or not image date time log files are generated Date stamp each captured image When checked each image captured to your AVI file by ANY of the capture modes time lapse motion detect astrophotography meteor trail or animation will contain a date stamp in the lower left hand corner Time stamp each captured image When checked each image captured to your AVI file by ANY of the capture modes time lapse motion detect astrophotography meteor trail or animation will contain a time stamp in the lower left hand corner It will be immediately to the right of the date stamp if you also checked date stamping Allow log files data time of each image to be generated By default log files are generated for each AVI file listing the date and
87. Also it defaults to TV Tuner mode so is not initially looking for your camera In HandyAvi you will need to bring up one of the Capture modes such as Time Lapse Images You should see an item in the Capture Device list that says Syntek STK1150 This is the EasyCap device Select it then click on Video Source That will bring up the manufacturer s Properties window seen below The device comes up with TV Tuner set It doesn t come with a TV Tuner so that is a pretty strange default Change that to Composite Video It defaults also to PAL B so select NTSC M if you are in the USA using NTSC video NTSC M is North American NTSC NTSC J is Japanese NTSC In Europe you probably will want to select one of the PAL types Close the window 251 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual ios oa O Video Decoder Video Proc Amp Image Video Sources Factory Default NTSC M Composite Video PAL BDGHI C S Video Reset C SECAM L iTV Tuner C PAL M x z PAL N 1 00 NTSC MJ Figure 143 Be prepared to wait for 60 seconds until video shows up in the Live Video Preview window This delay also occurs after you change Video Format We have completed our investigation into this strange delay behavior The EasyCap device creates a 60 second delay when its audio is not attached We attached the audio but we don t use it in HandyAvi in our new unreleased version of HandyAvi and the de
88. EAST and WEST push buttons are operated by using the left mouse button These buttons work just like the buttons on the Meade keypad i e the telescope will move in the direction indicated while the button is held down Motion will stop when the button is released After motion has been completed the coordinates are updated and displayed PARK SECTION The Park feature allows you to park the telescope i e holds it motionless It does this by turning on guide mode then automatically holding the East button down This stops the guide motor completely so that the telescope stops tracking the sky Why use park If you want to leave the telescope set up for days on end so that you do not have to realign it every night the Park mode prevents the cords from wrapping around the telescope as they would if the telescope continued tracking There is a time field so that you can Park the telescope in 7200 seconds for example When you click the Park box so that it is checked HandyAvi will look at the time field and count down to zero before parking the telescope If the time field is O or reaches 0 after counting down the telescope will park immediately Normally you would enter the time first then cause the Park check box to be checked When you uncheck the Park box the telescope is placed in guide mode the East button is released and the telescope again starts tracking the sky During Park the speed change buttons are grayed out
89. Highlight the day month hour minute or second you want to change and use the arrow keys up down to adjust the values Stop time The time at which the LAST image in the Go To list is to be started Highlight the day month hour minute or second you want to change and use the arrow keys up down to adjust the values GENERATE Calculates scope slew time assumed to be 8 degrees per second we issue a command to the telescope to set the rate to 8 degrees per second and adjusts all times between start time and end time to allow all images in the list to be captured It also calculates Padding which is the number of seconds unused between objects The GENERATE button simply generates the time values They are applied to your gotolist txt file only when the Apply to button is clicked Apply to This updates the time values in the gotolist txt file with these newly calculated values Check the List Runs set of list checks to determine if the list will execute properly with the times given 221 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Execute the list Runs the list so that telescope slews to the objects images are taken and downloaded etc Stop Execution Stops list execution You might need to also interact with Maxim DL to get it to stop imaging 222 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Preferences Preferences The preferences window allows you to set preferences It is under the File menu Except for File Recycling w
90. I files will be HUGE See also Video CODECs Configure Window Examples Configure Window Examples The following images show configuration windows associated with various CODECs that might be available on your machine These are accessible through the Configure button that appears on the movie setup windows IF the selected Compression scheme has a configuration window associated with it This shows the Movie Setup window for Time Lapse captures so you can see where the Configure button and Quality slider are 52 Image Capture Modes r Time Lapse Movie Setup Output File C _test timelapse avi Browse Compression Impa PICVideo M JPEG 3 VAW Cod Configure Take one frame every 1 000 seconds Play back rate images per second 30 Light Controls J Figure 24 Below we describe briefly the control each configuration window allows over compression Quality Cinepak for Windows 32 radus Version 1 10 0 11 Copyright 1992 1995 Radius Inc All Rights Reserved Compress to Color C Compress to Black amp White Cancel Figure 25 Cinepak CVID CODEC CVID has no adjustable quality option HandyAvi s Quality slider has no effect 53 andyavi 5 0 User s Manual DivX Codec Properties Use Divx profiles and watch video on your TV using Divx Cettified devices Main Codec Video r Codec Performance Encoding mode ree ESE Fastest for very high resolutio
91. IF the required decompression scheme has been installed on your computer HandyAvi will also allow you to read a file that was written using one compression scheme and write a new AVI file using a new compression scheme So you can convert AVI files from one compression scheme to another if the required codecs have been installed on your machine Configure Brings up the compression CODEC s configuration window This button only appears if the selected compression scheme HAS a configuration window Note that the Quality slider and the quality settings in some CODECs do not cooperate In the case of the mjpg CODEC the Forced quality slider determines the degree of JPEG compression and the Quality slider in the above window has absolutely no effect Other CODECs we have tested do not override our Quality slider When in doubt you should test by setting the quality and capturing for example three frames of the same scene use Time Lapse and take one frame every 3 seconds or so Then change the quality factor and make another movie The size of the two resultant AVI movie files should be different See Configure Window Examples for information on the Configure options of various CODECs Learn more about video codecs here Quality Adjust the quality of the compression scheme Most compression schemes create smaller files because they are actually discarding tiny image details By discarding more and larger image details you can prod
92. Images Make Movie from Still Images Telescope Port Telescope Controls Figure 95 The Frame Selector menu item brings up the Video Frame Selector window Video Frame r Frame Selection Options Select every 2 nd frame Select Al Unselect All Sort by IPEG size for Astronomy Normal Sort gt So view ar Save displayed frame as a bmp file Save displayed frame as a jpg file Save all checked frames as bmp files Save all checked frames as jpg files Create AVI video file from checked frames O0 Original Frame Number 0 A O1 Original Frame Number 1 E 02 Original Frame Number 2 03 Original Frame Number 3 04 Original Frame Number 4 O5 Original Frame Number 5 mip Original Frame Number 6 O7 Original Frame Number 7 18 Original Frame Number 8 19 Original Frame Number 9 010 Original Frame Number 10 011 Original Frame Number 11 012 Original Frame Number 12 013 Original Frame Number 13 014 Original Frame Number 14 D15 Original Frame Number 15 1016 Original Frame Number 16 017 Original Frame Number 17 018 Original Frame Number 18 119 Original Frame Number 19 J20 Original Frame Number 20 121 Oriqinal Frame Number 21 v Figure 96 The top sub window lists all frames in the AVI file There is a check box on the left that allows you to select a frame or any number of frames Standard Microsoft click an
93. In 3 Video Composite In Ban Bod Related Pin 6 Audio Line In 1 Audio Decoder Out Link Related Streams Figure 11 Video Tuner In means that the board is going to receive input from the TV tuner S Video and Composite inputs can also be selected as input sources We don t know why this board has two Video SVideo In selections TV Tuner The Capture Device section also now includes a TV Tuner button which provides access to the board manufacturer s TV Tuner settings window 10 Image Capture Modes Tuning Mode Tv Video Standards NTSC_M Figure 12 This window allows you to select the input television channel among other things On this particular board we have found that to input Channel 12 you have to enter 12 then click on Enter or the channel input is ignored Usually we would select Antenna unless we are connected to a cable There is a selection for Video Standards which includes NTSC_M NTSC_JM PAL _M PAL_N and PAL_COMBO The Tuning Mode includes TV and FM The Time Lapse Movie Setup Section Time Lapse Movie Setup Output File C _test timelapse avi Browse Compression Impa PICVideo M JPEG 3 VfW Cod Configure Take one frame every 1 000 seconds Play back rate images per second 30 Light Controls advanced START Figure 13 This section of the time lapse video capture window allows you to set up the webcam for making a time lapse vid
94. MANY lossy compression schemes some of which are very well known such as JPEG We can use JPEG to illustrate Lossy compression Figure 20 JPEG Quality Factor 99 Very high quality 358 Kilobytes 20 Image Capture Modes 21 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Figure 22 JPEG Quality Factor 50 reduced quality 23 4 Kilobytes 4 j a TA Figure 23 JPEG Quality Factor 10 notice ably reduced quality 9 9 Kilobytes Each of the above images when stored as a bmp file requires 672 8 Kilobytes of storage space Note that bmp is lossless because it does not use compression i e the image is stored with no loss of resolution or information but the file is BIG However when the lossy JPEG algorithms are applied and the file is stored as a JPEG file instead of a bmp file you can see that as the quality factor decreases the quality goes down and the storage space required goes down Note that some compression CODECs refer to compression factor instead quality factor A quality factor of 75 generally would mean a compression factor of 25 i e quality factor is 100 minus the compression factor Typically JPEG is run with a quality factor of 75 In Figure 21 above we see that storing an image as a JPEG image with a quality factor of 75 instead of as a bmp file reduces the size of the file from 672 8 Kilobytes to 70 4 Kilobytes We see that it is very difficult if not impossible to see any difference between Figure 2
95. Motion Detect frame area visible in the Scan AVI File for Meteors and Create New Movie area After completion of a trail a composite image will appear in the Last Motion Detect frame area If you were capturing a meteor for example the entire meteor track would be shown in this one frame Scan AVI File for Meteors and Create New Movie 187 tanayavi 5 0 User s Manual Create Movie START see Live Video Preview Enlarge Adjust Sensitivity Enlarge Output File Size 2690 KB Frame number 28 Status Monitoring sensitivity adjustments Next FTP upload 7 5 2008 0910 Last FTP upload 7 4 2008 1650 Figure 113 Start The Start button starts the meteor trail movie making process NOTE Output files will automatically be limited to less than 2 Gigabytes the AVI file size limit A new file with a unique new name will be generated and used automatically whenever the limit is about to be exceeded See Preferences for more information about Maximum AVI File Size Stop The Stop button stops the meteor trail movie making process Enlarge If you use one of the Enlarge buttons a new window will be created containing the video image This new window can be resized to any size This new window also contains a Size option that will allow you to select True Image Size which will resize the window to show the actual size of the captured video images If the video is being directed to an enlarged window no video will b
96. Of course each codec is created by software people who may have thought about this and limited it so they do not throw away all of the image data even if the Quality is zero 39 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Note that each codec is different and some may even ignore the Quality setting or not allow it to be set Also note that lossy compression schemes are used in many applications JPEG is an example of a lossy compression scheme that is used in MANY applications and the fact that some of the image data has been discarded is practically unnoticeable So compression with slightly reduced quality is a very good thing in most cases Learn more about video codecs here Sensitivity This slider lets you set up the motion detect sensitivity Each frame taken by the camera will be compared with the previously captured frame to see if it is different enough to be stored in your video output file If the sensitivity is set to 0 0 then only the first frame will be captured when you START making a video Other frames cannot be different enough to be captured if the sensitivity is set to 0 0 If the sensitivity is set to 100 0 then ALL frames will be captured after you START making a video Each frame will seem to be different from the previous frame so all frames will be captured If the sensitivity is set somewhere between 0 0 and 100 0 then not all frames will be captured Only frames different enough based on the sensitivity setting will be
97. Plug If instead you plug an S Video source into the adapter from a VCR or DVD player etc and choose 2 Video SVideo In then HandyAvi will see the video stream of the S Video device that you have plugged in Note that most surveillance cameras output Video Composite signals i e NTSC signals in many countries PAL in many others We have a Watec 902H2 ULTIMATE camera that we are using for Meteor Detection We plug its Video Composite output into the GA VD204 adapter or other USB Video adapter and then plug the adapter into the USB port HandyAvi sees the video and everything works well 123 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Note that some adapters check to see if you are using a USB 1 port or a USB 2 port Some of them will NOT allow you to set higher resolutions like 640 x 480 if you are using a USB 1 port This is usually undocumented and can be puzzling which is why we are mentioning it here It should be noted that the Watec 902H2 ULTIMATE is an EXTREMELY sensitive low light camera 0001 Lux supposedly and is more expensive than most cameras used for surveillance work We needed the sensitivity for meteor detection There are of course MANY cheaper cameras that output NTSC Video Composite signals that can be used with HandyAvi via a USB Video adapter The user here has now selected a Hauppauge WinTV 885 Video Capture board Capture Device Hauppauge WinTV 885 Video Capture v Video Format Video Frame Size 720 X 4
98. RYTHING DEP can be turned off on a per application basis or turned off entirely If you experience a problem when you try to Browse for a file you might want to try going to Control Panel System Advanced Performance Settings Data Execution Prevention and set it this way 245 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Performance Options threats cow does it work Turn on DEP for essential Windows programs and services only Turn on DEP for all programs and services except those I select Your computer s processor does not support hardware based DEP However Windows can use DEP software to help prevent some types of attacks Figure 142 SelectNthFilter Installation We created a DLL SelectNthFilter dll which allows us to process the video in stream mode which makes the batch processing system fast as possible since the frames are processed without having to wait for them to be retrieved or displayed at their recorded frame rate We were surprised to learn that the filter we created SelectNthFilter dll requires Microsoft NET Framework Version 2 0 in order to be registered so that it will run properly with the other video filters in the chain that do the work SelectNthFilter dll is the subsystem that selects the output frames according to the number you entered in Select Output Frames At the time this document was written you could obtain Microsoft NET Framework Version 2 0 from http Awww microsoft
99. Save _ Restore o Figure 39 Normally the whole image is sensitive to motion The Advanced Motion Detect Settings window allows you to create rectangular sensitive regions Note that the image area will contain the current image It is refreshed about once per second so you can see current image You will thus be able to see how the rectangles you create relate to the image The rectangular regions are created by placing the cursor on the image display area depressing the left mouse button and dragging it while holding it down When it is released the new rectangle is added to a list of rectangles maintained internally by the software On startup Restore and use the regions shown above If the displayed regions have been Save d then they will be remembered and used whenever a Motion Detect Capture session is started Unless the saved file has been deleted or moved In that case the entire video area again becomes sensitive 41 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Sound Alarm when motion is detected When this box is checked a bell will sound when motion is detected Delete all Will cause all rectangles to be deleted The entire image will then be sensitive to motion Undo Will erase the last rectangle Pressing it repeatedly will erase previous rectangles in the opposite order in which they were created Note that the Advanced Motion Detect Settings window rectangles are active immediately i e as soon as they
100. Scheme mjpg Rate 25000 Scale 1000 Figure 19 Figure 19 shows that the compression scheme used to compress the file MarsSmallTest avi was mjpg which is the FOURCC code for the Morgan Multimedia MJPG codec HandyAvi will also attempt to open files compressed with codecs that are NOT installed on your machine If the required codec is not installed HandyAvi will of course be unable to PLAY the file but it will try to produce an AVI File Info report as shown in Figure 19 so that you will be able to identify the missing codec If you know which codec was used you might be able to locate an installable version of the codec via the Internet and install it Then you would be able to play the 106 Image Capture Modes file using HandyAvi If you can play the file using HandyAvi then you can also use HandyAvi s editing features to create a new file using the same or a different codec and include or exclude selected frames from the new AVI file Many CODECs allow you to have control over the Quality factor or Compression factor that will let you make your files smaller Learn more about Compression Quality Learn more about Configure windows About Compression Quality There are many video compression schemes The purpose of a video compression scheme is to make a smaller file without sacrificing too much detail in the images An uncompressed AVI file is comprised of a series of bmp image files There are actually many
101. Telescope Controls Location Time Backlash Tracking Rete Objects Sky Rats Messier Automatic Go To and Shoot image List This tab can be used with an LX 200 telescope and a version of Maxim DL that supports scripting every version except the Basic version last time we checked We used this tab to automatically capture Messier Marathon objects in 2011 and 2013 2012 was clouded out See http www astroshow com Messier html for images we took using an internal test version of this system Compose the List Brings up this panel m Choose Go To list folder filename Images captured via Maxim DL will go to the same folder C HandyAvi MessierGoToList gotolist txt r m Create Go To List Entries At 05 Apr 2013 15 56 46 take 1 H shot s of 1 seconds with binning E of this object select one Diphda 00 43 36 17 59 00 2 0 8 Achernar 01 37 44 57 14 00 0 5 13 Hamal 02 07 12 23 28 00 2 0 17 Mira 02 19 24 02 59 00 2 1 20 Polaris 02 31 47 4 89 15 50 2 0 19 Aldebaran 04 35 56 16 31 00 0 9 33 Rigel 05 14 36 08 12 00 0 1 41 4 m Add an object to the Go To List Date TimeObj Il You will need to adj Nalues given below If 4 m r Camera Data Image download time when XY binning is set to 1 16 seconds Delete Selected Line Delete All Lines Choose Go To list folder filename First choose a Go
102. V User FourCC mipg Decompression V Enabled M Support interleave C Fastinteger Invert field order Integer Fancy upsampling C Float Iv MMX V SSE i M SSE2 l WGCoe F SMP Compression V Enabled V Support interleave C Fastinteger Invert field order Integer V Bitrate control Float Better bitrate control Iv MMx M SSE C 422 M 3DNow M SSE2 OTETA E M SMP Z Forced quality 75 Cancel About Figure 31 Morgan Multimedia MJPG Codec Morgan MJPG allows quality to be set if the Forced quality check box is checked The value in the display box here seen as 75 ALWAYS overrides the value set by the HandyAvi Quality sliders HandyAvi s Quality slider appears but has no effect We ran into a problem with the above version of the Morgan CODEC in Vista when we used image sizes other than 160x120 320x240 or 640x480 Caused a HandyAvi crash that we could not find a work around for We sent Email to the vendor describing the problem Received no answer after several days This CODEC seems to work just fine in Windows XP though In the past we have always used the Morgan Multimedia MJPG Codec but we have now installed the PICVideo MJPG CODEC and are using it instead on Vista 27 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Microsoft MPEG 4 Video Codec V2 Copyright Microsoft Corp 1996 1999 Options Keyframe every seconds Compression Control EE 75 r Data Rate Kilobit
103. We sent Email to the vendor describing the problem Received no answer after several days This CODEC seems to work just fine in Windows XP though In the past we have always used the Morgan Multimedia MJPG Codec but we have now installed the PICVideo MJPG CODEC and are using it instead on Vista 57 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Microsoft MPEG 4 Video Codec V2 Copyright Microsoft Corp 1996 1999 Options Keyframe every seconds Compression Control EE 75 r Data Rate Kilobits per Second 3000 4 ia ET Figure 32 mp42 CODEC We were unable to determine any effect when the Smoothness slider was changed HandyAvi s Quality slider is not visible Microsoft MPEG 4 Video Codec V3 Copyright Microsoft Corp 1996 1999 Options Keyframe every seconds Compression Control 44 75 m Data Rate Kilobits per Second 3000 al ey ok _Cancet_ Figure 33 MP43 CODEC We were unable to determine any effect when the Smoothness slider was changed HandyAvi s Quality slider is not visible 58 Image Capture Modes Configure Microsoft MPEG 4 Video Codec 1 Copyright Microsoft Corp 1996 1999 Options Kepframe every Ei seconds Compression Control Smoothness 75 Crispness 4 Data Rate Kilobits per Second 3000 Figure 34 MP41 CODEC We were unable to determine any effect when the Smoothness slid
104. a JPEG file instead of a bmp file you can see that as the quality factor decreases the quality goes down and the storage space required goes down Note that some compression CODECs refer to compression factor instead quality factor A quality factor of 75 generally would mean a compression factor of 25 i e quality factor is 100 minus the compression factor Typically JPEG is run with a quality factor of 75 In Figure 21 above we see that storing an image as a JPEG image with a quality factor of 75 instead of as a bmp file reduces the size of the file from 672 8 Kilobytes to 70 4 Kilobytes We see that it is very difficult if not impossible to see any difference between Figure 21 and Figure 22 so compression did not seem to degrade the image very much and it did reduce the file size from 672 8 Kilobytes to 70 4 Kilobytes We see in Figure 22 that the image has degraded slightly due to the lower quality factor of 50 The degradation is barely noticeable if you look carefully at the side of the horse s face where the white and brown hair join you can see that the boundary is no longer smooth We see in Figure 23 that the image has degraded very noticeably due to the very low quality factor The file is very small however 9 9 Kilobytes instead of the original 672 8 Kilobytes The above merely illustrates the concept of lossy compression Again there are MANY compression schemes that have been invented They all behave a little different
105. a serial port and send and receive data The data sent consists of an initialization string if one is necessary Then a series of data request strings are sent to ask the device at the other end of the serial port to send its data The data request strings are separated by semicolons In the example shown above the user has selected the COM3 port The COM port is connected for illustrative purposes and because it was readily available to a Meade Telescope The user has entered two data requests separated by a semicolon The first is GD which is the Meade serial command for Get Declination The second is GR which is the Meade serial command for Get Right Ascension The user then clicked Connect Serial Port The button shown above now says Disconnect Serial Port since the port is connected The user then clicked Send Data Request String to test the system The system then sent GD to the telescope which returned 55829 58 The sign in the returned data is used as a line terminator so the serial subsystems will know when all of the data for the last request has been received These signs are omitted from the displayed data The system then sent GR to the telescope which returned 07 22 328 The signs are omitted so the Returned data field shows 55829 58 07 22 328 We don t know why the scope returns a B instead of a but it does and in the software we wrote for scope control elsewhere in HandyA
106. ach trigger event will cause the writing of a whole sequence of frames The next trigger frame will not be seen until the write is complete making it difficult to determine the true sensitivity That is why we allow the sensitivity to be set BEFORE starting the Create Movie function Pre Frames The Pre Frames slider allows you to specify how many image frames preceding the trigger frame will be written to your AVI output file Allowable values are 0 to 250 When a meteor or other motion is detected the system will write out as many frames preceding the trigger frame as specified Then the trigger frame will be written out and additional frames will be written out if motion continues to be detected After no motion has been detected post frames are written out Note If you click on a slider you can then use the left and right arrow keys on the keyboard to make fine adjustments Post Frames The Post Frames slider allows you to specify how many image frames following the last detected motion will be written to your AVI output file Allowable values are from 1 to 250 We recommend that you set this to 5 or more since this value also establishes a time window for further motion detection For example let s say that 6 Pre frames and 5 Post frames are specified When a meteor or other motion is detected the trigger event the system will write out the 6 frames that immediately preceded the motion event frame Then the trigger frame wi
107. age to create motion detect sensitive rectangular or circular regions You may create as many as desired C On startup Restore and use the regions shown above V Sound alarm when meteor is detected Delete al Undo save _ Restore ox Figure 66 By left mouse clicking and dragging motion detect sensitive areas can be placed on the window In the case shown we were considering a setup for lightning capture The circle is probably not what we want in this case but serves to illustrate the use of circular regions When the wind blows the palm fronds blow and could trigger the motion detection algorithm By setting up rectangular and circular motion sensitive areas that do NOT include the palm fronds or trees but include much of the sky we avoid the problem The only areas that will trigger motion detection are the areas within the rectangles and circles Note that overlaps are not a problem The overlapped regions get examined more than once for motion however which can degrade performance slightly If you created 100 large overlapped regions you might cause enough performance degradation to be significant There is no need to do that so don t do that Also note that placing circles and or rectangles can be done ahead of time or on the fly AFTER recording has been started The effect of each rectangle is IMMEDIATE A Total CPU Usage box has been added so that you can see immediately the effect your choices are having on per
108. ality is set to 0 then theoretically all image data is discarded and the resultant AVI file will contain blank images Of course each codec is created by software people who may have thought about this and limited it so they do not throw away all of the image data even if the Quality is zero Note that each codec is different and some may even ignore the Quality setting or not allow it to be set Also note that lossy compression schemes are used in many applications JPEG is an example of a lossy compression scheme that is used in MANY applications and the fact that some of the image data has been discarded is practically unnoticeable So compression with slightly reduced quality is a very good thing in most cases Learn more about video codecs here Play back rate images per second Determines how fast your frames will be displayed when you play the AVI movie that you have recorded If you want the frames to be played in real time then you should set the rate to the same rate as the camera was set to when it was recording If you want each frame to be presented at a very slow rate then you could set the play back rate to 1 second In this case each frame of the movie would be displayed for one second when the movie is played Take group of lets you set up the astronomy image capture parameters For example Take 2 frames every 10 seconds will capture and add two frames to your new AVI file every 10 seconds Frames that could be captured will
109. ally whenever the limit is about to be exceeded See Preferences for more information about Maximum AVI File Size STOP Terminate video capture and close the AVI output file The file can then be viewed as a movie inside HandyAvi by Open ing it using the File menu See the Movie Display section Live Video Preview This window shows what the camera is actually seeing at the frame rate at which it is currently running The Last Captured Frame window shows the last frame that was captured to your new video file If nothing has yet been captured it shows a blank as seen in the above image Enlarge If you use one of the Enlarge buttons a new window will be created containing the video image This new window can be resized to any size by clicking and dragging an edge or corner of the window This new window also contains a Size option that will allow you to select a True Image Size option which will resize the window to show the actual size of the captured video images Pressing the t key will also perform the True Image Size function Size True Aspect Ratio Resize True Image Size T Live Preview Frames Size True Aspect Ratio Resize Figure 53 76 Image Capture Modes Figure 53 shows an enlarged Live Preview Frames window that has been sized with the Size option to the True Image Size of 320x240 which was the size selected in Figure 4 in the Capture Device section There is also a True Aspect Ratio Resize
110. ames Output every 12 frame The example above shows that the user selected the number 12 This means that a new Time Lapse movie generated by Convert will contain every 12 frame of the original movie The other frames will not be present in the new movie The action in the new movie will appear to be speeded up by a factor of 12 You may choose values other than 12 of course If you choose 100 the action in a newly generated movie would be speeded up by a factor of 100 This is the setting that actually does the Time Lapse operation Bells and Whistles Sound bell after completion of each file If this box is checked then a bell will sound after completion of each file conversion Sound whistle after completion of all files If this box is checked then a whistle will sound after all files have been converted Set Output Directory for Converted Files 180 Tools Set Check this box if you want to send ALL output files to a directory folder that you choose If this box is unchecked then the each output file will be sent to the directory folder that the input file resides in Browse The Browse button brings up a directory selector that will allow you to select the output directory You can also create a new directory here Note You can also type in a directory name If the directory path name that you type in does not exist a message box will pop up warning you about this and the directory path will revert to its previous sett
111. ample to photograph clouds moving in the sky you could take one frame every 20 seconds The time lapse is then 20 seconds When you play back such a video at 30 frames per second the motion of the clouds appears to be greatly speeded up Time lapse photography can be used to film e clouds moving e flowers opening e traffic on freeways e boats moving on a lake or the ocean e ants moving about their nest e construction of buildings bridges and freeways e birds growing up in a nest e shadows caused by the sun s motion e plants growing e cell division using a microscope e ice melting e snow melting e etc The only limitations are your imagination regarding what to photograph using a time lapse video process Anything that occurs slowly can be speeded up using time lapse photography The results are often amazing Speeding up the action of the tendrils of vines as they seem to intelligently seek something to wrap around can be fascinating HandyAvi will allow you to set any time lapse time that you desire from as fast as your webcam can produce images up to years of elapsed time between frames andyavi 5 0 User s Manual How to open the time lapse video control window File Tools View Help Time Lapse Images N Motion Detect Images Astronomy Images File Capture Tools View He Meteor Trail Images S Animation Images Or Figure 1 From the main HandyAvi window select
112. ams Figure 9 You can see that we have opened the Input pull down Video Composite In means HandyAvi will see the video stream from a camera plugged into the adapter s Composite Video input port a standard Phono Plug If instead you plug an S Video source into the adapter from a VCR or DVD player etc and choose 2 Video SVideo In then HandyAvi will see the video stream of the S Video device that you have plugged in Note that most surveillance cameras output Video Composite signals i e NTSC signals in many countries PAL in many others We have a Watec 902H2 ULTIMATE camera that we are using for Meteor Detection We plug its Video Composite output into the GA VD204 adapter or other USB Video adapter and then plug the adapter into the USB port HandyAvi sees the video and everything works well Image Capture Modes Note that some adapters check to see if you are using a USB 1 port or a USB 2 port Some of them will NOT allow you to set higher resolutions like 640 x 480 if you are using a USB 1 port This is usually undocumented and can be puzzling which is why we are mentioning it here It should be noted that the Watec 902H2 ULTIMATE is an EXTREMELY sensitive low light camera 0001 Lux supposedly and is more expensive than most cameras used for surveillance work We needed the sensitivity for meteor detection There are of course MANY cheaper cameras that output NTSC Video Composite signals that can be used with Han
113. and have had excellent results Also note that for USB webcams we often need longer cables than the standard length of a webcam cable We have very successfully used USB repeater or extension cables such as the Model G2LUB16 IOGEAR s Premium USB Active Extension Booster Cable These cables come in 16 foot lengths and require no separate power supplies We have used 3 of them in series with no difficulty and their sales literature says they will work at distances of up to 75 feet 210 Tools They do seem to fail if they get wet during a rainstorm however They seem to recover when they dry out but we have never been able to dry one out in the field after it gets wet Bring spares Opening the Telescope Controls To open the telescope control panel select the Menu item Tools Telescope Controls If the telescope is powered up has a serial cable connected to your computer and if you have chosen the correct COM port the Telescope Controls panel will come up Lx 200 Telescope Controls LX200 Controle Location Time Backlash Tracking Rate Objects Sky Flats Messier ee Raga e Dynamic Focus RA Sia A a Park in Slow Stepper Motor Y Out teps per hour sooam ss E Gsk east ON ih pec foose HART ows Park Cote 0 On Figure 54 See Telescope Controls for further information Telescope Controls First Telescope Tab LX 200 Conirols LK 200 Telescope Controls LX2
114. any white pixels are followed by how many black pixels are followed by how many white pixels etc across the row If you are sending a printed text document there are usually a LOT of white pixels then a few black pixels then a LOT of white pixels etc in a row You can actually get very good compression for most faxed documents using this strategy AND it is lossless i e the document that shows up at the other end is essentially identical to the original document Unfortunately lossless compression cannot be done for most images That is why lossy compression is used Lossy compression Lossy compression refers to a compression scheme that compresses the data but loses some of the data If you compress an image using a lossy compression scheme the restored image when decompressed is NOT identical to the original image However if the scheme is a good one the images will look almost identical There are MANY lossy compression schemes some of which are very well known such as JPEG We can use JPEG to illustrate Lossy compression gt 4 s N gh quality 358 Kilobytes y Factor 99 Very hi Figure 20 JPEG Qualit 131 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual 4 Figure 21 JPEG Quality Factor 75 high quality 70 4 Kilo 132 bytes Image Capture Modes 133 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Figure 23 JPEG Quality Factor 10 noticeably reduced quality 9 9 Kilobytes Each of the above image
115. arded and the resultant AVI file will be large If the Quality is set to 0 then theoretically all image data is discarded and the resultant AVI file will contain blank images Of course each codec is created by software people who may have thought about this and limited it so they do not throw away all of the image data even if the Quality is zero Note that each codec is different and some may even ignore the Quality setting Also note that lossy compression schemes are used in many applications JPEG is an example of a lossy compression scheme that is used in MANY applications and the fact that some of the image data has been discarded is practically unnoticeable So compression with slightly reduced quality is a very good thing in most cases Learn more about video compression and CODECs here Sensitivity The Sensitivity slider lets you set up the Meteor Trail Detection sensitivity When you have not yet pressed start to take a movie the right hand image Adjust sensitivity of the Create Movie section registers a frame and increases the counter by one for each frame that triggered the motion detection algorithm If the sensitivity is set high to 100 for example then simple camera noise will trigger the motion detection algorithm and the counter will count up rapidly indicating that nearly all frames seen by the camera are seen as motion frames If you press Start with this setting every frame would be a trigger frame and c
116. are created they will begin operating This will allow you to tune the sensitivity if necessary During capture of an AVI file when one or more of these sensitive regions have been created image frames will be captured to the output file ONLY when motion occurs within one or more of the rectangles This will allow you to ignore trees blowing in the wind for example but capture frames when motion occurs in the areas of interest Three sensitive rectangles are shown above One would show any movement around the table at the other end of the pool one would show any movement on a small portion of the path to the left of the pool and the third smaller window covers a small region of the pool deck Any movement in any or all of these areas subject to the sensitivity setting of course would cause frames to be captured Motion in all other areas of the image is ignored Save Saves the rectangles in a file for future use Restore Restores the rectangles stored in a file so that they will be used Email Brings up the Email setup window 42 Image Capture Modes EMail A Still Image and or Thumbnail Images Whenever Motion Is Detected x Outgoing SMTP Server Name or TCP IP Address SMTP smtp abc def net Help EMail Particulars From userID whatever com Help To userID whatever com Subject Motion Detected Text This is ztest EMail Still Image Transmission Settings V Email the 4 th full size image of each
117. ate Pressing Set then enters the data into the telescope NOTE Whenever Set is pressed the telescope updates the planet positions Mercury s position changes significantly from day to day so if the telescope is left set up for more than one day pressing the Set button in the Date area will cause the planet positions to be updated and will allow Mercury and Venus in particular to be accurately found Time Displays the current time and is updated every second by querying the telescope and displaying the results A new Local time can be entered in the edit box and then when Set is pressed it will be entered into the telescope HandyAvi also computes the corresponding sidereal time and enters that into the telescope also There is about a 1 second delay for the time setting operation so press Set one second early if you want to be within a second Part of the delay is simply transmitting the data to the telescope The LX 200 has a Dec Backlash setting that can be from 0 to 100 The LX 200 software will not respond to this being set by HandyAvi but the new GPS scopes will The LX 200 also has a Tracking Rate setting that can be set at a rate to track the Moon among other things The Moon moves slowly but noticeably against the background stars If you are making images of the Moon you might want to track it at the proper rate Again the LX 200 software will not respond to this being set by HandyAvi but the new GPS scopes will
118. ate Movie section will display either Centering or Tracking followed by the pixel coordinates of the position of the planet or star on the screen The Centering or Tracking words might have a direction appended to them so you will know which way the scope is attempting to move Centering Help Brings up this page of the help file Allowable Drift This slider determines how far away from the center the target image will be allowed to drift before HandyAvi attempts to drive it back to the center of the image frame Rerun Auto centering Calibration You can rerun the calibration while Handy is capturing data Start button was pressed This item will be grayed out i e unavailable for use if calibration was OK The Astronomy Movie Setup Section 72 Image Capture Modes Astronomy Image Movie Setup Output File C _TEST Astro 0003 avi Browse Compression mjpg Morgan Multimedia M JPEG V3 codec w Quality 65 Play back frame rate frames per second 30 Take group of 500 frames every 600 000 seconds Create a new output file for each group Sequentially numbered Figure 50 This section of the Astronomy video capture window allows you to set up the webcam for making an astronomy video Output File Type in the path name of the new video file you want to create Browse Brings up a standard file selector window so that you can more easily place the file in a particular folder Compression Se
119. ause nearly everything to be sent to the output AVI video file You typically do not want to do this Before pressing start you should play with the sensitivity setting and set it just below the point where the counter stops counting Basically you are setting the camera noise threshold After this is set properly then the only things that should trigger the motion detection would be true motion events such as meteors airplanes lightning flashes etc Setting a sensitivity value essentially sets a noise threshold above which trigger events are recognized HandyAvi employs a sophisticated implicit dark frame algorithm to suppress camera noise and cosmic ray noise This method operates on the fly without interfering with normal frame capture i e no dead time is involved 184 Tools The algorithm allows stars to move slowly across the frame if the camera is unguided without triggering an event It also suppresses triggering on star scintillation twinkling caused by the Earth s atmosphere or on cosmic ray events or on camera noise The sensitivity can be set during capture as well as before or after This allows you to adjust the sensitivity and test it while a video is being made You will be able to see which frames are captured by looking at the Last Motion Detect frame window in the Scan AVI File for Meteors and Create New Movie Changing the sensitivity while meteor trail capture is underway is not recommended because e
120. automatic setting The Output Size selection allows you to select the frame size in pixels of the images that the camera will be taking Both the ToUcam and the Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000 for example allow the image sizes shown here Output Size 320 x 240 Figure 5 HandyAvi will automatically save and restore your Video Format settings if possible Video Settings There is also a button called Video Settings This will bring up the webcam manufacturer s video settings window and will allow you to change other types of camera settings such as contrast color brightness sensitivity etc depending on how many items the camera manufacturer allows you to modify The Video Settings window for the Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000 webcam looks like this 65 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual pate Camera controls Zoom Face Tracking V Full Auto Mode m Image Modes Black and White Miror Horizontal Mirror Vertical Mii Compensation ite balance 4 Shutter Speed Gain Incandescent m User Defaults i Ci cchioreecent Save Restore Restore 3 Daylight Flickerless Of C On Figure 6 The image in Figure 6 shows that the camera is in Full Auto Mode which means that the camera will automatically adjust for changes in light levels It will sometimes change the frame rate automatically when in this mode The Video Settings window for t
121. automatically upload his latest time lapse video to his web site Users can then view his latest 24 hour Loch Ness surveillance video Maybe somebody will eventually see Nessie Preferences Port Number 21 Default value 21 Normally you would NOT change this Active or Passive Passive Defaultis Active but some ISP s block the Active mode Remote directory uploadtest Select Test Connection Upload then Delete Test Fie_ Capture file Close the capture file and start a new one Every dayat 0000 hours local time m Whenever an AVI File resulting from a capture operation closes IV Upload the file to the web site s remote directory folder V Always force the name of the uploaded file to be test wmv IV Convert from AVI to WMV and upload the WMV file Much smaller file typically a O Figure 132 Set up FTP communication parameters This section allows you to enter information required to open an FTP session to your Web Site Server Name Your Internet Service Provider ISP provides you with a Server Name User Name and User Password for you to access your web site via FTP Enter your Server Name in this box User Name Enter your FTP User Name in this box User Password Enter your FTP User Password in this box Port Number IF your ISP told you to use some port OTHER THAN Port 21 enter it here Otherwise enter 21 in this box 21 is what is normally used by most
122. ave been installed on your machine Some come from Microsoft as part of your operating system Some come from the manufacturers of webcams that you might have installed You can even download and install codecs from the Internet Some are free and others are not http Awww fourcc org is a site that lists and describes almost all known codecs If you surf to that site you will want to click on codec list to see all of the codecs Codecs have four character names known as Four Character Codes or FOURCC names This is how they are identified internally so that software applications such as HandyAvi can know which codec was used to produce a particular file FOURCC codes are also used internally when a HandyAvi user selects a compression scheme such as Indeo video 5 10 Indeo video 5 10 has a FOURCC name of IV50 If you have an AVI file that was encoded using IV50 you can see the IV50 codec name by opening the file in HandyAvi and using the View AVI File Info menu item 77 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual AVI File Info Ea AVI Name MarsSmallTest avi File Size 20544 KB Image Size 160x120 Number of Frames 999 Frames Per Second 25 Compression Scheme mjpg Rate 25000 Scale 1000 Figure 19 Figure 19 shows that the compression scheme used to compress the file MarsSmallTest avi was mjpg which is the FOURCC code for the Morgan Multimedia MJPG codec HandyAvi will also attempt to open files compressed w
123. ax Tutorial Make an AVI Clip of the Best Frames NOTE This section is for primarily for astronomers using HandyAvi First open an AVI file NOTE The AVI file used for this tutorial is in C Program Files HandyAvi ExampleAVl satdoc zip if you installed HandyAvi to its default installation directory You can unzip satdoc zip and use satdoc avi to replicate the steps of the tutorial below The file is an AVI file taken from a back yard in the Phoenix area with a ToUcam webcam using a 10 Meade LX 200 and a 2X Barlow Use the File Open menu item to open an AVI file We will open the file named satdoc avi The first frame of the AVI file will be displayed on the screen like this 163 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Fie Capture Tools View Window Help 387 97 Figure 80 IMPORTANT If no AVI movie file has been loaded the menu items Tools and Window will be hidden and unavailable The AVI movie shown in Figure 80 includes a lot of wasted space around the image of Saturn This wasted space can be eliminated by cropping the AVI movie file This will speed up subsequent operations to create a cropped version of the AVI file in Figure 80 The cropped AVI file will look like this when it is opened 164 Tools Untitled avi 0 00 1 37 Sec Fr 0 m 14 1 Figure 81 The above cropped file is a much smaller file that will allow a post processing program like RegiStax to run
124. be the current Live Video Preview frame visible in the Time Lapse Display Area The delay time entered can be any time desired 30 frames per second corresponds to a time delay of approximately 03 seconds If 03 seconds were to be used and if the camera were running at 30 frames per second all frames would be captured assuming your hardware can keep up Take one frame every 0 03 seconds Figure 14 Play back rate images per second Determines how fast your frames will be displayed when you play the AVI movie that you have recorded If you want the frames to be played in real time then you should set the rate to the same rate as the camera was set to when it was recording If you want each frame to be presented at a very slow rate then you could set the play back rate to 1 second In this case each frame of the movie would be displayed for one second when the movie is played Light Controls Brings up a control panel that will allow control over a PowerLinc USB 1132U or 1132CU X 10 control device One end of this device plugs into a wall socket and the other end plugs into a USB port You can turn other X 10 devices on and off from this panel and also allow the time lapse systems to turn a light on pause take the next time lapse image then turn the light off awaiting the time for the next time lapse image Advanced Brings up the following window During AVI movie capture Ea Create a bmp image file for each captured fra
125. being displayed as a jpg file Save all checked frames to bmp files Save each checked frame to its own bmp file Save all checked frames to bmp files Save each checked frame to its own jpg file 172 Tools Create AVI video file from checked frames This will bring up a standard Microsoft file selector window which will allow you to choose a directory and file name for the new AVI file You can create a new AVI file from the checked frames Close Closes the Video Frame Selector window If the Video Frame Selector Window is closed then reopened it will display frames in the order they were in when you closed the window The Video Frame Selector Window is specific to whichever AVI file has focus The Frame Selection Tutorial If you try to find instructions for Microsoft s standard item selection windows you will find that not much information exists in a form that is readily obtainable and or understandable In HandyAvi the check box functionality has been purposely separated from the text selection functionality Clicking on a check box is now different from clicking on the text to the right of the check box The following images are from the HandyAvi Video Frame Selector dialog window The accompanying text will show you how to select multiple items in the list 148 Original Frame Number 48 149 Original Frame Number 49 i 150 Original Frame Number 50 Original Frame Number 51 52 Original Frame Number 52 5
126. bumibaanduertemmce neta 159 Tutorial Make an AVI Clip of the Best Frames c sceceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees 163 Frame SONS CION omenia i a a ai aa 170 The Frame Selector n0nn0nnnnenennnoooeennnnnrrnerereerrrnnnnrereerenrrnnnnnaeeerrernnnnn nnee 170 The Frame Selection Tutorial cccccccccceeeeeseeccceeeeeeeeeeeeeeneeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees 173 Create Time Lapse movies from regular MOVICS cccceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees 177 Bate M ProCeSSiN geniena raa E AE 177 Scan an AVI File for Meters ceeeeeeeesceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaeeeeeeeeeeeeeeesnaaeeeeeeeees 181 Scan an AVI File for Meteors sas ccecccscccsscisecisecnesidecigaxMievicenad cigerifinagesdteniins 181 Select an Input File sitet titanate wreaitulnbieidicaidsta nade bd tani Sneltvtenmeb 183 Scan AVI File Movie Setup Section cceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeneeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaeees 183 Scan AVI File for Meteors and Create New Movie eeeeeeeeeteeeeeeeees 187 About Video Codecs cnccciciccssasacnnccnscemnttecanestbadtdancdadsneveaadiaensbepimeaisablves lt 5etex 189 About Compression Quality ccccceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeneneeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaees 190 Configure Window ExampleS ssssesssssssnnnnrnesseeertrrrnrnnnsstrrnnnnnnnnseeeennnn 194 Joi AVI PSS essnee inunan Bae nace inakuna anaanatae i a na atana 202 JOIN AVIFES E ee e ea rt aria are rer E E E rr eer ener err 202 Stack Images ame renee ere on Ore ere eee ere ee 204 St ck AO SS
127. c via the Internet and install it Then you would be able to play the file using HandyAvi If you can play the file using HandyAvi then you can also use HandyAvi s editing features to create a new file using the same or a different codec and include or exclude selected frames from the new AVI file Many CODECs allow you to have control over the Quality factor or Compression factor that will let you make your files smaller Learn more about Compression Quality Learn more about Configure windows About Compression Quality There are many video compression schemes The purpose of a video compression scheme is to make a smaller file without sacrificing too much detail in the images An uncompressed AVI file is comprised of a series of bmp image files There are actually many different bmp file formats Each of the formats is designed to reconstruct an image pixel by pixel Typically AVI files are made up of bmp files which have 3 Bytes for each pixel The three bytes contain the Red Green and Blue values for a pixel Thus a 640x480 uncompressed image requires approximately 3 x 640 x 480 bytes approximately because there may be some pad bytes at the end of each line There is also a small amount of header data describing the size color content length and width of the images etc 3 x 640 x 480 Bytes is 921600 bytes or almost 1 Megabyte If your AVI video camera is running at 30 frames images per second then you will be storing 30 x 9
128. ceutsnndotvansndeasvannd studeseicneenndotutesanennnnan 30 Motion detect Video Overview eccceceeeeeeeeeeeeneeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeenneeeeeeeeees 30 How to open the motion detect video control WINGOW cccceeeeeeeeeeeeees 31 The Capture Device Section wesscudseaiccticiacectiapiel el ieanieeyiest eben a cetcenNaeinoden 32 The Motion Detect Movie Setup Section cccccceeeeeeeeeseeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees 38 The Motion Detect Display Area cccccceceeeeeceeeeceeeeeeeeeeeeeeneeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees 45 About Video Codecs cass cccentnctcdasiasatsnctasrede con getensaaidenencenenaauaunaeeaceeeeinaseiies 47 About Compression Quality sccec cesisesscckbceneceshensescebdenedeenoeseseebiannceeioneeseuedenewte 48 Configure Window Examples wiicisc5 c504 cpindeee ccc ieteceedi bene colada ieee oudanden 52 Create an Astrophotography Video cccceeeeeeeeeeeeeeneeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeneneeeeeeeees 60 Astronomy Video OVerview cccccceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeenaaeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee 60 How to open the astronomy video control WINGOW ccccceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees 63 The Capture Device Section cccceeeeeeeeeeeeeneceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaeeeeeeeeeeeeeeneas 64 Telescope Controls Section siceicoins cesdsccdseidansased ned obnsagndeesdodegonndeeidennasseeonbes 70 The Astronomy Movie Setup SeCtion cccceceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeneeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees 72 The Create Astronomy Movie Section cc
129. ch QuickCam Pro 4000 webcam looks like this Camera controls Zoom Face Tracking Figure 6 The image in Figure 6 shows that the camera is in Full Auto Mode which means that the camera will automatically adjust for changes in light levels It will sometimes change the frame rate automatically when in this mode 34 Image Capture Modes The Video Settings window for the Philips ToUcam webcam looks like this Properties eal Image controls Camera controls Audio controls Performance Control a is OK aj vV d Full auto Frame rate s Image Frames i 5 1 10 15 20 25 30 aiil quality per second Help Image controls Modes Brightness Gamma B A Black and white O ga a Figure 7 These controls provide a great deal of control over your webcam and might need to be adjusted to get the best results under various lighting conditions For planetary astronomy of for example Saturn using a telescope we usually take the camera out of Full auto and adjust the Frame rate Brightness Contrast etc to provide an image that is not over exposed We have found that lowering the Frame rate is often helpful for planetary imaging Other webcams may have other types of video settings windows of course The above are simply examples of webcam control features that two different manufacturers decided to provide IMPORTANT if the Full auto control is checked in Figure 7
130. com downloads Or do a Google search on Microsoft Framework 2 0 After installing Microsoft NET Framework Version 2 0 please reinstall HandyAvi so that SelectNthFilter dll will become registered 246 Troubleshooting We were then further surprised VERY surprised to learn that SelectNthFilter dll was dependent on a DLL that is installed when you install the compiler but does NOT exist on other machines Our testing showed that everything was working but the installation was apparently failing on other machines We have located the rogue DLL and it is now being distributed with our code as of release 3 2 so we hope weseen the last of the SelectNthFilter installation problems Note that if you wish to operate HandyAvi without Microsoft NET Framework Version 2 0 all of the other functions of HandyAvi should work Only the Batch Processing feature of HandyAvi is dependent upon NET Framework Version 2 0 being present Crash Handler HandyAvi contains a Crash Handler that can be used to send us information if HandyAvi crashes for some reason We promise to look carefully at any of these that we receive and fix the problem if we can figure out what caused it You can help by sending us the report AND by providing some additional text indicating what you were doing at the time of the crash Every clue helps immensely Our goal is to provide RELIABLE TROUBLE FREE software and we strive to continuously improve our product Send us Ema
131. ction Options Select every 2 4 nd frame Select Al Unselect Al Sort by JPEG size for Astronomy Normal i z6 aj At ort view foe ens Save displayed frame as a bmp file Save displayed frame as a jpg file Save al checked frames as bmp files Save all checked frames as jpo files Create AVI video file from checked frames cows These quality values are somewhere close to the threshold where noise begins to be a factor for these particular images in this particular AVI file Frame 18 was selected as the best frame for both of the above Quality settings Figure 91 Frame 18 Whether frame 19 is better than frame 31 is a good question Figure 92 Frame 19 Figure 93 Frame 31 169 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual However both values of Quality identified Frame 39 as the worst frame Figure 94 Frame 39 Save the Best Frames We can now create a new AVI file from the best frames by selecting the first N frames in the Video Frame Selector window then left clicking the Create AVI video file from selected frames button This will bring up a standard file selector window and you can choose the directory and name for the new file If you click Save then a new AVI file will be generated containing the frames you selected The frames will appear in the new AVI file in the order they were in within the Video Frame Selector window The resultant AVI file can now be used as input to RegiS
132. d drag conventions are utilized See The Frame Selection Tutorial for more information The most recently selected item is displayed in the main display window The numbers on the left are frame index numbers The numbers on the right are the numbers of the original frames in the AVI file After sorting as described below the numbers on the right still refer to the original frame order in the AVI file but they appear in order of how good the image is from best to worst The Frame Selection Options box provides additional control over frame selection 171 tanayavi 5 0 User s Manual Select Select every second or every third or every fourth frame based on the number entered either by type in or by using the spinner control This is useful for making a time lapse movie from a normal movie Select All Select all of the frames Unselect All deselect all of the frames For astronomers Apply size frame sorting algorithm allows you to sort in Normal List the frames in the order that they appear in the AVI file Sort Sort the frames and list them in sorted order with the best frames being listed first and the worst frames listed last Adjust sort quality Select the JPEG compression quality factor Use this to minimize the effect of noise when the sorting is done View View an image as it would appear if you saved it to a file then redisplayed it It shows the effect of the quality factor A high quality factors does not co
133. d ihe athena eshcdnddnlaldacaoianidordnldn 259 Help Mensies iiie i ia e a a iiaa 260 ToolBar WOW isc ccs cscs carenusin ane veal cwaae se anes oud axnvwa ns aceviGwicaeevasexeusteniiaueeusedinus 260 NS E PEER EAE E E EEEE EE E EE EE EE O 263 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual HandyAvi Overview HandyAvi Overview NOTE HandyAvi now has 5 different license options e HandyAvi Deluxe Edition Complete version that includes all fe atures e HandyAvi TimeLapse Edition Less expensive version with only the Time Lapse imaging capture feature e HandyAvi Surveillance Edition Less expensive version with only the Motion Detection capture feature e HandyAvi Astronomy Edition Less expensive version with Astronomy Meteor Capture and telescope control features e HandyAvi Animation Edition Less expensive version with only th e Animation capture features EACH edition allows full access to all of the HandyAvi Tools menu items This help file shows all of the features of the complete HandyAvi Deluxe Edition HandyAvi HandyAvi will HandyAvi will Is a multi purpose Webcam program for creating and editing AVI movie files Will work with nearly all types of webcams Works with NTSC and PAL cameras if you use a USB Video Adapter Supports video boards such as the Hauppauge WinTV 885 Capture Board Will control Meade telescopes et you make Time Lapse videos Motion Detect videos Astronomy videos Mete
134. der to produce one final frame for each 10 minute interval These frames can then be used to make a movie of the rotation of Jupiter Note that when file names are generated a test is done to see if a file of the generated name already exists If it does that name is not used and the next sequential name is generated and tested until an unused name is found This protects you from accidentally overwriting files The Create Astronomy Movie Section Create Movie Live Video Preview Last Captured Frame Output File Size 578 KB Frame number 12 Status Uploading file to your web site Tracking 23 16 Jup 0036 avi Next FTP upload 7 3 2008 0910 Last FTP upload 7 2 2008 1326 75 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Figure 52 START Starts video capture The Live Video Preview area will display all frames seen by the webcam in real time Captured frames frames sent to the AVI output file will appear in the Last Captured Frame area Note that the Start button here is yellow This indicates that a Set Allowable Image Capture Times preference item has been set Yellow means that video recording is currently allowed but at some point in time video recording will cease until it is again allowable Red would mean that video recording is not allowed at the current time NOTE Output files will automatically be limited to less than 2 Gigabytes the AVI file size limit A new file with a unique new name will be generated and used automatic
135. different bmp file formats Each of the formats is designed to reconstruct an image pixel by pixel Typically AVI files are made up of bmp files which have 3 Bytes for each pixel The three bytes contain the Red Green and Blue values for a pixel Thus a 640x480 uncompressed image requires approximately 3 x 640 x 480 bytes approximately because there may be some pad bytes at the end of each line There is also a small amount of header data describing the size color content length and width of the images etc 3 x 640 x 480 Bytes is 921600 bytes or almost 1 Megabyte If your AVI video camera is running at 30 frames images per second then you will be storing 30 x 921600 Bytes per second or 27 6 Megabytes per second 10 minutes of video would require 16 588 800 000 bytes or 16 5 Gigabytes That is why video compression is usually a good idea You would like to make the file smaller without messing up the images too much Lossless Compression Lossless compression refers to a compression scheme that compresses the data without losing any of the information in the picture If you compress an image using a lossless compression scheme the restored image when decompressed is IDENTICAL to the original image An example of lossless compression is Run Length Encoding used in FAX machines Run length encoding for a black and white image consists of looking at each row of pixels in the original image and creating a file that tells how many white pixels
136. disabled and the Go button is disabled but all other controls function normally so you can for example change focus or get a read out of the telescope s RA and Dec The Park setting is remembered by HandyAvi If you had it set when you exited HandyAvi it will be set when you reenter HandyAvi If the telescope was parked it will continue to be parked even if you exit HandyAvi FOCUS SECTION Tools Fast Stepped Slow Stepper Motor Fast Stepp er Motor Figure 57 This section allows you to operate the Meade focusing motor There are two basic focusing speeds slow and fast You can choose which speed you are using by checking or un checking the check box Experience has shown that during slow speed runs the motor often bogs down and stops so use of the fast speed might be necessary There are two Stepped modes Slow Stepped and Fast Stepped that allow you to use the Meade focuser in a much more controlled manner When stepping HandyAvi transmits a motor on motor off command of fixed duration If you hold the IN or OUT button down the telescope will execute a series of stepped motions Step mode is highly recommended if you are using a standard Meade focuser with the LX 200 Again the counter attempts to indicate position Each step provides a count of 2 This was to try to get a correlation between stepped and un stepped focus position Not entirely successful Note that the Meade focusin
137. display window comes up it will look something like the above image If you want the movie to automatically begin playing see the File Preferences menu item The default is to NOT play automatically The above window is now fully resizable by grabbing a corner or an edge and dragging Double clicking the left mouse button on the above image will cause the image to be displayed in full screen mode Double clicking while in full screen mode will return you to non full screen mode Controls E Stop Stop playing and reset to beginning of the movie Pressing the down arrow key on the keyboard is the same as selecting the Stop button 157 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual gt Play When this button is pressed the movie begins playing and the Pause button will be displayed in its place If the movie has run to the end pressing this button will start running the movie from the beginning Pressing the up arrow key on the keyboard is the same as selecting the Play button The arrow keys should be used to control the display when in full screen mode Il Pause When this button is pressed the movie will stop and the Play button will be displayed in its place Pressing the down arrow key on the keyboard also invokes the Pause function The arrow keys should be used to control the display when in full screen mode rl Display the next frame You can step forward through the movie a frame at a time You can also step forward by pressing the
138. displays the FOURCC value for the compressor in brackets at the beginning of the Compression line Note that HandyAvi will also allow you to read work with and display AVI files produced by other software or cameras and will select the proper decompression scheme automatically IF the required decompression scheme has been installed on your computer HandyAvi will also allow you to read a file that was written using one compression scheme and write a new AVI file using a new compression scheme So you can convert AVI files from one compression scheme to another if the required codecs have been installed on your machine Configure Brings up the compression CODEC s configuration window This button only appears if the selected compression scheme HAS a configuration window Note that the Quality slider and the quality settings in some CODECs do not cooperate In the case of the mjpg CODEC the Forced quality slider determines the degree of JPEG compression and the Quality slider in the Time Lapse Movie Setup window has absolutely no effect Other CODECs we have tested do not override our Quality slider When in doubt you should test by setting the quality and capturing for example three frames of the same scene use Time Lapse and take one frame every 3 seconds or so Then change the quality factor and make another movie The size of the two resultant AVI movie files should be different See Configure Window Examples for in
139. dly and is more expensive than most cameras used for surveillance work We needed the sensitivity for meteor detection There are of course MANY cheaper cameras that output NTSC Video Composite signals that can be used with HandyAvi via a USB Video adapter The user here has now selected a Hauppauge WinTV 885 Video Capture board Capture Device Hauppauge WinTV 885 Video Capture v Video Format Video Frame Size 720 X 480 Video Settings Frames per Second 30 Video Source Figure 10 The Video Source button now exposes this manufacturer s window Properes e Crossbar Input Output 1 Video Composite In fo Video Decoder Out X 1 Video Composite In 2 Video SVideo In 3 Video Composite In Video Side in Related Pin 6 Audio Line In 1 Audio Decoder Out Link Related Streams Figure 11 Video Tuner In means that the board is going to receive input from the TV tuner S Video and Composite inputs can also be selected as input sources We don t know why this board has two Video SVideo In selections TV Tuner The Capture Device section also now includes a TV Tuner button which provides access to the board manufacturer s TV Tuner settings window 97 andy avi 5 0 User s Manual Figure 12 This window allows you to select the input television channel among other things On this particular board we have found that to input Channel 12 you have to en
140. dow will be displayed Otherwise no window is displayed and HandyAvi exits promptly No window will be displayed during HandyAvi closing unless a new version is found No check will ever be done if you choose Never as the Automatically check for new versions interval 244 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Troubleshooting Troubleshooting DEP or Data Execution Prevention A HandyAvi customer alerted us to this potential problem Microsoft introduced something called Data Execution Prevention in Windows XP Its purpose is to prevent executable code programming statements from running in areas that are data areas rather than program areas Its purpose is to provide extra protection for your environment We didn t think we were doing anything to trigger DEP but the customer was trying to run HandyAvi on a Windows 2003 Server that had hardware DEP He said that when he tried to bring up a file selector to tell where to put his output file that HandyAvi exited We are and have been using the Microsoft standard CFileDialog class which in our opinion shouldn t trigger a problem We have been unable to replicate the problem on our machines If we can t replicate it then in general we can t fix it We are not the only ones with this potential problem evidently Microsoft has a list of major third party programs that need to be excluded from DEP We believe that Window 2003 Servers probably default to turning on DEP for EVE
141. dyAvi via a USB Video adapter The user here has now selected a Hauppauge WinTV 885 Video Capture board Capture Device Hauppauge WinTV 885 Video Capture v Video Format Video Frame Size 720 X 480 Video Settings Frames per Second 30 Video Source Figure 10 The Video Source button now exposes this manufacturer s window Properes e Crossbar Input Output 1 Video Composite In fo Video Decoder Out X 1 Video Composite In 2 Video SVideo In 3 Video Composite In Video Side in Related Pin 6 Audio Line In 1 Audio Decoder Out Link Related Streams Figure 11 Video Tuner In means that the board is going to receive input from the TV tuner S Video and Composite inputs can also be selected as input sources We don t know why this board has two Video SVideo In selections TV Tuner The Capture Device section also now includes a TV Tuner button which provides access to the board manufacturer s TV Tuner settings window 69 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual S Properties fs TVTuner Property Page Channel Country Tuning Space Tuning Mode 4 F p rr EZ ES Status Video Standards fags je pais Input pee E Lo Ere 1 C Antena sugars E2 Video 205250000 pe ie oo oe Audio 209750000 Figure 12 This window allows you to select the input television channel among other things On this particular board we have found that to input C
142. e brightest SAO objects There are 15 928 SAO objects in the Meade database It includes all SAO objects brighter than 7 magnitude SAO object numbers are 6 digit numbers and they are not ordered by brightness so there are a lot of holes i e if you type in a random 6 digit number you are unlikely to hit anything and the display will not show a new RA or DEC If you want to try something that works try SAO 151881 which is Sirius or SAO 67174 which is Vega You could obtain the SAO catalog from an on line source sort by magnitude and get some idea of which numbers would work The GCVS catalog is a catalog of variable stars 21 815 of them Meade has them numbered by constellation which consists of the first two digits followed by a 4 digit number assigned according to the standard sequence of variable star designations Again there are lots of holes A number such as 99999999 is sure to be unknown or unassigned For testing purposes you could use GCVS 860001 which is in Virgo Unfortunately we were unable to correlate that with anything in Megastar Caution is advised This is the Messier catalog of things that Charles Messier found irritatingly bothersome in his quest for new comets These are great objects whose numbers run from 1 to 110 M 1 is the Crab nebula for example Tools 5 NGC a The NGC or New General Catalog is a catalog of 7840 objects which include Galaxies Planetary Nebulae etc 6 CNGC a The CNGC
143. e you will want to click on codec list to see all of the codecs Codecs have four character names known as Four Character Codes or FOURCC names This is how they are identified internally so that software applications such as HandyAvi can know which codec was used to produce a particular file FOURCC codes are also used internally when a HandyAvi user selects a compression scheme such as Indeo video 5 10 Indeo video 5 10 has a FOURCC name of IV50 If you have an AVI file that was encoded using IV50 you can see the IV50 codec name by opening the file in HandyAvi and using the View AVI File Info menu item 47 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual AVI File Info Ea AVI Name MarsSmallTest avi File Size 20544 KB Image Size 160x120 Number of Frames 999 Frames Per Second 25 Compression Scheme mjpg Rate 25000 Scale 1000 Figure 19 Figure 19 shows that the compression scheme used to compress the file MarsSmallTest avi was mjpg which is the FOURCC code for the Morgan Multimedia MJPG codec HandyAvi will also attempt to open files compressed with codecs that are NOT installed on your machine If the required codec is not installed HandyAvi will of course be unable to PLAY the file but it will try to produce an AVI File Info report as shown in Figure 19 so that you will be able to identify the missing codec If you know which codec was used you might be able to locate an installable version of the code
144. e User Sngle CPU Compressor License Compression Quality Encode Normalized YUV Provided by Pegasus Imaging Corporation LT Lear 16 Web http wiew pegasusimaging com GUME TAA ee BO et sue t t corn Luminance Qualty 2 Subsameling Telephone 813 875 7575 FAX 813 875 7705 Chrominance Quatty 22 aa C phi 17 2Filds If More Than 240 Lines z R m 4 Make Primary M JPEG Codec Figure 30 PICVideo MJPG CODEC There are at least two MJPG CODEC vendors out there As far as we know you have to buy an MJPG CODEC if you want to use one The PICVideo MJPG CODEC has a Compression Quality slider that you can adjust to set your desired trade off between image size and image quality HandyAvi s Quality slider does not appear when the PICVideo MJPG compression scheme is selected so the above panel is the only way to adjust Quality Compression 114 Image Capture Modes Morgan Multimedia M JPEG codec registered 3 0 0 3 Copyright Morgan Multimedia 1990 2001 V Enable codec V User FourCC mipg Decompression V Enabled M Support interleave C Fastinteger Invert field order Integer Fancy upsampling C Float Iv MMX V SSE i M SSE2 l WGCoe F SMP Compression V Enabled V Support interleave C Fastinteger Invert field order Integer V Bitrate control Float Better bitrate control Iv MMx M SSE C 422 M 3DNow M SSE2 OTETA E M SMP Z Forced quality
145. e Video Source window will allow you to choose which one will be seen by HandyAvi Here is what the USB 2821 s Video Source windows looks like GS Properties Output 0 Video Decoder Out 0 Video Tuner In 1 Video Composite In 2 Video SVideo In 3 Video Composite In Miden Seo in Related Pin 6 Audio Line In 1 Audio Decoder Out Link Related Streams Figure 9 You can see that we have opened the Input pull down Video Composite In means HandyAvi will see the video stream from a camera plugged into the adapter s Composite Video input port a standard Phono Plug If instead you plug an S Video source into the adapter from a VCR or DVD player etc and choose 2 Video SVideo In then HandyAvi will see the video stream of the S Video device that you have plugged in Note that most surveillance cameras output Video Composite signals i e NTSC signals in many countries PAL in many others We have a Watec 902H2 ULTIMATE camera that we are using for Meteor Detection We plug its Video Composite output into the GA VD204 adapter or other USB Video adapter and then plug the adapter into the USB port HandyAvi sees the video and everything works well Image Capture Modes Note that some adapters check to see if you are using a USB 1 port or a USB 2 port Some of them will NOT allow you to set higher resolutions like 640 x 480 if you are using a USB 1 port This is usually undocumented and can be puzzling
146. e sent to the corresponding window in Figure 113 so it will be blank while the enlarged window is open 188 Tools E Live Preview Frames E Figure 114 The above image shows an enlarged Live Preview Frames window that has been sized with the Size option to the True Image Size of 320x240 which was the size of the images within the chosen AVI file About Video Codecs Note You do not have to learn about codecs to use HandyAvi However the purpose of a CODEC is to compress your video data so that your AVI files are smaller So if space on your hard drive is a consideration you will probably want to use a CODEC AVI files can be created either by using no compression uncompressed or by using one of literally hundreds of compression schemes codecs is short for Coder decoder that have been created by various companies Uncompressed files are generally MUCH larger than compressed files In order for HandyAvi to use a particular compression schemes it must have been installed on your computer Many AVI codecs probably already have been installed on your machine Some come from Microsoft as part of your operating system Some come from the manufacturers of webcams that you might have installed You can even download and install codecs from the Internet Some are free and others are not http www fourcc org is a site that lists and describes almost all known codecs If you surf to that site you will want to click on codec li
147. e setup windows IF the selected Compression scheme has a configuration window associated with it This shows the Movie Setup window for Time Lapse captures so you can see where the Configure button and Quality slider are Time Lapse Movie Setup Output File C _test timelapse avi Browse Compression Impa PICVideo M JPEG 3 VAW Cod x Configure Take one frame every 1 000 seconds Play back rate images per second 30 Light Controls advanced M e Figure 24 Below we describe briefly the control each configuration window allows over compression Quality Cinepak for Windows 32 radus Version 1 10 0 11 Copyright 1992 1995 Radius Inc All Rights Reserved Compress to Color C Compress to Black amp White 23 andyavi 5 0 User s Manual Figure 25 Cinepak CVID CODEC CVID has no adjustable quality option HandyAvi s Quality slider has no effect DivX Codec Properties Main Codec Video r Codec Performance Encoding mode EA Fastest Be oe for very high resolution live capture or High performance ates are necessary to retain full quality Balanced Default Better Quality Extreme Quality Insane Qualit m Frame Control Bidirectional coding Max Keyframe interval Keyframe threshold untracked blocks Advanced Restore defaults Cancel Figure 26 DivX CODEC DivX allows you to select various Encoding Modes which essentiall
148. e to buy an MJPG CODEC if you want to use one The PICVideo MJPG CODEC has a Compression Quality slider that you can adjust to set your desired trade off between image size and image quality HandyAvi s Quality slider does not appear when the PICVideo MJPG compression scheme is selected so the above panel is the only way to adjust Quality Compression 198 Tools Morgan Multimedia M JPEG codec registered 3 0 0 3 Copyright Morgan Multimedia 1990 2001 V Enable codec V User FourCC mipg Decompression V Enabled M Support interleave C Fastinteger T Invert field order Integer Fancy upsampling C Float lv MMX MV SSE M 3DN M SSE2 M WGCore F 3DNow M SMP Compression V Enabled V Support interleave C Fastinteger Invert field order Integer V Bitrate control Float Better bitrate control Iv MMx M SSE C 422 M 3DNow M SSE2 OTETA E M SMP IV Forced quality 75 Cancel About Figure 31 Morgan Multimedia MJPG Codec Morgan MJPG allows quality to be set if the Forced quality check box is checked The value in the display box here seen as 75 ALWAYS overrides the value set by the HandyAvi Quality sliders HandyAvi s Quality slider appears but has no effect We ran into a problem with the above version of the Morgan CODEC in Vista when we used image sizes other than 160x120 320x240 or 640x480 Caused a HandyAvi crash that we could not find a work around for We sent Email to the
149. easily place the file in a particular folder Compression Select any AVI file compression scheme resident on your computer File compression schemes or codecs short for coder decoder show up on your machine from many sources Microsoft installs several Your video camera may install one or more You may download and install compression schemes from the internet At the time of this writing there are over 280 codecs listed at http Awww fourcc org Note that one of the selection items is called Uncompressed If you select Uncompressed the image data in your files will not be compressed Your files will be LARGE However each image in an Uncompressed file will contain images that are exactly what the camera captured Compressed images are usually slightly different from the original images because information is lost during compression In most cases the difference is not noticeable Use of uncompressed images is important for some applications but not necessary or advisable for most Learn more about video codecs here HandyAvi displays the FOURCC value for the compressor in brackets at the beginning of the Compression line Note that HandyAvi will also allow you to read work with and display AVI files produced by other software or cameras and will select the proper decompression scheme automatically IF the required decompression scheme has been installed on your computer So you can convert AVI files from one compression scheme to another
150. east one movie file is open Play Video Reinitializes the active AVI file and plays the movie from the beginning This menu item is not active grayed unless an AVI file is open for playing within HandyAvi Frame Selector Opens the AVI file Frame Selector feature This menu item is not active grayed unless an AVI file is open for playing within HandyAvi 258 Menus Crop and Save Opens the AVI file Crop and Save feature when an AVI file is open on the screen This menu item is not active grayed unless an AVI file is open for playing within HandyAvi Batch Operations Creates Time Lapse movies from non Time Lapse movies If you already have an AVI movie file and you would like to create a Time Lapse movie from it this will allow you do it Scan a File for Meteors Scans an existing AVI file for meteors and creates a new AVI file containing only the meteor tracks that were detected Join AVI Files Creates one AVI file from two or more AVI files by splicing them together Telescope Port Opens the telescope communications port so that the proper port may be selected Telescope Controls Opens the telescope controls panel which provides control over any telescope that responds to Meade LX 200 commands View Menu HandyAvi File Capture Tools View Help MEZ v Toolbar Status Bar AVI File Info ile Frame Time Loa AVIE Figure 148 The menu when no movie file is open z HandyAvi
151. eceding the trigger frame as specified Then the trigger frame will be written out and then additional frames will be written out if motion continues to be detected After no motion has been detected the number of post frames specified are captured and written out Note If you click on a slider you can then use the left and right arrow keys on the keyboard to make fine adjustments Post Frames This slider allows you to specify how many image frames following the last detected motion will be written to your AVI output file Allowable values are from 1 to 250 We recommend that you set this to 5 or more since this value also establishes a time window for further motion detection 100 Image Capture Modes For example lets say that 6 Pre frames and 5 Post frames are specified When a meteor or other motion is detected the trigger event the system will write out the 6 frames that immediately preceded the motion event frame Then the trigger frame will be written out Then motion detection will continue interleaved as the 5 Post frames are written out If motion is detected during the writing of the Post frames image capture to the AVI file will continue and 5 new Post frames will be scheduled Motion detection and frame writing will continue in this manner as long as motion persists Eventually no more motion will be detected and HandyAvi will then record the final 5 Post frames then stop recording frames and begin waiting
152. eceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeneeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees 75 ADo rVideo COGS sorsra eE rE EE EEEE EEE ETE EEN 77 About Compression Quality icc co siiessnescioncericerese steer iacivertsennieeeciecevecteeeeaens 78 Configure Window Examples ccccceeessessececeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaaeees 82 Create a Meteor Trail Video siscczcconcdenineniinihenctenthenthtiendiantieniiatiendientienthtiiaves 90 Meteor Trail Video Overview cececcceeccceeeeeeeeeeeeeeaeeeeeeeeeeeeessesnaeeeeeeeeees 90 How to Open the Meteor Trail Video Control ccceceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees 91 The Capture Device Section sssssssneneeeeoseertrtrnrrteeerrrtttnnnrrreeerrrttnnnnnneeeet 92 The Meteor Trail Movie Setup SeCtiON cceeeceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeneeeeeeeeeeeeeeees 98 The Meteor Trail Create Movie Area ccceccceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees 103 About Video Codecs scecigcccicsieciitiicascicennindnnnidviondnainidviennceidsinadweaduaubunntteniicuidaaitnesltn 105 About Compression Quality so scescsevneusssonnsccds wets ieasscibiuNeuiiodeesesesdenalienemdsene 107 Configure Window EX IN PIGS isoiiscnencetes cond etedaeuesaucbidtoeveyeiehedteadterevervvedslbies 111 Create an Animation Video sca5sccee ced ccesvecs cesensdeseeevabestanyedacseeenntevenngegesenn lt cees 118 Animation Video Overview cccccceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaaeeeeeeeeeeeeneees 118 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual How to Open the Animation Contro
153. ecompressor View License Brightness 0 IV Enable Codec Provided by Pegasus Imaging Corporation S I Adyanced Deblocking Web iran gear pereeweeeeereweteeene Support support com 100 0 100 T Assume Normalized YUV Telephone 813 875 7575 EENE Swap Fields FAX 813 875 7705 ontas Force YUV Output ae eee eee ee ee rie 100 Regstration Code m M JPEG Compressor Settings rSingle User Sngle CPU Compressor License Compression Quality Encode Normalized YUV Provided by Pegasus Imaging Corporation LT Lear 16 Web http wiew pegasusimaging com GUME TAA ee BO et sue t t corn Luminance Qualty 2 Subsameling Telephone 813 875 7575 FAX 813 875 7705 Chrominance Quatty 22 aa C phi 17 2Filds If More Than 240 Lines z R m 4 Make Primary M JPEG Codec Figure 30 PICVideo MJPG CODEC There are at least two MJPG CODEC vendors out there As far as we know you have to buy an MJPG CODEC if you want to use one The PICVideo MJPG CODEC has a Compression Quality slider that you can adjust to set your desired trade off between image size and image quality HandyAvi s Quality slider does not appear when the PICVideo MJPG compression scheme is selected so the above panel is the only way to adjust Quality Compression 26 Image Capture Modes Morgan Multimedia M JPEG codec registered 3 0 0 3 Copyright Morgan Multimedia 1990 2001 V Enable codec
154. egasusimaging com GUME TAA ee BO et sue t t corn Luminance Qualty 2 Subsameling Telephone 813 875 7575 FAX 813 875 7705 Chrominance Quatty 22 aa C phi 17 2Filds If More Than 240 Lines z R m 4 Make Primary M JPEG Codec Figure 30 PICVideo MJPG CODEC There are at least two MJPG CODEC vendors out there As far as we know you have to buy an MJPG CODEC if you want to use one The PICVideo MJPG CODEC has a Compression Quality slider that you can adjust to set your desired trade off between image size and image quality HandyAvi s Quality slider does not appear when the PICVideo MJPG compression scheme is selected so the above panel is the only way to adjust Quality Compression 86 Image Capture Modes Morgan Multimedia M JPEG codec registered 3 0 0 3 Copyright Morgan Multimedia 1990 2001 V Enable codec V User FourCC mipg Decompression V Enabled M Support interleave C Fastinteger Invert field order Integer Fancy upsampling C Float Iv MMX V SSE i M SSE2 l WGCoe F SMP Compression V Enabled V Support interleave C Fastinteger Invert field order Integer V Bitrate control Float Better bitrate control Iv MMx M SSE C 422 M 3DNow M SSE2 OTETA E M SMP Z Forced quality 75 Cancel About Figure 31 Morgan Multimedia MJPG Codec Morgan MJPG allows quality to be set if the Forced quality check box is checked The value
155. en you would be able to play the file using HandyAvi If you can play the file using HandyAvi then you can also use HandyAvi s editing features to create a new file using the same or a different codec and include or exclude selected frames from the new AVI file Many CODECs allow you to have control over the Quality factor or Compression factor that will let you make your files smaller Learn more about Compression Quality Learn more about Configure windows About Compression Quality There are many video compression schemes The purpose of a video compression scheme is to make a smaller file without sacrificing too much detail in the images An uncompressed AVI file is comprised of a series of bmp image files There are actually many different bmp file formats Each of the formats is designed to reconstruct an image pixel by pixel Typically AVI files are made up of bmp files which have 3 Bytes for each pixel The three bytes contain the Red Green and Blue values for a pixel Thus a 640x480 uncompressed image requires approximately 3 x 640 x 480 bytes approximately because there may be some pad bytes at the end of each line There is also a small amount of header data describing the size color content length and width of the images etc 3 x 640 x 480 Bytes is 921600 bytes or almost 1 Megabyte If your AVI video camera is running at 30 frames images per second then you will be storing 30 x 921600 Bytes per second or 27 6 Megaby
156. eo Output File Enter the path name of the new video file you want to create Note The background color of this field will be YELLOW if you have selected File Recycling in the Preferences panel and have the Use file recycling box checked The color is simply to notify you that file recycling is active 11 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Browse Brings up a standard file selector window so that you can more easily place the file in a particular folder Compression Select any AVI file compression scheme resident on your computer File compression schemes or codecs short for coder decoder show up on your machine from many sources Microsoft installs several Your video camera may install one or more You may download and install compression schemes from the internet At the time of this writing there are over 280 codecs listed at http www fourcc org Note that one of the selection items is called Uncompressed If you select Uncompressed the image data in your files will not be compressed Your files will be LARGE However each image in an uncompressed file will contain images that are exactly what the camera captured Compressed images are usually slightly different from the original images because information is lost during compression In most cases the difference is not noticeable Use of uncompressed images is important for some applications but not necessary or advisable for most Learn more about video codecs here HandyAvi
157. eo cameras DVD players VHS players security cameras NTSC is the signal used by broadcast television prior to digital television anyway NTSC is a VERY widely used video standard in MANY countries NTSC is used in the USA PAL Similar to NTSC but it is used in even MORE countries than those using NTSC PAL is used in Europe S Video a video signal that is delivered by a 4 pin circular plug Typically a better quality signal Phono plug Plug that was developed for audio applications but often also used to deliver video signals BNC connector specialized coaxial cable connector used on high quality equipment It locks with a twist so cannot be jerked loose like a phono plug The cameras we ve tested with and use to make our own movies include the following 1 Philips PCVC 740K ToUcam A favorite among amateur astronomers This is a CCD camera that works well in low light conditions No longer in production Philips SPC 900 NC 00 PC Camera Also a favorite among amateur astronomers This is also a CCD camera and appears to be the successor the to PCVC 740K Logitech Quickcam VC An older CMOS camera that we test with because its driver is peculiar Unlike most other camera drivers the Quickcam driver does not go away when the camera is unplugged We had to do extra work to protect you from this anomaly Logitech Quickcam 4000 A CMOS camera that seems to perform pretty well under low light conditions We have had good
158. er was changed HandyAvi s Quality slider is not visible XviD Configuration r Main Settings Profile Level as L5 more Encoding type Single pass more Target quantizer 31 00 calc Frame Weight Quant Modifiers 0 W 1 00 Add Remove Zone Options More Advanced Options L J Load Defaults Decoder Options Figure 35 XviD CODEC 59 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual HandyAvi s Quality slider DOES control quality for this CODEC Create an Astrophotography Video Astronomy Video Overview HandyAvi allows you to easily make astronomy videos using a webcam Webcams have become increasingly popular for making telescopic webcam videos of the Moon and planets such as Venus Mars Jupiter and Saturn A webcam can be used to take MANY frames of a bright astronomical object the Moon and planets such as Venus Mars Jupiter and Saturn and capture them into an AVI movie file Each original frame typically looks blurry distorted and fuzzy due to effects of the Earth s atmosphere However if you take a great many such frames align them and average them together the result is typically amazing The blurriness distortion and fuzziness diminish greatly and fine details emerge HandyAvi can be used to take groups of frames as fast as your webcam can capture images spaced by any time interval desired For example if you specify 20 frames every 45
159. erent camera The file does illustrate how to automate initial image processing though use of Maxim DL s Scripting language Create Go To List Entries You can use this to add data to the Go To list or you can hand edit the Go To list Note that the date time field works by highlighting the day or the month or the year or the hour or the minute or the second and using the spinner controls up down arrows to the right of the field Add an Object to the Go To List This will add the selected object to the end of the Go To list Again remember that the list can be hand edited See the View the List button below Go To List section This is a scrolling window that will let you see the current list entries You cannot hand edit the list in this window To hand edit the list see the View the List button below Camera Data Image Download time You camera takes a certain amount of time to download an image You can take a very short exposure with your camera and then time how long it takes the download to complete Put the number of seconds in here This value will be used when the Change List Times panel runs to adjust the times at which objects are scheduled for shooting Delete Selected Line This will delete the line you selected in the Go To List window Delete All Lines This will delete all the line in the Go To List window so you can start over OK This will apply all of your changes Cancel This will cancel all of yo
160. es GENERATE Calculates scope slew time assumed to be 8 degrees per second we issue a command to the telescope to set the rate to 8 degrees per second and adjusts all times between start time and end time to allow all images in the list to be captured It also calculates Padding which is the number of seconds unused between objects The GENERATE button simply generates the time values They are applied to your gotolist txt file only when the Apply to button is clicked Apply to This updates the time values in the gotolist txt file with these newly calculated values Check the List Runs set of list checks to determine if the list will execute properly with the times given 154 Telescope Controls Execute the list Runs the list so that telescope slews to the objects images are taken and downloaded etc Stop Execution Stops list execution You might need to also interact with Maxim DL to get it to stop imaging Messier Marathon For information on the new system for automating the shooting of all Messier objects in one night see the Fifth Telescope Tab in the Telescope Controls item 155 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Displaying AVI Movies in HandyAvi Displaying AVI Movies HandyAvi can display AVI movies Simply use the File Open menu item to open an AVI file When it opens the movie display will come up Jup039x200 avi 2 28 8 04 Sec Fr 56 im f gt lt Figure 74 When the movie
161. es Allows preferences to be set such as deinterlacing interlaced video images Exit Exits HandyAvi Capture Menu ia HandyAvi File Tools View Help i Time Lapse Images N Motion Detect Images fl Astronomy Images Meteor Trail Images Animation Images Figure 145 The capture menu allows you to choose the type of AVI file you wish to create Time Lapse Images Set up HandyAvi to do time lapse imaging Motion Detect Images Set up HandyAvi to do motion detection imaging Astronomy Images Set up HandyAvi to do astronomical imaging Meteor Trail lmages Set up HandyAvi to do meteor trail imaging Animation Images Set up HandyAvi to do animation 257 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Tools Menu Tools View _Help N l Play Video Batch operations Scan a File for Meteors Join AVI Files Stack Images Make Movie from Still Images Telescope Port Telescope Controls Figure 146 No movie file is open Open an AVI movie file by using the File gt Open menu item or by clicking and dragging an AVI file onto the HandyAvi window G HandyAvi MarsSmallTest avi File Capture View Window Help wi Play Video Frame Selector Crop and Save Batch operations Scan a File for Meteors Join AVI Files Stack Images Im 0 00 39 96 Seg m gt H Telescope Port Telescope Controls Make Movie from Still Images Figure 147 At l
162. es the data but loses some of the data If you compress an image using a lossy compression scheme the restored image when decompressed is NOT identical to the original image However if the scheme is a good one the images will look almost identical There are MANY lossy compression schemes some of which are very well known such as JPEG We can use JPEG to illustrate Lossy compression gt 4 s N gh quality 358 Kilobytes y Factor 99 Very hi Figure 20 JPEG Qualit 49 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual 4 Figure 21 JPEG Quality Factor 75 high quality 70 4 Kilo 50 bytes Image Capture Modes 51 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Figure 23 JPEG Quality Factor 10 noticeably reduced quality 9 9 Kilobytes Each of the above images when stored as a bmp file requires 672 8 Kilobytes of storage space Note that bmp is lossless because it does not use compression i e the image is stored with no loss of resolution or information but the file is BIG However when the lossy JPEG algorithms are applied and the file is stored as a JPEG file instead of a bmp file you can see that as the quality factor decreases the quality goes down and the storage space required goes down Note that some compression CODECs refer to compression factor instead quality factor A quality factor of 75 generally would mean a compression factor of 25 i e quality factor is 100 minus the compression factor
163. etarcaiensatiecet ola iin dndian iaiaaeaia dasida 241 Check ior NeW V GISIONS aA a E AEA 243 Check for New Versions ccccccccccccccccceeessceeeeceueeeeeueeeeeueeeueeueueeesuaeeeeauess 243 TIRQUBISSINO OWING eesi aeaa eaaa aaa a baad a E aara ELE a ite 245 MIS SE OTN gcse ce cht alone set aceincirtinetind hd meecie reireaeine tee ceoteeenebdneitawemenent 245 Recovery of An Incomplete AVI File ccccceeeeeeeeseeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaeeees 247 WMS eases decent A bette ee eerste S EN 249 AandyAvVi WHS sese a a O a e EE EA eeN EOE N 249 Camera WHS soitns ss tecicpoidansteahiedstactdedtonbbiadieaosdedtoebhiedniassdebaondbonbhngeniebedebhoeona nie 249 BTN MOINS saaiachnciiatncateheaicaacascantucn useaetncascundctauanocaatand ean aca ateuaseancraiemandea 249 WA UMS e EEEE EE EEE OE EEEO dsb ake hada du EEE EE 250 USB Video Adaptors cesinta in oee Ean EE 250 NISCGa ameraS neea a A SA 253 Video BoardS cchatanedicutascanondedthoontadeinasdesidemaadehoaidestduasdadeaandentdacadasianardnaiaeaee 253 Things that didn t work ssssssssesessesssnnrnrnneesesesnnrnnnrnsserrrrnnnnnnnnserrnnnnnnnnnenent 254 TT e EE EEEE T EAE EEE EEE E AE EEE OEE EEEE AE EEA 257 File Menu CommandS cians iocssinccicsivadeesGenPanddendianonshiaddenwendeiandeendsiundreadindiae 257 Capture Men s moneen E EE AIET EE 257 TOOLS MENU me eae a eea aa ea ee e a a e e e e a a a Oaa 258 Vew I OIG e a e aaa aa aa e Yadav ida a e eaa eG 259 Window NN ILD sit aint titted thri
164. file formats Each of the formats is designed to reconstruct an image pixel by pixel Typically AVI files are made up of bmp files which have 3 Bytes for each pixel The three bytes contain the Red Green and Blue values for a pixel Thus a 640x480 uncompressed image requires approximately 3 x 640 x 480 bytes approximately because there may be some pad bytes at the end of each line There is also a small amount of header data describing the size color content length and width of the images etc 3 x 640 x 480 Bytes is 921600 bytes or almost 1 Megabyte If your AVI video camera is running at 30 frames images per second then you will be storing 30 x 921600 Bytes per second or 27 6 Megabytes per second 10 minutes of video would require 16 588 800 000 bytes or 16 5 Gigabytes That is why video compression is usually a good idea You would like to make the file smaller without messing up the images too much 130 Image Capture Modes Lossless Compression Lossless compression refers to a compression scheme that compresses the data without losing any of the information in the picture If you compress an image using a lossless compression scheme the restored image when decompressed is IDENTICAL to the original image An example of lossless compression is Run Length Encoding used in FAX machines Run length encoding for a black and white image consists of looking at each row of pixels in the original image and creating a file that tells how m
165. for a new motion event Note If you click on a slider you can then use the left and right arrow keys on the keyboard to make fine adjustments Play back rate images per second Determines how fast your frames will be displayed when you play the AVI movie that you have recorded If you want the frames to be played in real time then you should set the rate to the same rate as the camera was set to when it was recording If you want each frame to be presented at a very slow rate then you could set the play back rate to 1 second In this case each frame of the movie would be displayed for one second when the movie is played Create a new output file for each trail This was requested by a user who was trying to separate each meteor track from other meteor tracks so that he could determine the time of the track among other things If you check the box then each recorded trail will automatically be put into a new AVI file Up to 9999 files The new file names are generated automatically Checks are made to ensure that the new file name does not match an existing file name In case of a match the file name suffix counts up until it finds a name that is not being used New file names are the same as the original file name except that they contain a suffix such as 0001 For example if the original file is named myAviFile avi then when its track has completed it will be closed and a new file with the name myAviFile 0001 avi will be gene
166. formance If you place one tiny rectangle on the screen you will see the CPU usage go down No rectangles or circles means that the entire image is being examined for motion The performance registered is a reasonably accurate reflection of the load being placed on the system by the motion detection routines and will be about the same whether you have START ed video capture or are Image Capture Modes still setting up for video capture If the CPU usage reaches 100 frames might be skipped occasionally Note that circles require more CPU time than rectangles Circles were added to support meteor detection users who have full sky panoramic cameras and who want to avoid automobile lights and other disturbances like trees blowing in the wind occurring at the horizon s Sound Alarm when meteor is detected When this box is checked a bell will sound when a new meteor is detected On startup Restore and use the regions shown above If the displayed regions have been Save d then they will be remembered and used whenever a Motion Detect Capture session is started Unless the saved file has been deleted or moved In that case the entire video area again becomes sensitive Delete all Will cause all rectangles to be deleted The entire image will then be sensitive to motion Undo Will erase the last rectangle Pressing it repeatedly will erase previous rectangles in the opposite order in which they were created Note that the Advanced
167. formation on the Configure options of various CODECs Learn more about video codecs here Quality Adjust the quality of the compression scheme Most compression schemes create smaller files because they are actually discarding tiny image details By discarding more and larger image details you can produce a smaller AVI file If the Quality is set to 100 then little or no image data is discarded and the resultant AVI file will be large If the Quality is set to 0 then theoretically all image data is discarded and the resultant AVI file will contain blank images Of course each codec is created by software people who may have thought about this and limited it so they do not throw away all of the image data even if the Quality is zero Note that each codec is different and some may even ignore the Quality setting or not allow it to be set Also note that lossy compression schemes are used in many applications JPEG is an example of a lossy compression scheme that is used in MANY applications and the fact that some of the image data has been discarded is practically unnoticeable So compression with slightly reduced quality is a very good thing in most cases Learn more about compression here 12 Image Capture Modes Take one frame every seconds Set up the time lapse image capture time delay between frames For example Take one frame every 10 seconds will capture and add one frame to your new AVI file every 10 seconds The captured frame will
168. frame of the movie being captured is reduced in size and pasted into an array A single JPEG image containing the requested number of thumbnail images is transmitted If the check box is not checked no thumbnail images will be composed and sent Enable Email Transmission If this check box is checked then Email will be sent If the check box is not checked no Email messages will be sent by HandyAvi Send Test Message Press this button to send a test message to test whether you have correctly entered the SMTP server address and the Email From and To addresses The test message will contain one full size test image No thumbnail images will be included Here is a representative Email message composed and sent by HandyAvi where the user requested that the fourth image be a full size image and that the first 13 thumbnail images be captured and sent 44 Image Capture Modes Motion Detected Attachments HandyAvi lt me mine com gt T Emailimage jog 9 11PM T EMailThumbs jpg me mine com f Unread 2 Total 2383 Figure 41 The above is just a test illustrating what HandyAvi will do The test images are of a highlighter being moved through the camera view field The Motion Detect Display Area 45 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Live Video Preview Enlarge Adjust Sensitivity Enlarge Output File Size 0 KB Frame number 702 Status Monitoring sensitivity adjustments Next FTP upload 7 3 20
169. g is active Our calibration algorithm will calibrate successfully IF reasonable motion actually occurs within 20 seconds in the Dec direction and within 20 seconds in the RA direction Calibration is usually achieved within 2 seconds ETX 90 and ETX 120 We purchased these scopes primarily for testing when we received a report from a user that the LX 200 algorithms didn t seem to work properly for these types of telescopes We did intensive testing and rewrote HandyAvi s Serial I O routines to accommodate differences we discovered We also wrote a different algorithm for doing auto centering with these types of telescopes HandyAvi is able to identify the Autostar device so it knows whether you are using an LX classic or a newer telescope with the Autostar hand controller When the Start button is pressed and if auto centering is checked HandyAvi will force the slew rate to Guide mode then attempt calibration by moving the telescope a tiny bit in both the Dec and RA directions If successful HandyAvi will then know how long and in which direction to move the telescope so that the planet or star will stay centered during the image capture operations 71 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Our experience has been that you should try to center the planet or star before you select Start This will minimize the wandering that occurs initially as HandyAvi attempts to center the object HandyAvi always forces the telescope to use Guide mode for
170. g motor is not a stepper motor so it is almost impossible to tell accurately what the focus position is The two buttons IN and OUT determine which direction the focusing motor is moving the eyepiece They operate in the same manner that the NORTH SOUTH EAST and WEST buttons do i e the motor will run as long as the button is held down The motor will stop when the button is released Note that the button that was last pushed stays a little grayer than the other button This will help you remember which direction you were going as you attempt to focus at 2 00 AM when your brain has shut down and the image download time of certain CCD cameras puts you to sleep while attempting to focus The counter attempts to show the position of the focusing control The motor seems to take about one second to reach full speed in the fast mode The motor seems to coast to a stop over a period of about three seconds if it was going at full speed The algorithm HandyAvi is using does a simple linear interpolation using those numbers as an approximation When a button is pressed the PC time clock is accessed and the value is stored When the button is released the time clock is again accessed and the difference is taken yielding an elapsed time value accurate to 1 millisecond The counter is based upon these elapsed times and the motor acceleration deceleration values More work on measuring acceleration deceleration rates might make this more accurate but
171. g upon the capabilities of the selected device We see in the Capture Device section that the webcam currently selected is the Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000 Its Video Frame Size is currently set to 640x480 lts frame rate is set to 30 frames per second Note that this value will sometimes be overridden by the camera drivers when the camera is in a mode where brightness and contrast are set automatically The video frame size and the video frame rate can be changed by left clicking the Video Format button This will bring up the camera manufacturer s Video Format or Properties window which will allow you to make changes to basic camera functionality Video Format This button causes display of a window provided by the manufacturer of your webcam For a Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000 the window that comes up looks like this Video Format Compression Video Standard None Frame Rate 30 000 I Frame Interval Flip Horizontal I P Frame Interval Color Space Compression RG 24 Y Output Size Quality 640 x 480 bt ok _ cae ay Figure 4 This window may be used to change the video format settings of your camera In particular the Frame Rate tells how many frames per second your camera will capture although your camera driver will sometimes override this if it is set to an automatic setting The Output Size selection allows you to select the frame size in pixels of the images tha
172. ger V Bitrate control Float Better bitrate control Iv MMx M SSE C 422 M 3DNow M SSE2 OTETA E M SMP Z Forced quality 75 Cancel About Figure 31 Morgan Multimedia MJPG Codec Morgan MJPG allows quality to be set if the Forced quality check box is checked The value in the display box here seen as 75 ALWAYS overrides the value set by the HandyAvi Quality sliders HandyAvi s Quality slider appears but has no effect We ran into a problem with the above version of the Morgan CODEC in Vista when we used image sizes other than 160x120 320x240 or 640x480 Caused a HandyAvi crash that we could not find a work around for We sent Email to the vendor describing the problem Received no answer after several days This CODEC seems to work just fine in Windows XP though In the past we have always used the Morgan Multimedia MJPG Codec but we have now installed the PICVideo MJPG CODEC and are using it instead on Vista 139 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Microsoft MPEG 4 Video Codec V2 Copyright Microsoft Corp 1996 1999 Options Keyframe every seconds Compression Control EE 75 r Data Rate Kilobits per Second 3000 4 ia ET Figure 32 mp42 CODEC We were unable to determine any effect when the Smoothness slider was changed HandyAvi s Quality slider is not visible Microsoft MPEG 4 Video Codec V3 Copyright Microsoft Corp 1996 1999
173. ght on Turn light off Activate Use light control during Time Lapse session Duration 2 Seconds 1 second or more During Time Lapse photography itis sometimes necessary or helpful to light the subject whenever a frame is being captured These controls allow you to use a power control device to turn a light on and off automatically during the session Note If the Duration is greater than the time interval between frames then it will override the frame interval time L ox ances Figure 16 Use Light Control is a check box When checked HandyAvi will attempt to use the PowerLinc device plugged in to your computer to turn a light on and off during your Time Lapse photography session House Code is a letter from A through P that is set to match the setting you selected on your Appliance Module The appliance modules have small circular switches that can be set to a House Code and a Unit Code of your choosing Unit Code is a number from 1 through 16 that is set to match the setting you selected on your Appliance Module Duration is the length of time the light will stay on each time it is turned on The value must be set to at least one second This is due to the sluggishness of the X 10 devices They do not seem to respond well if they are switched at faster rates Turn Light On allows you to test your settings by attempting to turn the light on This does not test the Duration setting 17 tandyavi 5 0 User
174. h the image display to display the most recently selected image Clicking on any check box displays the image of the associated frame Multiple selections may be made using standard CTRL left mouse click operations or click and drag operations etc in accordance with standard Microsoft Windows conventions The sorting area allows the images to be sorted either into Normal order which is the order they appear in the AVI file or by JPEG size which sorts them according to the size of their JPEG file equivalents Blurry images compress better than non blurry images so the size of the file can easily determine a sort order It is important to note that JPEG allows a quality factor that runs from 1 to 100 Higher factors allow finer image details to be saved If the factor is set to 100 then very little compression occurs and noisy images are compressed the least This means that a noisy image would be selected as better than the same image without the noise By adjusting the sort quality you can select the amount of detail you wish to sort on and avoid the noise The spinner buttons associated with the Adjust sort quality when you click on them will cause the JPEG compressed decompressed image to be displayed as if you stored the image using the selected quality factor then displayed the resultant image You can then immediately see the resolution of features that will be sorted on Here is how that looks for various values of sort quality
175. hannel 12 you have to enter 12 then click on Enter or the channel input is ignored Usually we would select Antenna unless we are connected to a cable There is a selection for Video Standards which includes NTSC_M NTSC_JM PAL_M PAL_N and PAL_COMBO The Tuning Mode includes TV and FM Telescope Controls Section Telescope Controls PAra V Use auto centering Centering Help Allowable drift 5 This section of the Astronomy Image Capture window allows interaction with a Meade telescope HandyAvi currently handles Meade LX series classic telescopes as well as newer Meade telescopes that use Meade s Autostar hand controller The Autostar hand controller has two ports one which is connected to your telescope and the other which connects to your computer via a cable that plugs into an adapter that plugs into your computer s serial port If your computer does not have a serial port there are USB Serial adapter cables available through Amazon com and other on line vendors Display telescope controls If you check this box HandyAvi will display the telescope controls assuming that you have set up the COM port If the box is checked and you close the astronomy session then reopen the Capture Astronomy Images window then the telescope controls will be displayed before the Astronomy Image Capture window comes up There might be a delay If you closed the telescope control window un checking and re checking t
176. hat the camera is in Full Auto Mode which means that the camera will automatically adjust for changes in light levels It will sometimes change the frame rate automatically when in this mode The Video Settings window for the Philips ToUcam webcam looks like this 94 Image Capture Modes os Properties Image controls Camera controls Audio controls Performance Control is OK aj Vv xj Full auto Frame rate Image Frames e 5 10 15 20 25 30 aiil quality per second Help Image controls Modes Brightness Gamma E Ti Black and white O O z z Figure 7 These controls provide a great deal of control over your webcam and might need to be adjusted to get the best results under various lighting conditions For planetary astronomy of for example Saturn using a telescope we usually take the camera out of Full auto and adjust the Frame rate Brightness Contrast etc to provide an image that is not over exposed We have found that lowering the Frame rate is often helpful for planetary imaging Other webcams may have other types of video settings windows of course The above are simply examples of webcam control features that two different manufacturers decided to provide IMPORTANT if the Full auto control is checked in Figure 7 it can override the frame rate and set it to a lower value Under dim lighting the automatic settings for many webcams cause the frame rate to be reduced
177. he Hauppauge WinTV Video 885 Capture device Other buttons see below may also appear in this section depending upon the capabilities of the selected device We see in the Capture Device section that the webcam currently selected is the Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000 Its Video Frame Size is currently set to 640x480 lts frame rate is set to 30 frames per second Note that this value will sometimes be overridden by the camera drivers when the camera is in a mode where brightness and contrast are set automatically The video frame size and the video frame rate can be changed by left clicking the Video Format button This will bring up the camera manufacturer s Video Format or Properties window which will allow you to make changes to basic camera functionality 64 Image Capture Modes Video Format This button causes display of a window provided by the manufacturer of your webcam For a Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000 the window that comes up looks like this A Video Format Compression Frame Rate 30 000 1 Frame Interval st Flip Horizontal _Snap Shot ai BE Color Space Compression Raez xl Output Size Quality saxa gt ok __ caca ay Figure 4 This window may be used to change the video format settings of your camera In particular the Frame Rate tells how many frames per second your camera will capture although your camera driver will sometimes override this if it is set to an
178. he Philips ToUcam webcam looks like this 66 Image Capture Modes os Properties Image controls Camera controls Audio controls Performance Control is OK aj Vv xj Full auto Frame rate Image Frames e 5 10 15 20 25 30 aiil quality per second Help Image controls Modes Brightness Gamma E Ti Black and white O O z z Figure 7 These controls provide a great deal of control over your webcam and might need to be adjusted to get the best results under various lighting conditions For planetary astronomy of for example Saturn using a telescope we usually take the camera out of Full auto and adjust the Frame rate Brightness Contrast etc to provide an image that is not over exposed We have found that lowering the Frame rate is often helpful for planetary imaging Other webcams may have other types of video settings windows of course The above are simply examples of webcam control features that two different manufacturers decided to provide IMPORTANT if the Full auto control is checked in Figure 7 it can override the frame rate and set it to a lower value Under dim lighting the automatic settings for many webcams cause the frame rate to be reduced so that brighter images can be obtained You can see in Figure 7 that the original frame rate of 30 frames per second has been overridden so that the frame rate is now 5 frames per second By switching Full auto off you can
179. hich applies only to Time Lapse capture and Motion detect capture preferences are global i e they apply to all the capture modes 6 Preferences l t oe Do not use deinterlacing Default as C Deinterlace using even fields only Deinterlace using odd fields only Deinterlace using blending Date and or time stamp each captured image V Date stamp each captured image I Allow log files date time of each image to be generated Set allowable image capture times Set up automatic FTP upload to a web site Set up COM port to display data on captured images Recyde Files in order to limit disk space usage I Autoplay newly created videos Maximum AVI File Size KB 1900000 Use Default Figure 128 Image Deinterlacing What is interlacing and deinterlacing Interlacing originated when early television engineers worked to solve television image display problems Each television frame or image was painted on the screen one line at a time starting at the top of the picture tube If you do that the screen appears to flicker 223 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual 224 rapidly One way to solve that would have been to use long persistence phosphors such as those used in radar scopes where the image fades away slowly However that would make television images look blurred The television engineers discovered that if they painted every OTHER line of a frame the odd lines for example
180. his box will bring up the 70 Image Capture Modes telescope control window It can also of course be opened from the main menu item Tools Telescope controls The check box is provided here for convenience Use auto centering When this item is checked HandyAvi will keep a star or planet centered in the frame of the camera you are using with your telescope This will prevent it from drifting outside of the frame The auto centering activities will only take place while image capture is underway Image capture is started with the Start button and stopped with the Stop button Note Auto centering is designed for use primarily with planetary or star images where there is a bright area that needs to be centered We are using what amounts to a center of mass calculation so it can be affected by objects of varying brightness around the periphery i e extended objects such as the moon where only part of the surface is visible in the camera view field We have tried auto centering with the Moon and find that it will keep certain fields centered but it may choose to center on an area other than the exact area where you would like it to center Advanced methods such as phase correlation are available to us but they are rather slow because they require large Fourier transforms to be taken For now we opted not to use them for auto centering They are being used however in our image stacking subsystem We had to create two different methods
181. i s Astronomy Capture window will come up 63 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Ba ae Fang eR oT Eg a a ar 7 n gon x Capture Device Creste Mowe Phiips SPC S00NC PC Camera x Video Format Video Frame Sre 640 K 430 Video Settings Frames per Second 30 Telescope Contras I Desplay telescope controls F Use auto centering Allowable dit jH s Astronomy Image Movie Setup Output File C _Astro 7Jun0 up 0035 avi Browse Compression Emina PICMideo MPEG 3 VAY Cod Configure o Fie Size 1218 K8 ann para a Status Uploading file to your web site Play back frame rate frames per second 30 Jup 0035 ani Take group of 500 frames every 600 000 seconds I Create a new output fle for each group Sequentialy numbered text FTP upload 7 3 2008 0910 Last FTP upload 7 2 2008 1258 Figure 49 This window controls all of the astrophotography functions of HandyAvi The Capture Device Section Capture Device Hauppauge WinTV 885 Video Capture Video Format Video Frame Size 720 X 480 Video Settings Frames per Second 30 TV Tuner Figure 3 This section of the Capture window allows you to choose a webcam i e a capture device If you have several webcams plugged in they will all be listed here if you click on the pull down arrow In addition some other types of video capture devices may be listed here such as the Hauppauge WinTV PVR PCI II Capture device or t
182. ices may be listed here such as the 119 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Hauppauge WinTV PVR PCI II Capture device or the Hauppauge WinTV Video 885 Capture device Other buttons see below may also appear in this section depending upon the capabilities of the selected device We see in the Capture Device section that the webcam currently selected is the Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000 Its Video Frame Size is currently set to 640x480 lts frame rate is set to 30 frames per second Note that this value will sometimes be overridden by the camera drivers when the camera is in a mode where brightness and contrast are set automatically The video frame size and the video frame rate can be changed by left clicking the Video Format button This will bring up the camera manufacturer s Video Format or Properties window which will allow you to make changes to basic camera functionality Video Format This button causes display of a window provided by the manufacturer of your webcam For a Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000 the window that comes up looks like this Video Format Compression Video Standard None Frame Rate 30 000 gt I Frame Interval Hi Flip Horizontal P Frame Interval z Color Space Compression Re 24 Y Output Size Quality eom ok Cancel Figure 4 This window may be used to change the video format settings of your camera In particular the Frame Rate tells how many frames
183. ie Setup panel If Use file recycling is checked then when you hit the Start button in the Motion Detect Movie Setup panel the file name will be automatically changed to A 0001 avi and that will be used as the first file At midnight that file will be closed and a new file with the name A 0002 avi will be created and used At midnight each night a new file will be generated up to the Use at most number you entered In this case we are using 3 files so the third file used will be named A 0003 avi When midnight arrives the file name will then be changed to A 0001 avi i e it will be recycled overwritten At midnight each night the next file will be used overwritten This way you should never generate more than three files and your disk should never fill up You might wish to keep 2 weeks of data or 14 files for normal business operations Preferences Note that the OLDEST file is always selected for reuse The Date Modified date is used to determine this If you generate your own files and they are created out of order they will still be used in date order not file name order Use file recycling File recycling is active only when this box is checked Use at most N files Enter the number of files you wish to use as your set of recycling files The minimum number of files allowed is 2 There is no maximum number but you should limit the number to something reasonable Maximum AVI file size is 2 Gigabytes Normall
184. igure 21 above we see that storing an image as a JPEG image with a quality factor of 75 instead of as a bmp file reduces the size of the file from 672 8 Kilobytes to 70 4 Kilobytes We see that it is very difficult if not impossible to see any difference between Figure 21 and Figure 22 so compression did not seem to degrade the image very much and it did reduce the file size from 672 8 Kilobytes to 70 4 Kilobytes We see in Figure 22 that the image has degraded slightly due to the lower quality factor of 50 The degradation is barely noticeable if you look carefully at the side of the horse s face where the white and brown hair join you can see that the boundary is no longer smooth We see in Figure 23 that the image has degraded very noticeably due to the very low quality factor The file is very small however 9 9 Kilobytes instead of the original 672 8 Kilobytes The above merely illustrates the concept of lossy compression Again there are MANY compression schemes that have been invented They all behave a little differently They are all designed to reduce the size of the image file without noticeably degrading the image when it is displayed Why do you care You care because the AVI files that you will be generating consist of a collection of images stored in a file Movies are made up of many images that are displayed rapidly in succession If you do not use compression your AVI files will be HUGE See also Video CODECs Configure Wi
185. il if you encounter a problem http www Support AZcendant com We try to answer all Email as quickly as possible We will work hard to resolve as quickly as possible any problem you might encounter Recovery of An Incomplete AVI File Recovery of an incomplete AVI file If a file being captured was not closed properly due to a power failure software failure process kill operation or anything else that interrupts HandyAvi processing so that HandyAvi does not get a chance to close the AVI file properly it is possible to recover the AVI file automatically How do recover a file that was interrupted not closed properly Simply use HandyAvi file open to open the file HandyAvi will see that in the same directory as your AVI file there is also a file with the same name as your AVI file except that it has a AVX suffix The AVX file contains information that HandyAvi will use to reconstruct essential parts of your AVI file when it was not closed properly HandyAvi will automatically repair your AVI file and open it After successfully repairing the file the AVX file will be deleted Several customers have reported that this automatic recovery feature worked excellently for them We did a LOT of testing to be sure that this recovery feature would work HandyAvi is probably the only AVI file generation program that has this recovery feature We thought this feature was essential for surveillance operations where you cannot afford
186. ilable from the http Awww AZcendant com web site A window will appear displaying you your version number and the latest version number If you wish to obtain the new version you can visit the http Awww AZcendant com web site and download the latest version and install it NOTE The upgrade to a new version is normally FREE Your current license will work You do not have to reinstall your license Simply download and install the upgrade and you are immediately in business Here is what the Check for New Versions window looks like this aeck for New Versions of HandyAvi Ea HandyAvi Version Status The version of HandyAvi you are running is Version 3 2 The latest version of HandyAvi is Version 3 2 You are currently using the most recent version of HandyAyi When Handyavi Closes Automatically check for new versions One Week Intervals kd Figure 140 When HandyAvi closes it will if you allow it to do so automatically run the new version check You have the following choices One Week Intervals v Always One Day Intervals E One Week Intervals Two Week Intervals One Month Intervals Three Month Intervals Six Month intervals Never Figure 141 243 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual HandyAvi keeps track of the time when the last version check was done When HandyAvi closes and IF the interval has elapsed and IF a more recent version is found then the Check for New Versions of HandyAvi dialog win
187. ile Figure 120 One original image Figure 121 Stacked image This window has a File menu item that will let you save the stacked image as a JPG file or a BMP file Save Image as JPG File Save Image as BMP file Exit Figure 122 Make a Movie from Still Images Make Movie From Still Images HandyAvi will let you make a movie from a collection of JPG or BMP images 206 Tools Play Video Frame Selector Crop and Save Batch operations Scan a File for Meteors Join AVI Files Stack Images Make Movie from Still Images N Telescope Port Telescope Controls Figure 123 This will bring up the Create Movie from Still Images control window B 0014 jpg B 0008 jpg B 0015 jpg B 0022 jpg B 0009 jpg B 0016 jpg B 0023 jpg B 0010 jpg B 0017 jpg B 0024 jpg B 0011 jpg B 0018 jpg B 0025 jpg B 0012 jpg B 0019 jpg B 0026 jpg B 0013 jpaq B 0020 jpg B 0027 jpg Refresh List Remove Selected Items r Select Compression Scheme CODEC mjpg PICVideo M JPEG 3 VfW Codec Quality Play back frame rate images per second Output file size Output File Size 1282 KB Status test avi completed sucessfully 207 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Figure 124 The Directory Selector Section Select Directory Containing bmp and or jpg files Directory C __MARS JPGFiles Browse B 0007 jpg B 0014 jpg B 0021 jpg B 0001 j
188. ile AVI File to Scan for Meteors AVI File C _Meteors m 19Nov07 avi Browse Figure 110 Enter the path name for a file you wish to scan for Meteors Note This will also scan files containing lightning strokes To trigger a scan a frame has to contain an image that has some pixels brighter than those in the previous frame Lightning as well as meteors has this property Scan AVI File Movie Setup Section Meteor Trail Output Movie Setup Output File Browse Compression mjpa Morgan Multimedia M JPEG V_ Quality pa E 65 Sensitivity _ 90 7 Preframes H 5 Post Frames t aA Play back frame rate images per second 30 Create a new output file for each trail Advanced Create a JPG file for each Composite Image Figure 111 This section of the Scan AVI file for Meteors video capture window allows you to set up the webcam for making a Scan AVI file for Meteors video Output File The Output File field allows you to type in the path name of the new video file you want to create Browse Brings up a standard file selector window so that you can more easily place the file in a particular folder Compression The Compression field allows you to select any AVI file compression scheme resident on your computer File compression schemes or CODECs for coder decoder show up on your machine from many sources Microsoft installs several Your video camera
189. ill be placed in a file with a new unique name runmeteorcapture When HandyAvi starts up with this parameter it will bring up the Meteor Capture control window and begin making a movie The new movie will be placed in a file with a new unique name runmotiondetectcapture When HandyAvi starts up with this parameter it will bring up the Motion Detect Capture control window and begin making a movie The new movie will be placed in a file with a new unique name runastronomycapture When HandyAvi starts up with this parameter it will bring up the Astronomy Capture control window and begin making a movie The new movie will be placed in a file with a new unique name runanimationcapture When HandyAvi starts up with this parameter it will bring up the Animation Capture control window and begin making a movie The new movie will be placed ina file with a new unique name n This option can follow any one of the above If you wish to start more than one instance of HandyAvi from the command line this can be used to eliminate camera selection conflicts You can set n to be a number such as 1 or 2 or 3 depending on how many cameras you are using and which one you want this instance of HandyAvi to use How do you use a command line parameter e In windows XP bring up the Start Run window and type in HandyAvi followed by one of the command line parameters such as HandyAvi runmotiondetectcapture Or HandyAvi runtimela
190. images are photographed in order one image at a time then played back at 16 frames per second the figures in the drawings Micky Mouse Snow White etc appear to move realistically HandyAvi s animation mode will allow you to create your own animation by for example arranging a scene adding that scene to your new movie by clicking once on the mouse moving something in the scene clicking the mouse again to add the new scene to your movie etc As an example you could create a movie of a flashlight moving smoothly on a table You would do this by putting the flashlight on the table adding the image of the scene including the flashlight to your movie then moving the flashlight slightly then adding that image to your movie etc When finished you would have a movie that shows a flashlight moving smoothly over the table as if it were moving under its own power A good book on animation techniques is Creating 3 D Animation by Peter Lord and Brian Sibley and is based on Aardman Studios which produced Chicken run and The Curse of the Were Rabbit featuring Wallace and Grommet These movies were done using modeling clay Each frame of one of these movies consists of modeling clay scenes where the clay is changed slightly for each succeeding image so as to show changing facial expressions arms moving etc Some animators use modeling clay and various props Some use puppets Some use drawings You are limited only by your imagination How
191. ing Convert Left click this button to begin processing HandyAvi uses streaming to do the frame selection and conversion operations This is the fastest possible way to do the conversion HandyAvi should be as fast or faster than any other similar conversion software Cancel Left click this button to cancel the Convert files to Time Lapse Files dialog window Exit or clicking the X box in the upper right hand corner of the dialog window will exit the Convert files to Time Lapse Files dialog window AND save your current settings such as the compression scheme you chose Cancel will not save your current settings NOTE that if a Convert operation is in progress Cancel will not cause conversion to stop Use the Esc Escape key to terminate processing if you change your mind about completing the batch job Exit Exits the Convert files to Time Lapse Files dialog window AND saves your current settings Output Files This window shows the path and name of each new file as it is being created When a file is converted the new file is created in the same directory as the original file unless you used the Set output directory for converted files option by checking the Set check box The new file has the same name as the original file EXCEPT that a unique suffix is added to the file name For example if C directory1 myFile avi were the original file the new file would be named C directory1 myFile avi 0001 avi If C directory1
192. ions After installing the registration key please restart the program Figure 138 Key Entry Dialog Window Help Bring up this help section Install Key Paste Paste the contents of the Microsoft Paste Buffer into the edit box When you do a Copy operation the copied data goes into a paste buffer and is then available for paste operations in various applications HandyAvi Registration OK Will install the key If the edit box is empty no change will be made to the installed key HandyAvi will exit in any case When HandyAvi is restarted and if the key was valid you should not see the Unregistered Version dialog window again It is also possible to display your registration data Registered To Under the Help menu item there is a menu item Registered to that will display a dialog window showing your registration data The data shown below is for Joe Use If no data is shown then the program has not been registered Registered to x This copy of HandyAvi is registered to Joe User Joe User CoolISP com Figure 139 Registered to Dialog Window 241 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Check for New Versions Check for New Versions This Help item will briefly access the AZcendant web site and get the contents of a file containing the version number of the latest version of HandyAvi The version number of your copy of HandyAvi will be compared with the latest version of HandyAvi ava
193. ires 672 8 Kilobytes of storage space Note that bmp is lossless because it does not use compression i e the image is stored with no loss of resolution or information but the file is BIG However when the lossy JPEG algorithms are applied and the file is stored as a JPEG file instead of a bmp file you can see that as the quality factor decreases the quality goes down and the storage space required goes down Note that some compression CODECs refer to compression factor instead quality factor A quality factor of 75 generally would mean a compression factor of 25 i e quality factor is 100 minus the compression factor Typically JPEG is run with a quality factor of 75 In Figure 21 above we see that storing an image as a JPEG image with a quality factor of 75 instead of as a bmp file reduces the size of the file from 672 8 Kilobytes to 70 4 Kilobytes We see that it is very difficult if not impossible to see any difference between Figure 21 and Figure 22 so compression did not seem to degrade the image very much and it did reduce the file size from 672 8 Kilobytes to 70 4 Kilobytes We see in Figure 22 that the image has degraded slightly due to the lower quality factor of 50 The degradation is barely noticeable if you look carefully at the side of the horse s face where the white and brown hair join you can see that the boundary is no longer smooth 110 Image Capture Modes We see in Figure 23 that the image has degraded very
194. is will cause a short video test file to be uploaded to the selected remote directory on your web site This will test the connection Error messages will appear if the connection is unavailable or if the user ID and or password is not correct Test Connection Upload then Delete Test File This will cause a short video test file to be uploaded to the selected remote directory on your web site That short test file will then be deleted from the selected remote directory on your web site Error messages will appear if the connection is unavailable or if the user ID and or password is not correct Set up COM port to display data on captured images Click this button to bring up the following panel 228 Preferences Display data from COM port on captured images Select Serial Port coms Prolific USB to Serial Comm Port Ready Refresh Port List Currently selected port COM8 Baud 9600 E Enter initialization string if required If not Leave blank Enter Data Request String GD GR Test Disconnect Serial Port Port status Connected Send Initialization String Returned data 55629 58 07 22 328 Activate V While capturing images send the Data Request String and display the returned data on the image x _ caret This Preference item was created to accommodate a researcher who wanted to write the current temperature of some experimental apparatus on each captured image It lets you choose
195. ith codecs that are NOT installed on your machine If the required codec is not installed HandyAvi will of course be unable to PLAY the file but it will try to produce an AVI File Info report as shown in Figure 19 so that you will be able to identify the missing codec If you know which codec was used you might be able to locate an installable version of the codec via the Internet and install it Then you would be able to play the file using HandyAvi If you can play the file using HandyAvi then you can also use HandyAvi s editing features to create a new file using the same or a different codec and include or exclude selected frames from the new AVI file Many CODECs allow you to have control over the Quality factor or Compression factor that will let you make your files smaller Learn more about Compression Quality Learn more about Configure windows About Compression Quality There are many video compression schemes The purpose of a video compression scheme is to make a smaller file without sacrificing too much detail in the images An uncompressed AVI file is comprised of a series of bmp image files There are actually many different bmp file formats Each of the formats is designed to reconstruct an image pixel by pixel Typically AVI files are made up of bmp files which have 3 Bytes for each pixel The three bytes contain the Red Green and Blue values for a pixel Thus a 640x480 uncompressed image requires approximately 3 x 640
196. l WindOW ccccceeceessteeeeeeeeeeeeeee 118 The Capture Device Section cis eccciccicccicccdectvecessectquincnecensaceeaqaecdeenectaaeenesene 119 Animation Setup and Create Movie Area ccccceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees 125 The Animation Display Area weit sccettaceecsiaseir henteedieestaed Mousecl tices Maine 127 About Video Codecs rg aijasccelesiecctsnesedetecenecercarentetescncaeieneneieeecnseeteoie rade 129 About Compression Quality viccccinec csedebiiene cen cdaesdedodetecan ciatededsdebedeiiedebednbedalias 130 Configure Window Examples ccccccceeeceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeenaaees 134 Telescope Controls ase cicadas antpecieecehgscacued paxectebdesacueicerectetcanicteddecactetoeeictebeasce 143 Telescope COM POM armia iaa eae naranai aa eaaa a aiar EKn a a dole 143 Opening the Telescope Controls ccccceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeennneaeeeeeeees 143 Messier NNO sides sats ctctcniaccaion Densetsu aeadeidsdateadelsadensdeid idelendsesdebaddsrdecundeemenias 155 Displaying AVI Movies in HandyAvi ccccceeeeeeeseeeeeceeeeeeeeeeeeeseneeeeeeeeeees 157 Displaying AVI MOVICS o sc5c c0tsannicasdedacnpsctensunddasucussstendtensanesasecudaptesdadedanesiaet 157 DEEL EE ST 159 Tools OV GIVIOW od ciducccs ctdvcntsandeicn cctrandewndsthen andeeadnendeuhanahtnuadeondaenieendeantsendeoncne 159 COIS TAS VS A 159 Crop and AVS se storeesScrenspscy pinata ainenenerdua dca ubiemdbanutceuteenay
197. l panel select the Menu item Tools Telescope Controls If the telescope is powered up has a serial cable connected to your computer and if you have chosen the correct COM port the Telescope Controls panel will come up 143 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual LK 200 Telescope Controls LX200 Controls Location Time Backlash Tracking Rate Objects Sky Flats Messier Coordinates Motion Park Focus Dmae Feats poe Siw NORTH Sl cee oe RA 21 31 14 fo eo a sDD MM SS ere P pec fooorss HAET Gude Pot oe Figure 54 See Telescope Controls for further information Telescope Controls First Telescope Tab LX 200 Conirols 1X 200 Telescope Controls LX200 Controls Location Time Backlash Tracking Rate Objects Sky Flats Messier z ue Motion Park Focus Dymamic Focus HH MM SS C Slow NORTH Parkin Siow Stepper Motor Y Out teps per hour RA 21 31 14 nd fo soomnss ESO z tf WEST East j CN f oec 0001 56 HALT E Gun F Pak Courter O Fon Figure 56 The above image shows what you will see if the telescope port is working and the telescope is communicating properly with HandyAvi If everything is well the RA and DEC fields will contain numbers If the telescope is not responding for any reason the RA and DEC fields will be blank Note that the telescope control window is a modeless dialog window so it can be left up and operated
198. lay no longer occurs However unplugging the device from the computer s USB port when it is selected causes applications using EasyCap to hang This is true for for the Ulead Video Studio SE application that ships with EasyCap and it also occurs in all other software systems we ve tested using EasyCap This appears to be a problem with the EasyCap driver We ve been unable to locate a driver update AGAIN USE CAUTION WHEN USING THIS DEVICE DO NOT UNPLUG IT FROM THE USB PORT IF IT IS SELECTED FOR CAPTURE It also initializes with a default image size of 720x576 To change the image size select Video Format in HandyAvi Strangely you will see that none of the possible selections are 720x576 However you can select one of the following 160x120 176x144 320x240 352x240 352x288 640x480 or 720x480 Powers itself from the USB port No external power supply is required Diamond Multimedia One Touch Video Capture We have successfully used this adapter with HandyAvi The adapter seems to work well This adapter allows selection of image sizes of 352x576 352x288 or 720x576 only 252 Tips Powers itself from the USB port No external power supply is required We obtained three other manufacturer s adapters for testing and had good results with all of them NTSC Cameras We have a Watec WAT 902H2 Ultimate camera that produces an NTSC signal Why this camera Because it is one of the most sensitive cameras that is curren
199. lect any AVI file compression scheme resident on your computer File compression schemes or codecs short for coder decoder show up on your machine from many sources Microsoft installs several Your video camera may install one or more You may download and install compression schemes from the internet At the time of this writing there are over 280 codecs listed at http www fourcc org Note that one of the selection items is called Uncompressed If you select Uncompressed the image data in your files will not be compressed Your files will be LARGE However each image in an Uncompressed file will contain images that are exactly what the camera captured Compressed images are usually slightly different from the original images because information is lost during compression In most cases the difference is not noticeable Use of uncompressed images is important for some applications but not necessary or advisable for most Learn more about video codecs here HandyAvi displays the FOURCC value for the compressor in brackets at the beginning of the Compression line Note that HandyAvi will also allow you to read work with and display AVI files produced by other software or cameras and will select the proper decompression scheme automatically IF the required decompression scheme has been installed on your computer HandyAvi will also allow you to read a file that was written using one compression scheme and write a new AVI file using a new com
200. led Uncompressed If you select Uncompressed the image data in your files will not be compressed Your files will be LARGE However each image in an Uncompressed file will contain images that are exactly what the camera captured Compressed images are usually slightly different from the original images because information is lost during compression In most cases the difference is not noticeable Use of uncompressed images is important for some applications but not necessary or advisable for most Learn more about video codecs here HandyAvi displays the FOURCC value for the compressor in brackets at the beginning of the Compression line Note that HandyAvi will also allow you to read work with and display AVI files produced by other software or cameras and will select the proper decompression scheme automatically IF the required decompression scheme has been installed on your computer HandyAvi will also allow you to read a file that was written using one compression scheme and write a new AVI file using a new compression scheme So you can convert AVI files from one compression scheme to another if the required codecs have been installed on your machine Configure Brings up the compression CODEC s configuration window This button only appears if the selected compression scheme HAS a configuration window Note that the Quality slider and the quality settings in some CODECs do not cooperate In the case of the mjpg CODEC the Forced
201. ll also perform this action Selection of Smaller will resize to a slightly smaller size while keeping the true aspect ratio of your image Pressing the s key will also perform this action If you close an enlarged window the images will again appear in the Live Video Preview window or the other window if it was the one that had been enlarged Onion Checkbox Onion skinning refers to older techniques of doing animation where a new onion sheet was placed over the top of the previous animation frame You would place these sheets on a light table which would let you see the previous animation image and the new image you were drawing on the onion sheet This way you could judge how much difference you were making between the old frame and the new frame If you left click the Onion Checkbox the video preview coming from your camera and the Last Captured Frame can be blended together and will be displayed in the Last Captured Frame window The slider bar determines the transparency of each If the slider bar is to the left you see only the image from the camera If the slider bar is to the right you see only the image that was last captured By moving the slider bar you can adjust the blending of the two images so you can see both at the same time and see differences between the new image frame and the Last Captured Frame 128 Image Capture Modes Blink CheckBox This checkbox can only be set when the Onion checkbox is checked Se
202. ll be written out Then motion detection will continue as the 5 Post frames are written out If motion is detected during the writing of the Post frames image capture to the AVI file will continue and 5 new frames will be scheduled Motion detection and frame writing will continue in this manner as long as motion persists Eventually no more motion will be detected and HandyAvi will then stop recording frames and wait for a new motion event Note If you click on a slider you can then use the left and right arrow keys on the keyboard to make fine adjustments Advanced This button will bring up the Advanced Meteor Detect Settings window 185 andyavi 5 0 User s Manual Make cirdes Total CPU Usage 14 Click and drag in the above image to create motion detect sensitive rectangular or circular regions You may create as many as desired C On startup Restore and use the regions shown above V Sound alarm when meteor is detected Delete al undo save Restore ox Figure 112 By left mouse clicking and dragging motion detect sensitive areas can be placed on the window In the case shown we were considering a setup for lightning capture The circle is probably not what we want in this case but serves to illustrate the use of circular regions When the wind blows the palm fronds blow and could trigger the motion detection algorithm By setting up rectangular and circular motion sensitive areas that do NOT incl
203. low we describe briefly the control each configuration window allows over compression Quality Cinepak for Windows 32 radus Version 1 10 0 11 Copyright 1992 1995 Radius Inc All Rights Reserved Compress to Color C Compress to Black amp White 111 andyavi 5 0 User s Manual Figure 25 Cinepak CVID CODEC CVID has no adjustable quality option HandyAvi s Quality slider has no effect DivX Codec Properties Main Codec Video r Codec Performance Encoding mode EA Fastest Be oe for very high resolution live capture or High performance ates are necessary to retain full quality Balanced Default Better Quality Extreme Quality Insane Qualit m Frame Control sctional coding Adaptive Single Consecuti Max Keyframe interval 300 frames Keyframe threshold 50 untracked blocks Motion Estimation M Quarter pizel search Advanced Restore defaults Cancel Figure 26 DivX CODEC DivX allows you to select various Encoding Modes which essentially cause the quality to be higher or lower HandyAvi s Quality slider has no effect 112 Image Capture Modes Configure MainConcept DY Codec Main Concept Ltd 1999 2001 S A Grigoriey 1999 2001 Commercial Edition Release 2 0 4 Encoder l Change Fields Order IV Fastest 16 9 Decoder I Change Field Order P YUY2 disable F Preview Quality M UYVWY disable
204. ltages can be used instead as signals to control a stepper motor designed to replace the Meade DC motor With a stepper motor the focusing is precise and the counter will be completely accurate Newer Meade telescopes might have different focusing systems DYNAMIC FOCUS SECTION Telescope Controls As the temperature drops the telescope will shrink and the focus position will change The Dynamic Focus control allows you to automatically compensate for the shrinkage by stepping the telescope focus any desired number of steps per hour Second Telescope Tab Location and Time LX 200 Telescope Controls a 1X200 Controls Location Time Backlash Tracking Rate Objects Sky Flats Messer Date Dec Backlesh Tracking Rate Time f Sidereal 060 1 s _ P Moon 0579 Lottude 33 22 Local 05 08 08 Local 08 44 51 xian lial Get 60 1 Longtude 11154 p iil Siere 32050 Some scopes Se Figure 58 The above image shows the Location and Time Backlash Tracking Rate controls When one switches from LX200 Controls or Objects or Sky Flats to Location and Time Backlash Tracking Rate the Get operation of the first tab is automatically performed Telescope Location Enter the coordinates of the current location of the telescope into the telescope Type in the Latitude and Longitude then press Set to set the telescope s location into the telescope s internal memory Date Enter the current d
205. ly They are all designed to reduce the size of the image file without noticeably degrading the image when it is displayed Why do you care You care because the AVI files that you will be generating consist of a collection of images stored in a file Movies are made up of many images that are displayed rapidly in succession If you do not use compression your AVI files will be HUGE See also Video CODECs Configure Window Examples Configure Window Examples The following images show configuration windows associated with various CODECs that might be available on your machine These are accessible through the Configure button that appears on the movie setup windows IF the selected Compression scheme has a configuration window associated with it This shows the Movie Setup window for Time Lapse captures so you can see where the Configure button and Quality slider are 82 Image Capture Modes r Time Lapse Movie Setup Output File C _test timelapse avi Browse Compression Impa PICVideo M JPEG 3 VAW Cod Configure Take one frame every 1 000 seconds Play back rate images per second 30 Light Controls J Figure 24 Below we describe briefly the control each configuration window allows over compression Quality Cinepak for Windows 32 radus Version 1 10 0 11 Copyright 1992 1995 Radius Inc All Rights Reserved Compress to Color C Compress to Black amp White Cancel
206. mber 52 53 Original Frame Number 53 54 Original Frame Number 54 55 Original Frame Number 55 56 Original Frame Number 56 57 Original Frame Number 57 58 Original Frame Number 58 159 Original Frame Number 59 J60 Original Frame Number 60 Original Frame Number 61 LO on nN 1 Figure 99 Now we have placed the cursor over item 50 s check box and clicked the left mouse button This highlights selects item 50 AND sets the check box If we click on some other item s check box OR text item 50 s check box will continue to be set and the other item will be selected and or checked 174 Tools 48 Original Frame Number 48 149 Original Frame Number 49 051 Original Frame Number 51 52 Original Frame Number 52 M53 Original Frame Number 53 M54 Original Frame Number 54 M55 Original Frame Number 55 056 Original Frame Number 56 058 Original Frame Number 58 059 Original Frame Number 59 061 Original Frame Number 61 Figure 100 We can select multiple items by simply clicking the check box of each item we wish to select However there is a faster way to select multiple frames 048 Original Frame Number 48 149 Original Frame Number 49 Original Frame Number 50 Original Frame Number 51 Original Frame Number 52 Original Frame Number 53 Original Frame Number 54 Original Frame Number 55 Original Frame Number 56 Origi
207. me Create a jpg image file for each captured frame Store new bmp and jpg images in C _TEST pi Cancel OK Figure 15 This will allow you to create a bmp file and or a jpg file for every image that is being captured to the AVI file The bmp and jpg images will be sent to the directory chosen for storage The images are placed in the directory at approximately the same time they are captured and placed in the AVI file There appears to be very little CPU time penalty for using this feature START Starts the time lapse image capture session The system starts saving image frames to the Output File in accordance with the values you entered in the Time Lapse Movie Setup window Note that the Start button here is yellow This indicates that a Set Allowable Image Capture Times preference item has been set Yellow means that video recording is currently allowed but at some point in time video recording will cease until it is again allowable Red would mean that video recording is not allowed at the current time 13 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual NOTE Output files will automatically be limited to less than 2 Gigabytes the AVI file size limit A new file with a unique new name will be generated and used automatically whenever the limit is about to be exceeded See Preferences for more information about Maximum AVI File Size STOP Terminates the time lapse image capture session The AVI file s can now be viewed with
208. me Number 9 8 Original Frame Number 30 19 Original Frame Number 6 310 Original Frame Number 1 411 Original Frame Number 15 012 Original Frame Number 24 013 Original Frame Number 38 14 Original Frame Number 40 015 Original Frame Number 33 1016 Original Frame Number 35 17 Original Frame Number 16 018 Original Frame Number 34 119 Original Frame Number 4 J20 Original Frame Number 11 021 Original Frame Number 14 7 gt 2 m Save displayed frame as a bmp file Save displayed frame as a jpg file Save all checked frames as bmp files Save all checked frames as jpa files Create AVI video file from checked frames cee Figure 89 168 Tools 0 Video Frame Selector Sorted by JPEG size Original Frame Number 18 Original Frame Number 32 Original Frame Number 31 Original Frame Number 27 Original Frame Number 19 Original Frame Number 13 Original Frame Number 25 Original Frame Number 6 Original Frame Number 9 Original Frame Number 30 Original Frame Number 15 Original Frame Number 1 Original Frame Number 16 Original Frame Number 38 Original Frame Number 35 Original Frame Number 40 Original Frame Number 36 Original Frame Number 24 Original Frame Number 21 Original Frame Number 33 Original Frame Number 22 Original Frame Number 4 m Da Figure 90 Frame Sele
209. mes codecs is short for Coder decoder that have been created by various companies Uncompressed files are generally MUCH larger than compressed files In order for HandyAvi to use a particular compression schemes it must have been installed on your computer Many AVI codecs probably already have been installed on your machine Some come from Microsoft as part of your operating system Some come from the manufacturers of webcams that you might have installed You can even download and install codecs from the Internet Some are free and others are not http Awww fourcc org is a site that lists and describes almost all known codecs If you surf to that site you will want to click on codec list to see all of the codecs Codecs have four character names known as Four Character Codes or FOURCC names This is how they are identified internally so that software applications such as HandyAvi can know which codec was used to produce a particular file FOURCC codes are also used internally when a HandyAvi user selects a compression scheme such as Indeo video 5 10 Indeo video 5 10 has a FOURCC name of IV50 If you have an AVI file that was encoded using IV50 you can see the IV50 codec name by opening the file in HandyAvi and using the View AVI File Info menu item 129 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual AVI File Info Ea AVI Name MarsSmallTest avi File Size 20544 KB Image Size 160x120 Number of Frames 999 Frames Per Second 25
210. mpress an image using a lossy compression scheme the restored image when decompressed is NOT identical to the original image However if the scheme is a good one the images will look almost identical There are MANY lossy compression schemes some of which are very well known such as JPEG We can use JPEG to illustrate Lossy compression gt 4 s N gh quality 358 Kilobytes y Factor 99 Very hi Figure 20 JPEG Qualit 191 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual 4 Figure 21 JPEG Quality Factor 75 high quality 70 4 Kilo 192 bytes Tools 193 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Figure 23 JPEG Quality Factor 10 noticeably reduced quality 9 9 Kilobytes Each of the above images when stored as a bmp file requires 672 8 Kilobytes of storage space Note that bmp is lossless because it does not use compression i e the image is stored with no loss of resolution or information but the file is BIG However when the lossy JPEG algorithms are applied and the file is stored as a JPEG file instead of a bmp file you can see that as the quality factor decreases the quality goes down and the storage space required goes down Note that some compression CODECs refer to compression factor instead quality factor A quality factor of 75 generally would mean a compression factor of 25 i e quality factor is 100 minus the compression factor Typically JPEG is run with a quality factor of 75 In F
211. mpress an image very much and retains all of the noise effects A low quality factor causes the image to appear more blocky and eliminates the high spatial frequency components of the image i e the components that are the tiniest features in the image such as noise To sort the images from best to worst you should set the compression quality factor so that the images displayed when the View button is down are just a tiny bit blockier than the noise in the image This will minimize the effect of the noise when the images are sorted The images will sort much better if the noise specks do not dominate the sorting method A quality factor of 26 usually does a good job but this will vary depending upon the noisiness of the image There is a comment window that tells which frame is being displayed and whether you are seeing the original frame or seeing the compressed decompressed version that is shown when the View button is depressed Save displayed frame as a bmp file A standard Microsoft file selector window will appear allowing you to choose a directory and file name for the new bmp file You can save the currently selected highlighted frame the frame currently being displayed as a bmp file Save displayed frame as a jpg file A standard Microsoft file selector window will appear allowing you to choose a directory and file name for the new jpg file You can save the currently selected highlighted frame the frame currently
212. much faster than it would with the larger original images We could of course crop this more if we wished to do so but it looks pretty good as it is so we will continue to the next step Find the Best Frames We now select the menu item Tools Frame Selector This brings up the frame selector window 165 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Video Frame Selector Sc Frame Selection Options D0 Original Frame Number 0 1 Original Frame Number 1 Ej Select every 2 nd frame 02 Original Frame Number 2 03 Original Frame Number 3 Select All Unselect All 4 Original Frame Number 4 Sort by JPEG size for Astronomy 15 Original Frame Number 5 O7 Original Frame Number 7 8 Original Frame Number 8 19 Original Frame Number 9 010 Original Frame Number 10 011 Original Frame Number 11 012 Original Frame Number 12 013 Original Frame Number 13 114 Original Frame Number 14 J15 Original Frame Number 15 0O16 Original Frame Number 16 017 Original Frame Number 17 018 Original Frame Number 18 119 Original Frame Number 19 J20 Original Frame Number 20 021 Oriqinal Frame Number 21 Normal Sort 2s ra ee view eae o Save displayed frame as a bmp file Save displayed frame as a jpg file Save all checked fremes es bmp files Save all checked frames as jpg fles Create AVI video file from checked frames Figure 82 This window interacts wit
213. n Preferences You can prevent log files from being generated if you uncheck the Allow log files to be generated in Preferences You can cause a date time stamp to appear on every image that you capture by setting Date and or Time stamp options in Preferences 158 tanayavi 5 0 User s Manual Tools Tools Overview All HandyAvi editions allow access to the tools shown in the Tools Menu HandyAvi MarsSmallTest avi File Capture View Window Help H Play Video MarsSm Frame Selector Crop and Save Batch operations Scan a File for Meteors Join AVI Files Stack Images Leen 0 00 39 96 Sec Make Movie from Still Images m gt H Telescope Port Telescope Controls See the Tools Menu for further information Crop and Save Crop and Save The Crop and Save feature is designed primarily for planetary photography applications If you have an AVI file comprised of pictures of Saturn for example then you can place a crop box around Saturn and create a new AVI video movie file containing only Saturn and the region defined by the crop box This results in a new AVI video file whose frames are smaller than the original frames This new AVI file can be used with HandyAvi s image stacking tool or with post processing programs such as RegiStax The advantage is that the post processing program will run much faster using the smaller frames See the Crop and Save
214. n live capture or High performance ates are necessary to retain full quality Balanced Default Better Quality Extreme Quality Insane Qualit m Frame Control Bidirectional coding Adaptive Single Consecutive Max Keyframe interval 300 frames Kepframe threshold 50 untracked blocks Motion Estimation Quarter pixel search Advanced Restore defaults Cancel Figure 26 DivX CODEC DivX allows you to select various Encoding Modes which essentially cause the quality to be higher or lower HandyAvi s Quality slider has no effect 54 Image Capture Modes Configure MainConcept DY Codec Main Concept Ltd 1999 2001 S A Grigoriey 1999 2001 Commercial Edition Release 2 0 4 Encoder l Change Fields Order IV Fastest 16 9 Decoder I Change Field Order P YUY2 disable F Preview Quality M UYVWY disable Default Cancel Figure 27 DVSD Codec DVSD allow you just two Quality options Either Fastest or not HandyAvi s Quality slider has no effect E intel Indeo Video 4 4 Encoder Configuration Encoder Controls Access Key l Enable Scalability Bidirectional Prediction Load Default Transparency Minimum Viewport Size None bul Width fo Quality Best v Height fo Figure 28 V41 CODEC IV41 allows just two Quality settings Quick Compress or not HandyAvi s Quality slider DOES con
215. n more about video codecs here Quality Adjust the quality of the compression scheme Most compression schemes create smaller files because they are actually discarding tiny image details By discarding more and larger image details you can produce a smaller AVI file If the Quality is set to 100 then little or no image data is discarded and the resultant AVI file will be large If the Quality is set to 0 then theoretically all image data is discarded and the resultant AVI file will contain blank images Of course each codec is created by software people who may have thought about this and limited it so they do not throw away all of the image data even if the Quality is zero Note that each codec is different and some may even ignore the Quality setting or not allow it to be set Also note that lossy compression schemes are used in many applications JPEG is an example of a lossy compression scheme that is used in MANY applications and the fact that some of the image data has been discarded is practically unnoticeable So compression with slightly reduced quality is a very good thing in most cases Learn more about video codecs here Play back rate images per second Determines how fast your frames will be displayed when you play the AVI movie that you have recorded If you want the frames to be played in real time then you should set the rate to the same rate as the camera was set to when it was recording If 126 Image Capture Modes y
216. nal Frame Number 57 Original Frame Number 58 Original Frame Number 59 Original Frame Number 60 Original Frame Number 61 Figure 101 We can select a block of items if we click on the text instead of on the check boxes There are several ways to do this 1 Click on the first item Hold the Shift key down and press the up arrow or the down arrow The items in the window will scroll and be selected as they scroll The first item can be thought of as an anchor where everything from the anchor to the current item position is selected 2 Click on the first item Move the slider so the last item of a block you want to select is in the window Then press and hold the shift key down and click on the last item of the block This will select the entire block 3 Click on the first item and hold the left mouse button down While holding the button down drag the cursor down until it is outside the window The items will scroll and be selected as they become visible The scrolling speed will increase or decrease depending on how far outside of the window the cursor is At this point we can release the shift key if we were using it 175 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual 048 Original Frame Number 48 149 Original Frame Number 49 Original Frame Number 50 Original Frame Number 51 Original Frame Number 52 Original Frame Number 53 Original Frame Number 54 Original Frame Number 55 Original Frame Number 56 Original Frame Number 57 O
217. nce has shown that during slow speed runs the motor often bogs down and stops so use of the fast speed might be necessary 145 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual 146 There are two Stepped modes Slow Stepped and Fast Stepped that allow you to use the Meade focuser in a much more controlled manner When stepping HandyAvi transmits a motor on motor off command of fixed duration If you hold the IN or OUT button down the telescope will execute a series of stepped motions Step mode is highly recommended if you are using a standard Meade focuser with the LX 200 Again the counter attempts to indicate position Each step provides a count of 2 This was to try to get a correlation between stepped and un stepped focus position Not entirely successful Note that the Meade focusing motor is not a stepper motor so it is almost impossible to tell accurately what the focus position is The two buttons IN and OUT determine which direction the focusing motor is moving the eyepiece They operate in the same manner that the NORTH SOUTH EAST and WEST buttons do i e the motor will run as long as the button is held down The motor will stop when the button is released Note that the button that was last pushed stays a little grayer than the other button This will help you remember which direction you were going as you attempt to focus at 2 00 AM when your brain has shut down and the image download time of certain CCD camera
218. ndow Examples Configure Window Examples The following images show configuration windows associated with various CODECs that might be available on your machine These are accessible through the Configure button that appears on the movie setup windows IF the selected Compression scheme has a configuration window associated with it This shows the Movie Setup window for Time Lapse captures so you can see where the Configure button and Quality slider are 194 Tools m Time Lapse Movie Setup Output File C _test timelapse avi Browse Compression impa PiCVideo MPEG 3 VIW Cod Configure Quality Take one frame every 1 000 seconds Play back rate images per second 30 Ct Light Controls _ Aves STAT Figure 24 Below we describe briefly the control each configuration window allows over compression Quality Cinepak for Windows 32 di radus Cinepak Codec Version 1 10 0 11 Copyright 1992 1995 Radius Inc All Rights Reserved Compress to Color C Compress to Black amp White Cancel Figure 25 Cinepak CVID CODEC CVID has no adjustable quality option HandyAvi s Quality slider has no effect 195 andyavi 5 0 User s Manual DivX Codec Properties Use Divx profiles and watch video on your TV using Divx Cettified devices Main Codec Video r Codec Performance Encoding mode ree ESE Fastest for very high resolution live capture o
219. noticeably due to the very low quality factor The file is very small however 9 9 Kilobytes instead of the original 672 8 Kilobytes The above merely illustrates the concept of lossy compression Again there are MANY compression schemes that have been invented They all behave a little differently They are all designed to reduce the size of the image file without noticeably degrading the image when it is displayed Why do you care You care because the AVI files that you will be generating consist of a collection of images stored in a file Movies are made up of many images that are displayed rapidly in succession If you do not use compression your AVI files will be HUGE See also Video CODECs Configure Window Examples Configure Window Examples The following images show configuration windows associated with various CODEGs that might be available on your machine These are accessible through the Configure button that appears on the movie setup windows IF the selected Compression scheme has a configuration window associated with it This shows the Movie Setup window for Time Lapse captures so you can see where the Configure button and Quality slider are Time Lapse Movie Setup Output File C _test timelapse avi Browse Compression Impa PICVideo M JPEG 3 VAW Cod x Configure Take one frame every 1 000 seconds Play back rate images per second 30 Light Controls advanced M e Figure 24 Be
220. ns the 250 brightest stars 1 through 250 100 interesting double stars 251 through 350 and Sigma Octantis the southern pole star 351 Telescope Controls b STAR 901 through 909 are the planets in order from the sun with the moon being 903 instead of the earth i 901 Mercury ii 902 Venus iii 903 Moon iv 904 Mars v 905 Jupiter vi 906 Saturn vii 907 Uranus viii 908 Neptune ix 909 Pluto 2 SAO a SAO catalog of stars Meade appears to have placed as many important objects as possible in the other databases then filled up the rest of the space to a total of 64 000 objects in the LX 200 More or fewer in other Meade telescopes with the brightest SAO objects There are 15 928 SAO objects in the Meade database It includes all SAO objects brighter than 7 magnitude SAO object numbers are 6 digit numbers and they are not ordered by brightness so there are a lot of holes i e if you type in a random 6 digit number you are unlikely to hit anything and the display will not show a new RA or DEC If you want to try something that works try SAO 151881 which is Sirius or SAO 67174 which is Vega You could obtain the SAO catalog from an on line source sort by magnitude and get some idea of which numbers would work 3 GCVS a The GCVS catalog is a catalog of variable stars 21 815 of them Meade has them numbered by constellation which consists of the first two digits followed by a 4 digit number a
221. nstall Key When you purchase HandyAvi through the Internet a key will be E mailed to you The message will look something like this but will contain YOUR personal key instead of the key shown below Dear user Thank you very much for registering HandyAvi You will find your personal registration key below KEY BEGIN KEY KngKJOLScZeeeM8rLiNCNOs hp9DHN EX3IF3MTshXezxDPXIRgidiohPruvE u0OGKxCVP3ks3TWi5 NJZmhsCPkqMUh xeOdvsZDNqTCvJqiFPbuZH4AQOaeOWM bHewatz3HI FkjnOjVk8nIgEI7Bb3D mXUG4sA tZQZ9PtwsEPwA KEY END KEY To register HandyAvi using this key right click this message This will cause a popup menu to be displayed Use the Select All command in the popup menu The menu will disappear and this message will change its color become selected Then right click this message again to display the popup menu again and select the Copy command Now run HandyAvi and select Register in the Unregistered Version dialog window A Key entry window will appear Click the Paste Key button in the Key entry dialog window Then click OK in the Key entry window HandyAvi will install the registration key and exit Please restart HandyAvi If the key was entered correctly and was valid the Unregistered version window should NOT appear If you then select the Help menu item Registered to a dialog window will be displayed showing your registration data If you see your data i e the displayed data is not blank it means you
222. o Frame rate s Image Frames i 5 10 15 20 25 30 aiii quality per second Help Image controls Modes Brightness Gamma E 5 7 Black and white ag a Figure 7 These controls provide a great deal of control over your webcam and might need to be adjusted to get the best results under various lighting conditions For planetary astronomy of for example Saturn using a telescope we usually take the camera out of Full auto and adjust the Frame rate Brightness Contrast etc to provide an image that is not over exposed We have found that lowering the Frame rate is often helpful for planetary imaging Other webcams may have other types of video settings windows of course The above are simply examples of webcam control features that two different manufacturers decided to provide IMPORTANT if the Full auto control is checked in Figure 7 it can override the frame rate and set it to a lower value Under dim lighting the automatic settings for many webcams cause the frame rate to be reduced so that brighter images can be obtained You can see in Figure 7 that the original frame rate of 30 frames per second has been overridden so that the frame rate is now 5 frames per second By switching Full auto off you can manually set the frame rate override to 30 if you wish to capture more frames more quickly This is important because it can be puzzling if you are not aware of it Video Source The user here has
223. o choose a webcam i e a capture device If you have several webcams plugged in they will all be listed here if you click on the pull down arrow In addition some other types of video capture devices may be listed here such as the Hauppauge WinTV PVR PCI II Capture device or the Hauppauge WinTV Video 885 Capture device Other buttons see below may also appear in this section depending upon the capabilities of the selected device We see in the Capture Device section that the webcam currently selected is the Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000 Its Video Frame Size is currently set to 640x480 lts frame rate is set to 30 frames per second Note that this value will sometimes be overridden by the camera drivers when the camera is in a mode where brightness and contrast are set automatically The video frame size and the video frame rate can be changed by left clicking the Video Format button This will bring up the camera manufacturer s Video Format or Properties window which will allow you to make changes to basic camera functionality 92 Image Capture Modes Video Format This button causes display of a window provided by the manufacturer of your webcam For a Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000 the window that comes up looks like this Compression I Frame Interval P Frame Interval xz a Color Space Compression Re 24 v Output Size Quality 640 x 480 v Figure 4 This window may be used to change the
224. oad 7 3 2008 0910 Last FTP upload 7 2 2008 1142 Figure 37 This window controls all of the motion detect photography functions of HandyAvi The Capture Device Section Capture Device Hauppauge WinTV 885 Video Capture Video Format Video Frame Size 720 X 480 ings Frames per Second 30 TV Tuner 32 Image Capture Modes Figure 3 This section of the Capture window allows you to choose a webcam i e a capture device If you have several webcams plugged in they will all be listed here if you click on the pull down arrow In addition some other types of video capture devices may be listed here such as the Hauppauge WinTV PVR PCI II Capture device or the Hauppauge WinTV Video 885 Capture device Other buttons see below may also appear in this section depending upon the capabilities of the selected device We see in the Capture Device section that the webcam currently selected is the Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000 Its Video Frame Size is currently set to 640x480 lts frame rate is set to 30 frames per second Note that this value will sometimes be overridden by the camera drivers when the camera is in a mode where brightness and contrast are set automatically The video frame size and the video frame rate can be changed by left clicking the Video Format button This will bring up the camera manufacturer s Video Format or Properties window which will allow you to make changes to basic camera functionality
225. occurring at the horizon s Create a new output file for each trail This was requested by a user who was trying to separate each meteor track from other meteor tracks so that he could determine the time of the track among other things Note that there is a log file for every AVI file created that contains frame times If you check the box then each recorded trail will automatically be put into a new AVI file Up to 9999 files The new file names are generated automatically Checks are made to ensure that the new file name does not match an existing file name In case of a match the file name suffix counts up until it finds a name that is not being used New file names are the same as the original file name except that they contain a suffix such as 0001 For example if the original file is named myAviFile avi then when its track has completed it will be closed and a new file with the name myAviFile 0001 avi will be generated If that name is not already the name of an existing file in the current folder then it will be used as the name of a new recording file Recording will continue with no intervention required on the part of you the user Notes Frames taken by the camera will appear in the current Live Video Preview frame visible in the Scan AVI File for Meteors and Create New Movie area Frames being written out in response to a trigger event and being sent to your video output file will appear briefly rapidly in the Last
226. odern computers How to Open the Meteor Trail Video Control a HandyAvi File Tools View Help gt Time Lapse Images a Motion Detect Images HandyAvi File Capture Tools View Help ima LS Astronomy Images Meteor Trail Images N Animation Images Or Figure 63 From the main HandyAvi window select the Capture Meteor Trail Images menu item to bring up the Meteor trail Capture window 91 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual WD Meteor Trail Detect and Capture fo es Capture Device Logtech QuickCam Pro 4900 bd Video Frame Sze 640 X 430 Frames per Second 30 Meteor Tral Movie Setup Output File C __MARS ForLarrys en Browse Compression mpg PiCVideo M JPEG 3 VAY Cod 7 Configure Sesithity eee 000 Prefas H 5 PostFrames pamm 5 Output Fie Size 2590 KB Status Monitoring sensitivity adjustments Play back frame rate mages per second 2 T Create a new output file for each tral Advanced I Create a PG fie for each Composite Image Next FTP upload 7 2 2008 0910 Last FTP upload 7 2 2008 1307 Figure 64 This window controls all of the meteor trail photography functions of HandyAvi The Capture Device Section Capture Device Hauppauge WinTV 885 Video Capture v Video Format Video Frame Size 720 X 480 Video Settings Frames per Second 30 TV Tuner i E Figure 3 This section of the Capture window allows you t
227. of centering because of differences that exist between Meade LX classic older telescopes and newer Meade telescopes that are being controlled by an Autostar hand controller The telescope communication protocol is the same but the behavior of the Right Ascension and Declination motors is very different LX 200 We used a 10 Meade LX 200 classic telescope for testing here You should set the Dec Backlash for minimum delay of movement when the direction is reversed i e without jumping when Dec direction N S is reversed Pressing N E S or W on the Meade hand controller should cause the telescope to move slowly in the selected direction If you look through the telescope you can see the motion caused by pressing one of the keys The motion is slow but occurs almost immediately HandyAvi is able to use this fact to calibrate by moving the telescope in the N S direction and then in the E W direction to determine how much the scope moves in a given amount of time When the Start button is pressed and if auto centering is checked HandyAvi will force the slew rate to Guide mode then attempt calibration by moving the telescope a tiny bit in both the Dec and RA directions If successful HandyAvi will then know how long and in which direction to move the telescope so that the planet or star will stay centered during the image capture operation HandyAvi always forces LX classic series scopes to use Guide mode for the slew rate when auto centerin
228. ol over your webcam and might need to be adjusted to get the best results under various lighting conditions For planetary astronomy of for example Saturn using a telescope we usually take the camera out of Full auto and adjust the Frame rate Brightness Contrast etc to provide an image that is not over exposed We have found that lowering the Frame rate is often helpful for planetary imaging Other webcams may have other types of video settings windows of course The above are simply examples of webcam control features that two different manufacturers decided to provide IMPORTANT if the Full auto control is checked in Figure 7 it can override the frame rate and set it to a lower value Under dim lighting the automatic settings for many webcams cause the frame rate to be reduced so that brighter images can be obtained You can see in Figure 7 that the original frame rate of 30 frames per second has been overridden so that the frame rate is now 5 frames per second By switching Full auto off you can manually set the frame rate override to 30 if you wish to capture more frames more quickly This is important because it can be puzzling if you are not aware of it Video Source The user here has selected a USB 2821 Device which is a USB Video Adapter so a Video Source button is now displayed Image Capture Modes Capture Device USB 2821 Device v Video Format Video Frame Size 640 X 480 Video Settings Frames per
229. on 2 In the window that comes up select Create Shortcut This will create a copy of the shortcut and place it on the desktop 3 Right click the shortcut and select Properties 4 Add the runmotiondetectcapture string or one of the other command line strings if you are doing one of the other capture operations to the Target line after HandyAvi Make sure there is a blank before the minus sign 5 Click the Start button lower left of the main windows screen i e the desktop click All Programs right click the Startup folder and then click Open 6 Drag the copy of the HandyAvi shortcut into the Startup folder 7 The next time you start Windows HandyAvi will run automatically and when it runs it will begin a new motion detect operation and begin capturing data as if it had never been interrupted It will be using a new file name however so it doesn t overwrite your previous file It will use the usual rules for creating new file name See Maximum AVI File Size notes under Preferences for information on how unique file names are assigned If the power failed how do I recover the file that was interrupted Simply use HandyAvi file open to open the file See Recovery of an incomplete file 237 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual HandyAvi Registration Purchase The Purchase HandyAvi menu item will bring up a browser and take you to http www AZcendant com where you may purchase a license for HandyAvi I
230. oniinn ei n aai iaa aeeai Ea 204 Make a Movie from Still Images cceceeeeeeeeeeeeeeceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeetees 206 Make Movie From Still IMaQes cccceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeesesneeeeeeeeees 206 The Directory Selector Section cc ccccceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeneeeeeeeeeeeeeneees 208 The Select Compression Scheme Section 0 0 00seeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeseeeeees 208 The Make Movie Section 2 cccccceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeenaeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeas 209 Telescope Controls ce csccteeeete eect oe eters estes seen crete eto tidal 210 Telescope COM Port as saeco scien onattnensneceneencnsrencaesenetcnanenendinedeneseuenenentnandnewene 210 Opening the Telescope Controls ccccsecccceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeseenaeees 211 PRCTGNON CGS cinas iie aeiee EEEE e TEE EE esien 223 Preference S oosina ie vse e aaraa sits nace Soin airaa AEE aaa ENa Aai 223 AVI File Frame Time LOGE ocissccsttcnstancdooecptdeaniabodannoedbbandiadogndanhdesbaeidesiebatnnte 233 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Table of Contents Command Line Parameters siciicsisssveeedscssvessavesanssacsdiensasedeeasecnvanedacadaensaseevensedenan 235 Command Line Parameters icdcsuscwsiasrdcnsaraserinatansrdmarannduaiansranataamiamaiaisidededas 235 HandyAvi Registration ccponcieinsntesiastocutnechitetenseoautneesbivtuesbuansuantiietoebniateanabitveesins 239 VIKO NTE E E a E EEE AAE A E 239 Mistal KEY ieee 239 Registered TO iics
231. onitor a place where wild animals might appear e etc Applications are limited only by your imagination HandyAvi will allow you to set the sensitivity of the motion detect feature while you are capturing frames so that you can see the effect of the sensitivity setting in real time If you set the sensitivity to 0 0 then NO frames except the first will be captured If you set the sensitivity to 100 0 then ALL frames will be captured If you set the sensitivity somewhere between 0 0 and 100 0 then frames will be captured depending on how much the last stored motion detect image frame differs from the next frame taken by the webcam 30 Image Capture Modes How to open the motion detect video control window Figure 36 From the main HandyAvi window select the Capture Motion Detect Images menu item to bring up the Motion Detect Capture window 31 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual r Capture Device Philips SPC S00NC PC Camera Video Frame Size 640 X 480 Frames per Second 30 m Motion Detect Movie Setup Output File lc _test MotionDetect avil a Compression mjpg PICVideo M JPEG 3 VAW Cod Con a Quality Sensitivity H 36 4 Additional frames to capture after motion has stopped 0 Play back frame rate images per second 30 ee l Enlarge Adjust Sensitivity Enlarge Output File Size 0 KB Frame number 702 Status Monitoring sensitivity adjustments Next FTP upl
232. ope set up for days on end so that you do not have to realign it every night the Park mode prevents the cords from wrapping around the telescope as they would if the telescope continued tracking There is a time field so that you can Park the telescope in 7200 seconds for example When you click the Park box so that it is checked HandyAvi will look at the time field and count down to zero before parking the telescope If the time field is O or reaches 0 after counting down the telescope will park immediately Normally you would enter the time first then cause the Park check box to be checked When you uncheck the Park box the telescope is placed in guide mode the East button is released and the telescope again starts tracking the sky During Park the speed change buttons are grayed out disabled and the Go button is disabled but all other controls function normally so you can for example change focus or get a read out of the telescope s RA and Dec The Park setting is remembered by HandyAvi If you had it set when you exited HandyAvi it will be set when you reenter HandyAvi If the telescope was parked it will continue to be parked even if you exit HandyAvi FOCUS SECTION Slow Ste oper Motor Figure 57 This section allows you to operate the Meade focusing motor There are two basic focusing speeds slow and fast You can choose which speed you are using by checking or un checking the check box Experie
233. option Size True Aspect Ratio Resize Bigger B z Smaller S OO O Oa Selection of Bigger will resize the window to a slightly bigger size while keeping the true aspect ratio of your image Pressing the b key will also perform this action Selection of Smaller will resize to a slightly smaller size while keeping the true aspect ratio of your image Pressing the s key will also perform this action If you close an enlarged window the images will again appear in the Live Video Preview window or the other window if it was the one that had been enlarged Last Captured Frame This window shows the last frame that was sent to the AVI file There is also an Enlarge button that works the same as the Enlarge button for the Live Video Preview window About Video Codecs Note You do not have to learn about codecs to use HandyAvi However the purpose of a CODEC is to compress your video data so that your AVI files are smaller So if space on your hard drive is a consideration you will probably want to use a CODEC AVI files can be created either by using no compression uncompressed or by using one of literally hundreds of compression schemes codecs is short for Coder decoder that have been created by various companies Uncompressed files are generally MUCH larger than compressed files In order for HandyAvi to use a particular compression schemes it must have been installed on your computer Many AVI codecs probably already h
234. or and Lightning videos Animation videos et you Open play edit and join AVI movie files Edit an AVI file and make a new video from selected frames Create AVI files using any compression scheme codec found on your machine Create a new AVI file using a compression scheme OTHER than the one used to encode your original AVI file Set the play back speed of new movies that you create tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual e Make Time Lapse movies from any AVI movie file that you already have on hand e Scan an existing AVI file for meteors and create a new movie containing only the meteor trails that were found e Control any telescope that uses the standard Meade telescope control codes The LX 200 telescope for example e Display information about any AVI file including the codec that the file was created with e Write selected images or all of the images within your AVI file as either JPG files or BMP files e Create anew movie from a directory containing JPG files or BMP files e Align and stack images contained within an AVI file for planetary astronomy imaging tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Image Capture Modes Create a Time Lapse Video Time lapse Video Overview HandyAvi allows you to easily make time lapse videos using a webcam Regular webcam videos consist of frames taken as quickly as possible usually on the order of 30 frames per second Time lapse videos consist of frames taken at a slower rate For ex
235. or example C Program Files HandyAvi MessierGoToList In the MessierGoToList directory there are two files gotolist txt and ProcessMessierlmages vbs You can consider these to be backup files in case you need them We have also copied these files C HandyAvi MessierGoToList As shown above we chose to work in the c HandyAv MessierGotoListi directory and use the GoToList txt file that we copied to that directory You could of course create some new directory and copy the GoToList txt file to that directory then work in that new directory All images captured will go to the directory that you choose to work in Gotolist txt is the file we used to automatically shoot the Messier marathon in 2013 You will probably want to use it as a starting point There are instructions in the file that will help you setup data for the year and day you plan to shoot and the Latitude and Longitude of your shooting site Please read the instructions in the file Telescope Controls The Change List Times button will greatly simplify changing the times at which each shot will begin ProcessMessierlmages vbs is a copy of the Visual Basic file which we used in 2013 to automatically process all of the images we shot automatically If all images are shot there would be 330 image files in need of processing ProcessMessierlmages vbs is set up to specifically accommodate our SBIG ST 4000XCM one shot color camera so you would need to modify this file if you use a diff
236. ou want each frame to be presented at a very slow rate then you could set the play back rate to 1 second In this case each frame of the movie would be displayed for one second when the movie is played Capture Current Frame Left mouse click this button to capture the current frame the one being displayed in the Live Video Preview window and add it to the end of your movie file The Animation Display Area Figure 72 Enlarge If you use one of the Enlarge buttons a new window will be created containing the video image This new window can be resized to any size by clicking and dragging an edge or corner of the window This new window also contains a Size option that will allow you to select a True Image Size option which will resize the window to show the actual size of the captured video images Pressing the t key will also perform the True Image Size function True Aspect Ratio Resize True Image Size T 127 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Figure 73 The above figure shows an enlarged Live Preview Frames window that has been sized with the Size option to the True Image Size of 320x240 which was the size selected in the Capture Device section There is also a True Aspect Ratio Resize option True Aspect Ratio Resize Bigger Smaller nn wo a Selection of Bigger will resize the window to a slightly bigger size while keeping the true aspect ratio of your image Pressing the b key wi
237. ou want the frames to be played in real time then you should set the rate to the same rate as the camera was set to when it was recording If you want each frame to be presented at a very slow rate then you could set the play back rate to 1 second In this case each frame of the movie would be displayed for one second when the movie is played Start Starts the motion detect movie making process Note that the Start button here is yellow This indicates that a Set Allowable Image Capture Times preference item has been set Yellow means that video recording is currently allowed but at some point in time video recording will cease until it is again allowable Red would mean that video recording is not allowed at the current time NOTE Output files will automatically be limited to less than 2 Gigabytes the AVI file size limit A new file with a unique new name will be generated and used automatically whenever the limit is about to be exceeded See Preferences for more information about Maximum AVI File Size 40 Image Capture Modes Stop Stops the motion detect movie making process Advanced button brings up the Advanced Motion Detect Settings window Advanced Motion Detect Settings x STi Click and drag in the above image to create motion detect sensitive rectangular regions You can create as many as desired J On startup Restore and use the regions shown above V Sound alarm when motion is detected Undo
238. ovie K ext Output file size Output File Size 1282 KB Status test avi completed sucessfully Figure 127 Make Movie Brings up a File Selector window where you will enter the name for your output AVI movie file After receiving the output file name the system will begin making a movie from all of the JPG and or BMP files contained in the directory selected in the Directory Selector Section The progress bar will indicate how far along the process has gotten Exit Exit the Make a Movie From Still Images tool Telescope Controls Telescope COM Port In order to communicate with the telescope the telescope must be powered up have its RS232 port connected by a serial cable to your PC and HandyAvi must be talking to the correct COM port The COM port can be selected by using the menu item Tools Telescope Port The following port selection window will come up USB Serial cables may be used but it should be noted that not all types of USB Serial cables are guaranteed to work Testing has shown that some of them do not meet the specifications of the Serial UART chips that they are supposed to substitute for Select Serial Port 7 xi Select Serial Port COM2 Communications Port COMI Communications Port COM2 Communications Port COM3 ATEN USB to Serial Cable Le Figure 55 Note that we have been using IOGEAR s GUC232A USB Serial cables successfully for several years with the LX 200 out in the field
239. ow you have to buy an MJPG CODEC if you want to use one The PICVideo MJPG CODEC has a Compression Quality slider that you can adjust to set your desired trade off between image size and image quality HandyAvi s Quality slider does not appear when the PICVideo MJPG compression scheme is selected so the above panel is the only way to adjust Quality Compression 56 Image Capture Modes Morgan Multimedia M JPEG codec registered 3 0 0 3 Copyright Morgan Multimedia 1990 2001 V Enable codec V User FourCC mipg Decompression V Enabled M Support interleave C Fastinteger Invert field order Integer Fancy upsampling C Float Iv MMX V SSE i M SSE2 l WGCoe F SMP Compression V Enabled V Support interleave C Fastinteger Invert field order Integer V Bitrate control Float Better bitrate control Iv MMx M SSE C 422 M 3DNow M SSE2 OTETA E M SMP Z Forced quality 75 Cancel About Figure 31 Morgan Multimedia MJPG Codec Morgan MJPG allows quality to be set if the Forced quality check box is checked The value in the display box here seen as 75 ALWAYS overrides the value set by the HandyAvi Quality sliders HandyAvi s Quality slider appears but has no effect We ran into a problem with the above version of the Morgan CODEC in Vista when we used image sizes other than 160x120 320x240 or 640x480 Caused a HandyAvi crash that we could not find a work around for
240. pecified number of frames pre frames immediately preceding the trigger event so that the possibly dim beginning of the meteor trail is captured HandyAvi continues recording data while additional motion is detected HandyAvi continues recording an additional number of post frames after the last motion is detected The AVI file will contain COMPLETE meteor trails airplane trails or lightning events 90 Image Capture Modes The sophisticated motion detection algorithm employed by HandyAvi completely eliminates false detections caused by camera noise cosmic ray events star scintillation etc The AVI file will then contain only meteor trails and airplane trails or lightning flashes and will not occupy gigabytes of space You will not have to waste time looking through thousands of empty frames generated by other less sophisticated software systems RAM Requirements HandyAvi allows you to specify up to 250 pre frames and up to 250 post frames If you used the maximum settings for both the internal memory requirement would be 500 times the size of one of your camera images For frame sizes of 640 x 480 that would be 500 x 640 x 480 x 3 or about 460 Megabytes relatively small in relation to typical memory sizes of current computers Typical and recommended values for pre frames and post frames are 5 and 5 though so the buffers would occupy only 10 x 640 x 480 x 3 or about 10 Megabytes 10 Megabytes is very insignificant in m
241. pect ratio of your image Pressing the b key will also perform this action Selection of Smaller will resize to a slightly smaller size while keeping the true aspect ratio of your image Pressing the s key will also perform this action If you close an enlarged window the images will again appear in the Live Video Preview window or the other window if it was the one that had been enlarged About Video Codecs Note You do not have to learn about codecs to use HandyAvi However the purpose of a CODEC is to compress your video data so that your AVI files are smaller So if space on your hard drive is a consideration you will probably want to use a CODEC AVI files can be created either by using no compression uncompressed or by using one of literally hundreds of compression schemes codecs is short for Coder decoder that have been created by various companies Uncompressed files are generally MUCH larger than compressed files In order for HandyAvi to use a particular compression schemes it must have been installed on your computer Many AVI codecs probably already have been installed on your machine Some come from Microsoft as part of your operating system Some come from the manufacturers of webcams that you might have installed You can even download and install codecs from the Internet Some are free and others are not http Awww fourcc org is a site that lists and describes almost all known codecs If you surf to that sit
242. pg B 0008 jpg B 0015 jpg B 0022 jpg B 0002 jpq B 0009 jpg B 0016 jpg B 0023 jpg B 0003 jpg B 0010 jpq B 0017 jpq B 0024 jpg B 0004 jpg B 0011 jpa B 0018 jpq B 0025 jpg B 0005 jpg B 0012 jpg B 0019 jpg B 0026 jpg B 0006 jpg B 0013 jpg B 0020 jpg B 0027 jpg 4 i p Refresh List Remove Selected Items Figure 125 Browse Select a directory that contains the JPG and or BMP images that you want to make into a movie The movie will be made from the items in the list The first frame of the movie will be from the first file in the list The second frame will be from the second file in the list To specify the order of the frames you have to name them so they will be listed in order The system presents the list in sorted order The first file in the list will determine the image size All subsequent images in the list will be stretched to be the same size as the size of the first image For example if the first image is a 640x480 pixel image and the next image is a 100x100 pixel image the 100x100 pixel image will be stretched before being added to the output AVI file It will be stored as a 640x480 pixel image Refresh List Reads the file names from the directory restores all file names that you might have removed Remove Selected Items Select file names to be removed from the list then click on Remove Selected Items The names will be removed from the list The movie will be generated only from the files shown in the list The Select Comp
243. pression for most faxed documents using this strategy AND it is lossless i e the document that shows up at the other end is essentially identical to the original document Unfortunately lossless compression cannot be done for most images That is why lossy compression is used Lossy compression Lossy compression refers to a compression scheme that compresses the data but loses some of the data If you compress an image using a lossy compression scheme the restored image when decompressed is NOT identical to the original image However if the scheme is a good one the images will look almost identical There are MANY lossy compression schemes some of which are very well known such as JPEG We can use JPEG to illustrate Lossy compression gt 4 s N gh quality 358 Kilobytes y Factor 99 Very hi Figure 20 JPEG Qualit 79 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual 4 Figure 21 JPEG Quality Factor 75 high quality 70 4 Kilo 80 bytes Image Capture Modes 81 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Figure 23 JPEG Quality Factor 10 noticeably reduced quality 9 9 Kilobytes Each of the above images when stored as a bmp file requires 672 8 Kilobytes of storage space Note that bmp is lossless because it does not use compression i e the image is stored with no loss of resolution or information but the file is BIG However when the lossy JPEG algorithms are applied and the file is stored as
244. pression scheme So you can convert AVI files from one compression scheme to another if the required codecs have been installed on your machine Configure Brings up the compression CODEC s configuration window This button only appears if the selected compression scheme HAS a configuration window Note that the Quality slider and the quality settings in some CODECs do not cooperate In the case of the mjpg CODEC the Forced quality slider determines the degree of JPEG compression and the Quality slider in the Astronomy Movie Setup window has absolutely no effect Other CODECs we have tested do not override our Quality slider When in doubt you should test by setting the quality and capturing for example three frames of the same scene use Time Lapse and take one frame every 3 seconds or so Then change the 73 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual quality factor and make another movie The size of the two resultant AVI movie files should be different See Configure Window Examples for information on the Configure options of various CODECs Learn more about video codecs here Quality Adjust the quality of the compression scheme Most compression schemes create smaller files because they are actually discarding tiny image details By discarding more and larger image details you can produce a smaller AVI file If the Quality is set to 100 then little or no image data is discarded and the resultant AVI file will be large If the Qu
245. psecapture 2 This will connect to the second camera Then hit Enter e In Windows Vista there is a start search box within the Start area type HandyAvi runmotiondetectcapture for example into the Start Search box and hit Enter 235 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Control Panel Default Programs 34 Search Everywhere Search the Internet Help and Support 5 5 c eme HandyAvi exe runtimelapsecapture x a gt Figure 135 e You could also modify the Properties of a Shortcut to include the command line parameter so that it will take effect when you double click the shortcut HandyAvi Properties eal _ Securty Detais Previous Versions General Shortcut Compatibility Ay HandyAvi Target type Application Target location HandyAvi Target landyAvi HandyAvi exe funmotiondetectcapture Start in C Program Files HandyAvi Shortcut key None Run Normal window Comment Open File Location Change Icon Advanced Figure 136 How can I make sure that motion detection operations or meteor detection operations or time lapse operations or will continue automatically after a power failure Make HandyAvi run with one of the command line parameters whenever your machine starts up 236 Command Line Parameters On XP and Vista 1 Right click the HandyAvi shortcut icon 3 that was placed on the desktop during HandyAvi installati
246. r High performance ates are necessary to retain full quality Balanced Default Better Quality Extreme Quality Insane Qualit m Frame Control Bidirectional coding Adaptive Single Consecutive Max Keyframe interval 300 frames Kepframe threshold 50 untracked blocks Motion Estimation Quarter pixel search Advanced Restore defaults Cancel Figure 26 DivX CODEC DivX allows you to select various Encoding Modes which essentially cause the quality to be higher or lower HandyAvi s Quality slider has no effect 196 Tools Configure MainConcept DY Codec Main Concept Ltd 1999 2001 S A Grigoriey 1999 2001 Commercial Edition Release 2 0 4 Encoder I Change Fields Order IV Fastest l 16 9 Decoder Change Field Order YUY2 disable F Preview Quality M UYVWY disable Default Cancel Figure 27 DVSD Codec DVSD allow you just two Quality options Either Fastest or not HandyAvi s Quality slider has no effect E intel Indeo Video 4 4 Encoder Configuration Encoder Controls p Access Key l Enable Scalability Bidirectional Prediction Load Default Transparency Minimum Viewport Size None bi Width fo Quality Best v Height fo Figure 28 V41 CODEC IV41 allows just two Quality settings Quick Compress or not HandyAvi s Quality slider DOES control quality
247. r key is working and all shareware restrictions have been removed from your version Note that it is OK to copy the entire message into the Key entry window since the key will be located and extracted from the message by internally looking for the start and end labels When you start HandyAvi and have not yet purchased a license the following window will come up 239 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual xi You have 0 trial days left Use one of the buttons below or visit http www 4Zcendant com to buy a license to use HandyAvi Buy Now Register Figure 137 Unregistered Version dialog window 240 OK Will continue execution of HandyAvi However if there are no trial days left as shown above HandyAvi will exit Buy Now Will bring up your web browser and display the http Awww AZcendant com web page where you may buy a license to run HandyAvi Register Will bring up the Key entry window When you purchase a license to run HandyAvi you will receive a key by Email You will copy the key from the Email into the Key entry edit box Key entry i E 4n Email message will be sent to you when you purchase this product TF you have purchased this product and have received the Email message please copy the registration key From that Email message and paste it into the box below Then left click the OK button Clicking on OK will then cause your registration key to be installed and will remove all trial restrict
248. rated If that name is not already the name of an existing file in the current folder then it will be used as the name of a new recording file Recording will continue with no intervention required on the part of you the user Note that there is a_log file for every AVI file created that contains frame times These log files can be suppressed in Preferences if desired Log files are generated by default Note also that each frame can be labeled automatically with a date time stamp if you set the Date stamp each captured image and or Time stamp each captured image in Preferences Create a JPG file for each composite image During recording and immediately after a new meteor trail has been recorded the Last Captured Composite window of the Meteor Trail Create Movie area will display a composite image of the entire meteor trail A JPG file can be created and stored for each of these images The JPG file names will be automatically assigned If your original file name was metFile avi the file name of a composite image will look like metFile_n1_n2 jpg where n1 is the number of the first frame in the AVI file of the captured trail and n2 is the number of the last frame in the AVI file of the captured trail e g metFile_117_126 jpg Advanced This button will bring up the Advanced Meteor Detect Settings window 101 andyavi 5 0 User s Manual 102 Make cirdes Total CPU Usage 14 Click and drag in the above im
249. rder IV Fastest 16 9 Decoder I Change Field Order P YUY2 disable F Preview Quality M UYVWY disable Default Cancel Figure 27 DVSD Codec DVSD allow you just two Quality options Either Fastest or not HandyAvi s Quality slider has no effect E intel Indeo Video 4 4 Encoder Configuration Encoder Controls Access Key l Enable Scalability Bidirectional Prediction Load Default Transparency Minimum Viewport Size None bul Width fo Quality Best v Height fo Figure 28 V41 CODEC IV41 allows just two Quality settings Quick Compress or not HandyAvi s Quality slider DOES control quality for this CODEC 137 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual E ndeo video 5 10 Encoder Configuration Encoder Controls Access Key Quick Compress F Enable Scalability Transparency None v Miewport Size Full image X Figure 29 IV50 CODEC IV50 allows just two Quality settings Quick Compress or not HandyAvi s Quality slider DOES control quality for this CODEC Configure PICVideo M JPEG 3 M JPEG Decompressor View Settings r Single User Single CPU Decompressor View License Brightness 0 IV Enable Codec Provided by Pegasus Imaging Corporation S I Adyanced Deblocking Web iran gear pereeweeeeereweteeene Support support com 100 0 100 T Assume Normalized YUV Telephone 813 875 7575 EENE Swap Fields FAX 813 875
250. re is about a 1 second delay for the time setting operation so press Set one second early if you want to be within a second Part of the delay is simply transmitting the data to the telescope The LX 200 has a Dec Backlash setting that can be from 0 to 100 The LX 200 software will not respond to this being set by HandyAvi but the new GPS scopes will The LX 200 also has a Tracking Rate setting that can be set at a rate to track the Moon among other things The Moon moves slowly but noticeably against the background stars If you are making images of the Moon you might want to track it at the proper rate Again the LX 200 software will not respond to this being set by HandyAvi but the new GPS scopes will Third Telescope Tab Objects han ns LX 200 Telescope Controls LX200 Controls Location Time Backlash Tracking Rate Objects Sky Flats Messier Object STAR 04 i RA 08 09 36 List Dec 21 53 00 Figure 59 The above image shows the Objects tab Objects Choose a catalog M200 Telescope Controls LX200 Controls Location Time Bac Figure 60 You can then enter an object number and either Get the coordinates of the object and display them or Go To the object which will cause the telescope to display the coordinates of the object and begin slewing to the object Note that if you type in a number for an object that does not exist the only indication will be that the RA
251. ression Lossless compression refers to a compression scheme that compresses the data without losing any of the information in the picture If you compress an image using a lossless compression scheme the restored image when decompressed is IDENTICAL to the original image An example of lossless compression is Run Length Encoding used in FAX machines Run length encoding for a black and white image consists of looking at each row of pixels in the original image and creating a file that tells how many white pixels are followed by how many black pixels are followed by how many white pixels etc across the row If you are sending a printed text document there are usually a LOT of white pixels then a few black pixels then a LOT of white pixels etc ina row You can actually get very good compression for most faxed documents using this strategy AND it is lossless i e the document that shows up at the other end is essentially identical to the original document Unfortunately lossless compression cannot be done for most images That is why lossy compression is used Lossy compression Lossy compression refers to a compression scheme that compresses the data but loses some of the data If you compress an image using a lossy compression scheme the restored image when decompressed is NOT identical to the original image However if the scheme is a good one the 19 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual images will look almost identical There are
252. ression Scheme Section Select Compression Scheme CODEC mjpg PICVideo M JPEG 3 VfW Codec Play back frame rate images per second 5 Figure 126 Compression pull down Select any AVI file compression scheme resident on your computer File compression schemes or codecs short for coder decoder show up on your machine from many sources Microsoft installs several Your video camera may install one or more You may download and install compression schemes from the internet At the time of this writing there are over 280 codecs listed at http www fourcc org Note that one of the selection items is called 208 Tools Uncompressed If you select Uncompressed the image data in your files will not be compressed Your files will be LARGE However each image in an Uncompressed file will contain images that are exactly what the camera captured Compressed images are usually slightly different from the original images because information is lost during compression In most cases the difference is not noticeable Use of uncompressed images is important for some applications but not necessary or advisable for most Learn more about video codecs here HandyAvi displays the FOURCC value for the compressor in brackets at the beginning of the Compression line Note that HandyAvi will also allow you to read work with and display AVI files produced by other software or cameras and will select the proper decompression scheme automatically
253. riginal Frame Number 58 Original Frame Number 59 Original Frame Number 60 Original Frame Number 61 gt Figure 102 Now while the block is selected if we click one of the check boxes all of the selected items will become checked If we again click one of the selected item s check box all of the items will become UNchecked This toggling of check boxes can be repeated indefinitely Original Frame Number 56 Original Frame Number 57 Original Frame Number 58 Original Frame Number 59 Original Frame Number 60 J61 Original Frame Number 61 62 Original Frame Number 62 063 Original Frame Number 63 064 Original Frame Number 64 065 Original Frame Number 65 O66 Original Frame Number 66 O67 Original Frame Number 67 Original Frame Number 68 Original Frame Number 69 Figure 103 We previously selected the block of items 50 through 59 We have now moved the scroll bar so that more items are visible If we hold the shift key down and place the cursor over item 67 then press the left mouse button the additional items are added to the block We established an anchor in Figure 101 Item 50 and it is still the anchor Now release the shift key 176 Tools Original Frame Number 55 Original Frame Number 56 Original Frame Number 57 Original Frame Number 58 Original Frame Number 59 Original Frame Number 60 Original Frame Number 61 Original Frame Number 62 Original Frame Number 63 Original Frame Number 64
254. ring twilight Frames are taken of empty sky and the background sky 217 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual brightness is captured and the dust particles become visible in the captured frame The captured frame can be used later to subtract out the dust particle contribution to images of deep space objects The difficult part of taking sky flats is that the sky is not empty of stars and twilight may not last long enough HandyAvi contains an algorithm for making sky flats First use the first tab LX 200 Controls to point the telescope at a region of the sky containing as few bright stars as possible Set the Milliseconds field to the length of time that the telescope should move in Center mode Start Sends a command to the telescope to set its speed to Center as opposed to Guide Find or Slew speed The telescope will then move North then East then South then West then North etc Each move will be for the number of milliseconds that were entered in the Milliseconds field This will trace a square in the sky The purpose is to cause the star background to move quickly so that the stars if they are dim enough will not leave visible trails This will allow a sky flat to be taken either during twilight or anytime from light polluted skies Stop Stops the telescope s motion and returns its speed to Guide mode Fifth Telescope Tab Messier Marathon 218 Telescope Controls LX 200 Detected Using COM4
255. ront of it so that it will be displayed properly on captured images when the Activate check box is checked Activate While capturing images send the Data Request String and display the returned data on the image 231 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual If this item is checked the requests for data will be active during all image capture operations and you will see the data in the field at the bottom left corner of your captured images OK Clicking this will save the data so it will be remembered and saved data will be used during image capture Cancel Clicking this will cause any new changes that you made to be discarded Recycle files in order to limit disk space usage 232 Click this button to bring up the Recycle Files panel Recycle Files File recycing applies only to the Time Lapse capture mode and the Motion Detect capture mode Please click the Help button for more information V Use file recyding Help Use atmost 3 files _ Cancel ae This panel controls File Recycling File Recycling applies ONLY to the Time Lapse and Motion Detect capture modes When file recycling is active and you are using either the Motion Detect or Time Lapse mode the system will create and use one new file every day up to the Use at most N files value where N is the number of files you want to use Example of use Say you enter a file name of A avi into the Output File name field of the Motion Detect Mov
256. running the meteor detection routines The Monitoring sensitivity adjustments mode allows you to set the Sensitivity slider as well as Advanced settings to set up motion sensitive areas See the Scan AVI File Movie Setup Section below The system continues to loop through all frames until the START button in pressed When START is pressed the system immediately sends the first through the last frame while scanning for meteors The output file will contain all meteor sequences detected After the last frame has been scanned a message box will come up saying AVI Output File Finished The system performs a STOP and is then again in the Monitoring sensitivity adjustments mode where all frames are repeatedly sent to the Live Video Preview window W Scan AVI File For Meteors tolo ees AVI Fie to Scan for Meteors Scan AVI Fie for Meteors and Create New Movie AY Fie C _Meteors m1SNow07 an Browse START j sToe Meteor Trail Output Movie Setup 3 Live Video Previe Ender Adjust Sensitivit Erter Outputrie ENE oe Enere cid Erterge Compression fmipg Morgan Multimedia MPEG V_ Quality ss Sit auu 90 7 Preframes i Njia Bo EN Post frames Play back frame rate mages per second 7 Create a new output file for each trav Advanced Create a JPG file for each Composite Image Status Monitoning sensitivity adjustments Figure 109 182 Tools Select an Input F
257. s J Figure 24 Below we describe briefly the control each configuration window allows over compression Quality Cinepak for Windows 32 radus Version 1 10 0 11 Copyright 1992 1995 Radius Inc All Rights Reserved Compress to Color C Compress to Black amp White Cancel Figure 25 Cinepak CVID CODEC CVID has no adjustable quality option HandyAvi s Quality slider has no effect 135 andyavi 5 0 User s Manual DivX Codec Properties Use Divx profiles and watch video on your TV using Divx Cettified devices Main Codec Video r Codec Performance Encoding mode ree ESE Fastest for very high resolution live capture or High performance ates are necessary to retain full quality Balanced Default Better Quality Extreme Quality Insane Qualit m Frame Control Bidirectional coding Adaptive Single Consecutive Max Keyframe interval 300 frames Kepframe threshold 50 untracked blocks Motion Estimation Quarter pixel search Advanced Restore defaults Cancel Figure 26 DivX CODEC DivX allows you to select various Encoding Modes which essentially cause the quality to be higher or lower HandyAvi s Quality slider has no effect 136 Image Capture Modes Configure MainConcept DY Codec Main Concept Ltd 1999 2001 S A Grigoriey 1999 2001 Commercial Edition Release 2 0 4 Encoder l Change Fields O
258. s JPEG is an example of a lossy compression scheme that is used in MANY applications and the fact that 99 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual some of the image data has been discarded is practically unnoticeable So compression with slightly reduced quality is a very good thing in most cases Learn more about video codecs here Sensitivity This slider lets you set the Meteor Trail Detection sensitivity When you have not yet pressed Start to take a movie the right hand image Adjust sensitivity of the Create Movie section registers a frame and increases the counter by one for each frame that triggered the motion detection algorithm If the sensitivity is set high to 100 for example then simple camera noise will trigger the motion detection algorithm and the counter will count up rapidly indicating that nearly all frames seen by the camera are seen as motion frames If you press Start with this setting every frame would be a trigger frame and cause nearly everything to be sent to the output AVI video file You typically do not want to set sensitivity this high unless you are testing the camera Before pressing start you should play with the sensitivity setting and set it just below the point where the counter stops counting Basically you are setting the camera noise threshold After this is set properly then the only things that should trigger the motion detection would be true motion events such as meteors airplanes lightning flashes
259. s Normally you would see only the installed CODECs Normally you would use only one of the installed CODECs We have chosen to list ALL of the CODECs both installed and uninstalled to provide greater flexibility in the batch processing mode IMPORTANT You should test any CODEC you want to use by using it to create a Time Lapse movie from a regular movie Then see if the new Time Lapse movie will play properly There are literally hundreds of CODECS that have been written by all sorts of people Some of the CODECs comply with standards and some don Some work well and some don HandyAvi does not make any alterations to your original movies so the danger is only that new movies that you produce with certain CODECs might not play or all of the new frames might be blank green images We ve seen that with one of the CODECs on one of our machines Quality This allows adjustment of the compression factor Some compression CODECs allow a Quality adjustment which will affect the size of the compressed file If Quality is set high 85 to 100 the file will be larger less compressed If Quality is set low 0 to 20 the file will be smaller more compressed HOWEVER highly compressed files often have poor image quality Compression is typically achieved by discarding image information which means that the resultant image is degraded If the chosen CODEC does not support Quality adjustments the slider will be hidden Select Output Fr
260. s puts you to sleep while attempting to focus The counter attempts to show the position of the focusing control The motor seems to take about one second to reach full speed in the fast mode The motor seems to coast to a stop over a period of about three seconds if it was going at full speed The algorithm HandyAvi is using does a simple linear interpolation using those numbers as an approximation When a button is pressed the PC time clock is accessed and the value is stored When the button is released the time clock is again accessed and the difference is taken yielding an elapsed time value accurate to 1 millisecond The counter is based upon these elapsed times and the motor acceleration deceleration values More work on measuring acceleration deceleration rates might make this more accurate but at the moment you should consider this number only a rough guide It is very unlikely to provide accurate positioning information Once focus is achieved the counter can be set to zero to provide at least some sense of where the focus position is was There are two other focus types Slow Stepper Motor and Fast Stepper Motor These are designed to accommodate a do it yourself stepper motor that is being used by the author of this section of the HandyAvi system The Meade focus motor port on the LX 200 labeled Focuser puts out 19 Volts or 19 Volts depending upon which direction the Meade standard DC focusing motor should run These vo
261. s slider was changed HandyAvi s Quality slider is not visible XviD Configuration r Main Settings Profile Level as L5 more Encoding type Single pass X more Target quantizer 31 00 calc aeaaee tallest file 31 Frame Weight Quant Modifiers 0 W 1 00 Add Remove Zone Options More Advanced Options Load Defaults Decoder Options Figure 35 XviD CODEC 201 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual HandyAvi s Quality slider DOES control quality for this CODEC Join AVI Files Join AVI Files This tool creates one AVI file from two or more AVI files by splicing them together View Help Play Videc Frame Selector rop and save Batch operations Scan a File for Meteors Join AVI Files N Stack Images Make Movie from Still Images Telescope Port Telescope Controls Figure 115 NOTE The size of images in the files following the first file will be resized automatically to match the size of images in the first file This means that videos with different image sizes can be joined 202 Tools i Join AVI Files Select Files to Join They will be joined in the order they are added Add Files to List Remove Selected Files Remove All Files E AAHOMEPAGE baja WhaleBreath avi C ___MARS 24Nov07 mars24Nov07 000 1 avi Select Compression Scheme CODEC mipx Morgan Multimedia M JPEG V3 codec
262. s when stored as a bmp file requires 672 8 Kilobytes of storage space Note that bmp is lossless because it does not use compression i e the image is stored with no loss of resolution or information but the file is BIG However when the lossy JPEG algorithms are applied and the file is stored as a JPEG file instead of a bmp file you can see that as the quality factor decreases the quality goes down and the storage space required goes down Note that some compression CODECs refer to compression factor instead quality factor A quality factor of 75 generally would mean a compression factor of 25 i e quality factor is 100 minus the compression factor Typically JPEG is run with a quality factor of 75 In Figure 21 above we see that storing an image as a JPEG image with a quality factor of 75 instead of as a bmp file reduces the size of the file from 672 8 Kilobytes to 70 4 Kilobytes We see that it is very difficult if not impossible to see any difference between Figure 21 and Figure 22 so compression did not seem to degrade the image very much and it did reduce the file size from 672 8 Kilobytes to 70 4 Kilobytes We see in Figure 22 that the image has degraded slightly due to the lower quality factor of 50 The degradation is barely noticeable if you look carefully at the side of the horse s face where the white and brown hair join you can see that the boundary is no longer smooth We see in Figure 23 that the image has degraded
263. s a copy of the Visual Basic file which we used in 2013 to automatically process all of the images we shot automatically If all images are shot there would be 330 image files in need of processing ProcessMessierlmages vbs is set up to specifically accommodate our SBIG ST 4000XCM one shot color camera so you would need to modify this file if you use a different camera The file does illustrate how to automate initial image processing though use of Maxim DL s Scripting language Create Go To List Entries You can use this to add data to the Go To list or you can hand edit the Go To list Note that the date time field works by highlighting the day or the month or the year or the hour or the minute or the second and using the spinner controls up down arrows to the right of the field Add an Object to the Go To List This will add the selected object to the end of the Go To list Again remember that the list can be hand edited See the View the List button below Go To List section This is a scrolling window that will let you see the current list entries You cannot hand edit the list in this window To hand edit the list see the View the List button below Camera Data Image Download time You camera takes a certain amount of time to download an image You can take a very short exposure with your camera and then time how long it takes the download to complete Put the number of seconds in here This value will be used when the
264. s of compression schemes codecs is short for Coder decoder that have been created by various companies Uncompressed files are generally MUCH larger than compressed files In order for HandyAvi to use a particular compression schemes it must have been installed on your computer Many AVI codecs probably already have been installed on your machine Some come from Microsoft as part of your operating system Some come from the manufacturers of webcams that you might have installed You can even download and install codecs from the Internet Some are free and others are not http Awww fourcc org is a site that lists and describes almost all known codecs If you surf to that site you will want to click on codec list to see all of the codecs Codecs have four character names known as Four Character Codes or FOURCC names This is how they are identified internally so that software applications such as HandyAvi can know which codec was used to produce a particular file FOURCC codes are also used internally when a HandyAvi user selects a compression scheme such as Indeo video 5 10 Indeo video 5 10 has a FOURCC name of IV50 If you have an AVI file that was encoded using IV50 you can see the IV50 codec name by opening the file in HandyAvi and using the View AVI File Info menu item AVI File Info fea AVI Name MarsSmallTest avi File Size 20544 KB Image Size 160x120 Number of Frames 999 Frames Per Second 25 Compression
265. s per Second 3000 4 ia ET Figure 32 mp42 CODEC We were unable to determine any effect when the Smoothness slider was changed HandyAvi s Quality slider is not visible Microsoft MPEG 4 Video Codec V3 Copyright Microsoft Corp 1996 1999 Options Keyframe every seconds Compression Control 44 75 m Data Rate Kilobits per Second 3000 al ey ok _Cancet_ Figure 33 MP43 CODEC We were unable to determine any effect when the Smoothness slider was changed HandyAvi s Quality slider is not visible 28 Image Capture Modes Configure Microsoft MPEG 4 Video Codec 1 Copyright Microsoft Corp 1996 1999 Options Kepframe every Ei seconds Compression Control Smoothness 75 Crispness 4 Data Rate Kilobits per Second 3000 Figure 34 MP41 CODEC We were unable to determine any effect when the Smoothness slider was changed HandyAvi s Quality slider is not visible XviD Configuration r Main Settings Profile Level as L5 more Encoding type Single pass more Target quantizer 31 00 calc Frame Weight Quant Modifiers 0 W 1 00 Add Remove Zone Options More Advanced Options L J Load Defaults Decoder Options Figure 35 XviD CODEC 29 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual HandyAvi s Quality slider DOES control quality for
266. s per second 30 Capture Current Frame Figure 71 This section of the Animation video capture window allows you to set up the webcam for making an Animation video Output File Type in the path name of the new video file you want to create Browse Brings up a standard file selector window so that you can more easily place the file in a particular folder 125 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Compression Select any AVI file compression scheme resident on your computer File compression schemes or codecs short for coder decoder show up on your machine from many sources Microsoft installs several Your video camera may install one or more You may download and install compression schemes from the internet At the time of this writing there are over 280 codecs listed at http www fourcc org Note that one of the selection items is called Uncompressed If you select Uncompressed the image data in your files will not be compressed Your files will be LARGE However each image in an Uncompressed file will contain images that are exactly what the camera captured Compressed images are usually slightly different from the original images because information is lost during compression In most cases the difference is not noticeable Use of uncompressed images is important for some applications but not necessary or advisable for most Learn more about video codecs here HandyAvi displays the FOURCC value for the compressor in brackets
267. sites Active or Passive Default is Active Some ISPs block Active though so you can set it to Passive if you need to 227 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Remote Directory Enter the remote directory path i e the path to the directory on your web site where you want your video files to be uploaded to Select This will bring up a window that will show files and directories on your remote web site 11 17 2006 05 55 PM 01 13 2008 07 09 PM 07 24 2006 09 00 PM 07 24 2006 08 52 PM 07 24 2006 03 52PM 07 24 2006 03 53 PM 07 24 2006 09 00 PM 04 15 2008 11 13 AM 01 13 2004 07 29 PM 07 24 2006 03 53PM 07 24 2006 03 53 PM 07 24 2006 08 58 PM 08 01 2006 02 07 AM 06 20 2008 10 02 AM 01 19 2006 04 41PM 07 24 2006 08 59 PM 07 24 2006 03 59 PM imap index htm frey aF fevi mers fmovie NOteHTML tet fother papers pluto redwoods fster al Ji p d o Ji p 4 J Ji di J E dJi J i IRET Figure 133 Double click on one of the folder icons to select that folder The folder will then be selected and its contents will be displayed The first folder in the list is a folder not shown above because we ve paged down to show the upload test directory When a folder is double clicked the system will move up one directory in the hierarchy and list that directory You might want to test the directory connection before using the Select button Test Connection Upload Test File Th
268. ssigned according to the standard sequence of variable star designations Again there are lots of holes A number such as 99999999 is sure to be unknown or unassigned For testing purposes you could use GCVS 860001 which is in Virgo Unfortunately we were unable to correlate that with anything in Megastar Caution is advised 4 Messier a This is the Messier catalog of things that Charles Messier found irritatingly bothersome in his quest for new comets These are great objects whose numbers run from 1 to 110 M 1 is the Crab nebula for example a The NGC or New General Catalog is a catalog of 7840 objects which include Galaxies Planetary Nebulae etc a The CNGC catalog or Computerized New General Catalog appears to be another designation for the NGC catalog within the Meade database a The IC or Index Catalog contains 5386 objects One of them IC 434 contains the Horse head Nebula a The Uppsala General Catalog contains 12 921 Galaxies numbered apparently from 1 to 12921 149 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual List Brings up an object list consisting of the Meade LX 200 guide stars followed by the NGC object catalog Hade 140356 60 2300 06 144 E Arctuius 14 15 40 1910 00 ao 147 Alphekka 1534 44 24200 22 165 _Lancel_ Antares 182928 262700 as 177 Vega 183700 3470 00 n4 Albreo 193044 7580 31 223 Altai 195048 520 08 26 Deneb 20 41 28 45170 13 232 Eni 24412 S0 24 f 238 Fomahaut
269. st to see all of the codecs Codecs have four character names known as Four Character Codes or FOURCC names This is how they are identified internally so that software applications such as HandyAvi can know which codec was used to produce a particular file FOURCC codes are also used internally when a HandyAvi user selects a compression scheme such as Indeo video 5 10 Indeo video 5 10 has a FOURCC name of IV50 If you have an AVI file that was encoded using IV50 you can see the IV50 codec name by opening the file in HandyAvi and using the View AVI File Info menu item 189 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual AVI File Info Ea AVI Name MarsSmallTest avi File Size 20544 KB Image Size 160x120 Number of Frames 999 Frames Per Second 25 Compression Scheme mjpg Rate 25000 Scale 1000 Figure 19 Figure 19 shows that the compression scheme used to compress the file MarsSmallTest avi was mjpg which is the FOURCC code for the Morgan Multimedia MJPG codec HandyAvi will also attempt to open files compressed with codecs that are NOT installed on your machine If the required codec is not installed HandyAvi will of course be unable to PLAY the file but it will try to produce an AVI File Info report as shown in Figure 19 so that you will be able to identify the missing codec If you know which codec was used you might be able to locate an installable version of the codec via the Internet and install it Th
270. t the camera will be taking Both the ToUcam and the Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000 for example allow the image sizes shown here Image Capture Modes Output Size 320 x 240 M 320 x 240 default Figure 5 HandyAvi will automatically save and restore your Video Format settings if possible Video Settings There is also a button called Video Settings This will bring up the webcam manufacturer s video settings window and will allow you to change other types of camera settings such as contrast color brightness sensitivity etc depending on how many items the camera manufacturer allows you to modify The Video Settings window for the Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000 webcam looks like this Camera controls Zoom Face Tracking Figure 6 The image in Figure 6 shows that the camera is in Full Auto Mode which means that the camera will automatically adjust for changes in light levels It will sometimes change the frame rate automatically when in this mode The Video Settings window for the Philips ToUcam webcam looks like this tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Properties Ex Image controls Camera controls Audio controls Perfomance Control D me is OK aj V amp x Full auto Frame rate s Image Frames i 5 10 15 20 25 30 aiii quality per second Help Image controls Modes Brightness Gamma E 5 7 Black and white ag a Figure 7 These controls provide a great deal of contr
271. tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual HandyAvi 5 0 User s Manual 11 May 2013 Copyright 2005 2013 Anderson s AZcendant Software All Rights Reserved tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Table of Contents HandyAvi OVGRVIGW isioctccieuitaiecetiteontsedaiideaetababedbs abiduentadadanndesaiededeysoaoenonboebaedetadad 1 POY cece tetas Meee teeta eine ic ea e Behe eR DA 1 IY eree E A EEEE 1 Image Capture Modes a eeccaccestasasnsasnsdnsne cs tsaucnnsdensiucdensunasconuncudmeeimcsnomcstennesdias 3 Create a Time Lapse Video o ceeeeeeeeeeccceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees 3 Time lapse Video OVErVieW cccccceeeeeeeeeeeneeeeeeeeeeeeeeeecaaeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeenaaeees 3 How to open the time lapse video Control WINKOW ccccceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees 4 The Capture Device SeCtiON ccccceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeseeeaeeeeeeeeeeeeteeneaeees 5 The Time Lapse Movie Setup Section c cccceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees 11 The Time Lapse Display Area cccccceeeeessseeecceeeeeeeeeestsneeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeas 14 DIME Control sissit saes e a aaa 15 About Video Codecs ivc ntscciccetuinteseivietendteteteneieisiecodeietensiriwieasdesedoneieiniensbennes 18 About Compression Quality cccceeeeeeeeeeeeeneeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees 19 Configure Window Examples ccccccccceeeeeeeeneeeeeeeeeeeeeceeneeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeneaaees 23 Create a Motion Detect Video acicnicciscincnti
272. tax for example The frames are smaller and consist of the best images that were in your original AVI file RegiStax will run faster and hopefully produce a better image The new file is also smaller so can be saved more easily The author of this section of code saved ALL Mars images he took during the close approach in 2003 The smaller files archive better and will be easier to work with in the future as better image processing techniques are developed Frame Selector The Frame Selector The Frame selector allows new AVI movie files to be created containing only the selected images from the original AVI movie file In addition individual frames can be turned into bmp files There is also a special sorting feature for astronomical images that will put images into a best to worst order This is very handy for creating a new smaller video containing the best frames The new smaller video can be used as input to an astronomy post processing program such as RegiStax to produce stacked images whose detail and definition greatly surpasses that of any individual original frame See The Frame Selector for more details on usage See the Frame Selection Tutorial You MUST have an open AVI file File Open in order to access the Frame Selector menu item 170 Tools Tools View Window Hel p Play Video TnT I Frame Selector N Crop and Save Batch operations Scan a File for Meteors Join AVI Files Stack
273. te The system will continue to record as long as motion continues even if the pre frames and post frames values are set very low How it works A simple minded way to capture meteor trails would be to simply record everything all night long For a small frame size of 320x240 pixels containing color 8 hours of video at 30 frames per second uncompressed would require 8 x 3600 x 30 x 320 x 240 x 3 194 4 Gigabytes Using compression could bring that down some it would still be Gigabytes though but you would still have to sit at your computer and look through 8 hours worth of data to see if you captured any meteor trails It would be much better to use motion detection to record data only when a meteor flashed by However meteors generally start out very dim then flash to very bright then quickly dim again Typical motion detection algorithms would probably see the bright flash record that frame and a few more bright trail frames then stop recording before completion of the dim trail They would completely miss capture of the beginning of the trail What you d really like to do is employ motion detection AND somehow capture a selected number of frames BEFORE the bright flash and then continue recording frames AFTER the bright flash while any additional motion is detected so that the entire meteor trail or aircraft trail is captured HandyAvi employs a sophisticated algorithm which allows you to do exactly that HandyAvi automatically captures a s
274. ter 12 then click on Enter or the channel input is ignored Usually we would select Antenna unless we are connected to a cable There is a selection for Video Standards which includes NTSC_M NTSC_JM PAL_M PAL_N and PAL_COMBO The Tuning Mode includes TV and FM The Meteor Trail Movie Setup Section Meteor Trail Movie Setup Output File C _TEST MeteorDetect avi Browse Compression Imp Microsoft MPEG 4 Video Coc v Sensitivity j 823 OP 5_ PostFrames c 5 Play back frame rate images per second EJ 7 Create a new output file for each trail Advanced Create a JPG file for each Composite Image Figure 65 This section of the Meteor Trail Video Capture window allows you to set up the webcam for making a Meteor Trail video 98 Image Capture Modes Output File Type in the path name of the new video file you want to create Browse Brings up a standard file selector window so that you can more easily place the file in a particular folder Compression Select any AVI file compression scheme resident on your computer File compression schemes or codecs short for coder decoder show up on your machine from many sources Microsoft installs several Your video camera may install one or more You may download and install compression schemes from the internet At the time of this writing there are over 280 codecs listed at http www fourcc org Note that one of the selection items is cal
275. tes per second 10 minutes of video would require 16 588 800 000 bytes or 16 5 Gigabytes That is why video compression is usually a good idea You would like to make the file smaller without messing up the images too much 190 Tools Lossless Compression Lossless compression refers to a compression scheme that compresses the data without losing any of the information in the picture If you compress an image using a lossless compression scheme the restored image when decompressed is IDENTICAL to the original image An example of lossless compression is Run Length Encoding used in FAX machines Run length encoding for a black and white image consists of looking at each row of pixels in the original image and creating a file that tells how many white pixels are followed by how many black pixels are followed by how many white pixels etc across the row If you are sending a printed text document there are usually a LOT of white pixels then a few black pixels then a LOT of white pixels etc in a row You can actually get very good compression for most faxed documents using this strategy AND it is lossless i e the document that shows up at the other end is essentially identical to the original document Unfortunately lossless compression cannot be done for most images That is why lossy compression is used Lossy compression Lossy compression refers to a compression scheme that compresses the data but loses some of the data If you co
276. the Capture Time Lapse Images menu item to bring up the Time Lapse Capture window There will be a delay after selecting the menu item as HandyAvi searches for cameras and establishes communication with one of them The main Time Lapse Capture control window will then be displayed Image Capture Modes Output File C _test timelapse avi Browse Compression impa PICVideo M JPEG 3 VfW Cod 7 Configure Quality Take one frame every 1 000 seconds Play back rate images per second 30 Controls d Live Video Preview Enlarge Last Time Lapse Frame Enlarge Output File Size 66 KB Status Previewing Live Video Next FTP upload 7 3 2008 0910 Last FTP upload 7 2 2008 1144 Figure 2 This window controls all of the time lapse photography functions of HandyAvi The Capture Device Section m Capture Device Hauppauge WinTV 885 Video Capture v Video Frame Size 720 X 480 Frames per Second 30 TV Tuner Figure 3 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual This section of the Capture window allows you to choose a webcam i e a capture device If you have several webcams plugged in they will all be listed here if you click on the pull down arrow In addition some other types of video capture devices may be listed here such as the Hauppauge WinTV PVR PCI II Capture device or the Hauppauge WinTV Video 885 Capture device Other buttons see below may also appear in this section dependin
277. this CODEC Create a Motion Detect Video Motion detect Video Overview HandyAvi allows you to easily make motion detect videos using a webcam What we mean by a motion detect video is that the only image frames that are transferred to your new AVI output file are frames that are different from the previous frame by some amount determined by a sensitivity setting For example if your webcam is operating at 30 frames per second and you are doing motion detect video capture with your webcam pointed at some scene then the first frame will be captured to your new AVI video file No further frames are sent to your new AVI video file until something has moved flashed appeared or disappeared from the first frame Each newly captured frame becomes the frame against which subsequent frames are compared As long as things keep changing subject to the sensitivity setting in the scene that the webcam is pointed at then new frames will be sent to your new AVI video file If nothing is changing no frames will be sent to your new AVI video file This means that you can monitor some scene for activity and capture all activity to your AVI video file without capturing video when there is no activity This greatly reduces the storage needed for monitoring activity in a scene Motion detect video could be used to e monitor an entryway e monitor a driveway e monitor a parking area e monitor a warehouse e capture lightning during a thunderstorm e m
278. time of each frame Unchecking this option prevents these log files from being generated Set Allowable Image Capture Times The panel that comes up allows you to control the times during which images may be captured and added to your AVI file This panel applies to ALL of the capture modes Time Lapse Motion Detect Astrophotography Meteor Trail and Animation 225 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual j i Set Allowed Capture Times i Allow Image Capture C During these times only Duration 5 Hour From 16 00 PM To Applies to either selection above Do not capture images on Saturdays or Sundays Cancel Help Figure 131 Always Image capture is always allowed This is the default During these times only Image capture will be allowed ONLY during the times specified Do not capture images on Saturdays or Sundays This overrides both the Always and During these times only settings This allows you to prevent capture of for example time lapse activity at a construction site when no work is being done during the weekends The Always and During these times only are still effective on week days Set up Automatic FTP Upload to a Web Site 226 This panel allows you to set up FTP communications and automatically upload your latest video to your Web Site We added this option to satisfy a request from a user at Loch Ness in Scotland who has a video camera set up on the lake and wants to
279. tly being manufactured It is sensitive to 0001 Lux according to the manufacturer This is VERY sensitive to very low levels of light and ideal for certain astronomy applications such as making videos of meteors and possibly meteor strike flashes on the dark side of the moon although no one has successfully captured a meteor strike flash yet You could be the first We bought a RadioShack cable that has a Female BNC connector on one end and a Male Phono plug on the other end We connect the cable s BNC connector to the camera s BNC connector then we plug the phono plug into a USB Video Adapter We bought a USB 2 0 Video Adapter with Audio It has a female phono plug that accepts a male phono plug The other end has a USB plug We plug the USB end into the computer s USB port Then we bring up HandyAvi and open Capture Time Lapse Images We see in the Capture Device list an item that says USB 2821 Video If the camera is powered up we see its video in the Live Video Preview window Similarly for the other Capture menu modes We upgraded the Capture Device panels of our various Capture methods to display the Video Source for adapters or other video devices that allow a choice of video input The USB 2 0 Video Adapter with Audio allows input from either an NTSC or PAL camera video source In addition it can accept data from an S Video source If HandyAvi is connected to a device that offers a choice of video sources
280. to lose any data 247 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual 248 We wanted HandyAvi to be at least as reliable as a tape recorder and the addition of this recovery scheme has satisfied that requirement If for some reason the AVI file cannot be opened after automatic recovery is attempted the AVI file and the AVX file will be unchanged PLEASE NOTE that the AVI file even if it was not completed closed properly still contains ALL of the images that were captured If you have something of critical importance that somehow cannot be recovered automatically unlikely please contact us through our web site http www AZcendant com We understand the AVI file structures in great detail so we may be able to reconstruct your data In this case we would need both the AVI file and the AVX file No guarantees but we would give it a try tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual HandyAvi Tips This section contains some tips you might find useful Can upload new AVI files to an internet site automatically HandyAvi now has a Set up Automatic Upload do a Web Site option in the Preferences panel under the File Menu Can I use a Digital Video camera with HandyAvi At least one of our customers is successfully doing so and wrote this to us The Sony HDR HC1E has a setting called iLink CONV This needs to set to ON to convert HD DV video to DVI or the computer will not recognise the format We of course have not been able to test all possible video
281. to set the Play back frame rate low like 1 or 2 images per second so someone viewing the movie could see the rotation at a reasonable speed See our Mars movie at http www astroshow com mars ccdmars html HandyAvi also features a telescope control system that will allow you to control nearly all features of most Meade telescopes One of the HandyAvi features in the astronomy video control window is the ability to issue commands to a Meade telescope to keep a planetary image centered automatically When this option is selected centering calibration will occur when the video capture is START ed and commands will be sent to the telescope as necessary to keep the planetary image centered in the webcam image field This means that you can take 1000 images of Jupiter or Mars or Saturn or every 10 minutes and sleep during the entire process if you so wish You might need to stay awake and continue to adjust telescope focus however because most telescopes shrink as it gets colder through the night How to open the astronomy video control window i HandyAvi File Tools View Help Ta Time Lapse Images Motion Detect Images Ly amp HandyAvi File Capture Tools View Help mama X Astronomy Images N Meteor Trail Images Animation Images Figure 48 From the main HandyAvi window select the Capture Astronomy Images menu item to bring up the Astronomy Capture window HandyAv
282. trol quality for this CODEC 55 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual E ndeo video 5 10 Encoder Configuration Encoder Controls Access Key Quick Compress F Enable Scalability Transparency None v Miewport Size Full image X Figure 29 IV50 CODEC IV50 allows just two Quality settings Quick Compress or not HandyAvi s Quality slider DOES control quality for this CODEC Configure PICVideo M JPEG 3 M JPEG Decompressor View Settings r Single User Single CPU Decompressor View License Brightness 0 IV Enable Codec Provided by Pegasus Imaging Corporation S I Adyanced Deblocking Web iran gear pereeweeeeereweteeene Support support com 100 0 100 T Assume Normalized YUV Telephone 813 875 7575 EENE Swap Fields FAX 813 875 7705 ontas Force YUV Output ae eee eee ee ee rie 100 Regstration Code m M JPEG Compressor Settings rSingle User Sngle CPU Compressor License Compression Quality Encode Normalized YUV Provided by Pegasus Imaging Corporation LT Lear 16 Web http wiew pegasusimaging com GUME TAA ee BO et sue t t corn Luminance Qualty 2 Subsameling Telephone 813 875 7575 FAX 813 875 7705 Chrominance Quatty 22 aa C phi 17 2Filds If More Than 240 Lines z R m 4 Make Primary M JPEG Codec Figure 30 PICVideo MJPG CODEC There are at least two MJPG CODEC vendors out there As far as we kn
283. ts in 2011 and 2013 2012 was clouded out See http www astroshow com Messier html for images we took using an internal test version of this system Compose the List Brings up this panel 151 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual 152 m NOTE For image capture you must have Maxim DL Choose Go To list folder filename Images captured via Maxim DL will go to the same folder C HandyAvi MessierGoToList gotolist txt i Create Go To List Entries At 05 Apr 2013 15 56 45 take 1 shot s of 1 seconds with binning 1 4 of this object select one Diphda 00 43 36 17 59 00 2 0 8 Achernar 01 37 44 57 14 00 0 5 13 Hamal 02 07 12 23 28 00 2 0 17 Mira 02 19 24 02 59 00 2 1 20 Polaris 02 31 47 89 15 50 2 0 19 Aldebaran 04 35 56 16 31 00 0 9 33 Rigel 05 14 36 08 12 00 0 1 41 i m Add an object to the Go To List Nalues given below Ii o i x 4 m i Camera Data Image download time when XY binning is set to 1 165 seconds Delete Selected Line Delete All Lines OK Cancel Choose Go To list folder filename First choose a Go To file that either already has data in it or create an empty file to start from scratch We provide a complete Messier Marathon file that can be used as a Starting point We call that file a Go To List When HandyAvi is installed you can find our example GoToList txt file in the same directory where HandyAvi was installed F
284. tting the blink checkbox will cause the Last Captured Frame and the current image from the camera to be displayed one after the other at 1 2 second intervals so you can see the motion you are creating between the two frames Last Live Slider Controls the relative transparency of the Last Captured Frame image and the current video image when the Onion box is checked Review Frames Before capturing any frames this field allows you to set the number of Review frames that will be captured in a circular buffer If it is set to 50 and you have captured 100 frames in your animation video so far then you can use the display and play buttons below to view the last 50 frames or to run the last 50 frames as if they were a movie gt l Display Next Frame This displays the next frame in the capture buffer K Display Previous Frame This displays the previous frame in the capture buffer Play Review Frames This will play all frames in the capture buffer as if they were a movie Bi stop Playing Review Frames This will stop playing review frames About Video Codecs Note You do not have to learn about codecs to use HandyAvi However the purpose of a CODEC is to compress your video data so that your AVI files are smaller So if space on your hard drive is a consideration you will probably want to use a CODEC AVI files can be created either by using no compression uncompressed or by using one of literally hundreds of compression sche
285. uce a smaller AVI file If the Quality is set to 100 then little or no image data is discarded and the resultant AVI file will be large If the Quality is set to 0 then theoretically all image data is discarded and the resultant AVI file will contain blank images Of course each codec is created by software people who may have thought about this and limited it so they do not throw away all of the image data even if the Quality is zero Note that each codec is different and some may even ignore the Quality setting or not allow it to be set Also note that lossy compression schemes are used in many applications JPEG is an example of a lossy compression scheme that is used in MANY applications and the fact that some of the image data has been discarded is practically unnoticeable So compression with slightly reduced quality is a very good thing in most cases Learn more about video codecs here Play back frame rate images per second Determines how fast your frames will be displayed when you play the AVI movie that you have recorded If you want the frames to be played in real time then you should set the rate to the same rate as the camera was set to when it was recording If you want each frame to be presented at a very slow rate then you could set the play back rate to 1 second In this case each frame of the movie would be displayed for one second when the movie is played The Make Movie Section 209 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Make m
286. ude the palm fronds or trees but include much of the sky we avoid the problem The only areas that will trigger motion detection are the areas within the rectangles and circles Note that overlaps are not a problem The overlapped regions get examined more than once for motion however which can degrade performance slightly If you created 100 large overlapped regions you might cause enough performance degradation to be significant There is no need to do that so don t do that Also note that placing circles and or rectangles can be done ahead of time or on the fly AFTER recording has been started The effect of each rectangle is IMMEDIATE A Total CPU Usage box has been added so that you can see immediately the effect your choices are having on performance If you place one tiny rectangle on the screen you will see the CPU usage go down No rectangles or circles mean that the entire image is being examined for motion The performance registered is a reasonably accurate of the load being placed on the system by the motion detection routines and will be about the same whether you have STARTed video capture or are still setting up for video capture If the CPU usage reaches 100 frames might be skipped occasionally 186 Tools Note that circles require more CPU time than rectangles Circles were added to support meteor detection users who have full sky panoramic cameras and who want to avoid automobile lights and other disturbances
287. ur changes View the List This will bring up the list in a NotePad editor so you can hand edit it if you wish to do so Change List Times This will bring up the following panel 153 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual SS Tere A Enter start and stop times and increment See http aa usno navy mil data docs RS_OneYear php for twilight tables Start time 12 Mar 2013 20 06 00 Usually the start of Nautical Twilight Stop time 13 Mar 2013 06 30 00 Usually the end of Nautical Twilight Padding 87 seconds calculated during GENERATE operation Apply to C MyProjects HandyAvi TelescopeExampleGoToFolder 12Mar 201 Browse 13 Mar 2013 05 07 58 a 13 Mar 2013 05 12 57 13 Mar 2013 05 17 56 13 Mar 2013 05 22 54 13 Mar 2013 05 27 58 13 Mar 2013 05 32 56 13 Mar 2013 05 37 56 13 Mar 2013 05 43 08 13 Mar 2013 05 48 18 13 Mar 2013 05 53 15 13 Mar 2013 05 58 12 13 Mar 2013 06 03 09 13 Mar 2013 06 08 06 13 Mar 2013 06 13 03 13 Mar 2013 06 18 00 j 13 Mar 2013 06 22 57 Z 13 Mar 2013 06 27 54 Start time The time at which the FIRST image in the Go To list is to be started Highlight the day month hour minute or second you want to change and use the arrow keys up down to adjust the values Stop time The time at which the LAST image in the Go To list is to be started Highlight the day month hour minute or second you want to change and use the arrow keys up down to adjust the valu
288. vendor describing the problem Received no answer after several days This CODEC seems to work just fine in Windows XP though In the past we have always used the Morgan Multimedia MJPG Codec but we have now installed the PICVideo MJPG CODEC and are using it instead on Vista 199 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual Microsoft MPEG 4 Video Codec V2 Copyright Microsoft Corp 1996 1999 Options Keyframe every seconds Compression Control EE 75 r Data Rate Kilobits per Second 3000 4 ia ET Figure 32 mp42 CODEC We were unable to determine any effect when the Smoothness slider was changed HandyAvi s Quality slider is not visible Microsoft MPEG 4 Video Codec V3 Copyright Microsoft Corp 1996 1999 Options Keyframe every seconds Compression Control 44 75 m Data Rate Kilobits per Second 3000 al ey ok _Cancet_ Figure 33 MP43 CODEC We were unable to determine any effect when the Smoothness slider was changed HandyAvi s Quality slider is not visible 200 Tools Configure Microsoft MPEG 4 Video Codec 1 Copyright Microsoft Corp 1996 1999 Options Kepframe every Ei seconds Compression Control Smoothness 75 Crispness 4 Data Rate Kilobits per Second 3000 Figure 34 MP41 CODEC We were unable to determine any effect when the Smoothnes
289. vi we look for the B and replace it with a so that the user will not be confused by it 229 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual 230 A space was placed in front of each returned item and they were then displayed in the Returned data box This essentially tested the setup and verified that it worked When the Activate check box is activated then before each captured image of any capture mode Time lapse Motion detect Animation Astronomy or Meteor Detect the system will open the serial port send the initialization string if there is one send the first data request string and read the returned data and append it to a character string then send the second data request string and read the returned data and append it to a character string etc until no more semicolon separated strings are found The serial port will then be closed The accumulated character string containing the results of the serial reads will then be displayed on the current image following the date stamp and time stamp if they are active If they are not active then the accumulated character string will be displayed where the date stamp and or time stamp would have been displayed Note that the serial port opening getting data closing operations take time Tests show that you will be limited to a frame capture rate not much greater than two frames per second This is sufficient for most imaging purposes and certainly for most time lapse imaging purposes
290. want to set this to the frame rate the camera was operating at when it made the movie 203 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual You can determine the frame rate of a movie by opening the movie in HandyAvi use the File menu and then use the View menu item AVI File Info to bring up the AVI File Info window AVI File Info a AVI Name MarsSmallTest avi File Size 20544 KB Image Size 160x120 Number of Frames 999 Frames Per Second 25 Compression Scheme mjpg Rate 25000 Scale 1000 Figure 117 Join Files Join Files Starts the file joining operation Stack Images Stack Images Image stacking is a technique that is primarily used for improving astronomical images When you try to photograph a planet such as Jupiter through a telescope the Earth s atmosphere continuously distorts the image so that the images usually look pretty blurry they dance around a lot and they contain a lot of noise However by taking several hundred images registering aligning their centers then stacking them adding them all together pixel by pixel then dividing each pixel by the number of images the blurriness diminishes and amazing detail often emerges You might also want to consider using the freeware program RegiStax which is a truly excellent image stacking program Select the Stack Images tool 204 Tools Tools View Help tE SEIECTO Batch operations Scan a File for Meteors Join AVI Files
291. was used to produce a particular file FOURCC codes are also used internally when a HandyAvi user selects a compression scheme such as Indeo video 5 10 Indeo video 5 10 has a FOURCC name of IV50 If you have an AVI file that was encoded using IV50 you can see the IV50 codec name by opening the file in HandyAvi and using the View AVI File Info menu item AVI File Info AVI Name MarsSmallTest avi File Size 20544 KB Image Size 160x120 Number of Frames 999 Frames Per Second 25 Compression Scheme mjpg Rate 25000 Scale 1000 Figure 19 18 Image Capture Modes Figure 19 shows that the compression scheme used to compress the file MarsSmallTest avi was mjpg which is the FOURCC code for the Morgan Multimedia MJPG codec HandyAvi will also attempt to open files compressed with codecs that are NOT installed on your machine If the required codec is not installed HandyAvi will of course be unable to PLAY the file but it will try to produce an AVI File Info report as shown in Figure 19 so that you will be able to identify the missing codec If you know which codec was used you might be able to locate an installable version of the codec via the Internet and install it Then you would be able to play the file using HandyAvi If you can play the file using HandyAvi then you can also use HandyAvi s editing features to create a new file using the same or a different codec and include or exclude selected frames
292. which is why we are mentioning it here It should be noted that the Watec 902H2 ULTIMATE is an EXTREMELY sensitive low light camera 0001 Lux supposedly and is more expensive than most cameras used for surveillance work We needed the sensitivity for meteor detection There are of course MANY cheaper cameras that output NTSC Video Composite signals that can be used with HandyAvi via a USB Video adapter The user here has now selected a Hauppauge WinTV 885 Video Capture board Capture Device Hauppauge WinTV 885 Video Capture v Video Format Video Frame Size 720 X 480 Video Settings Frames per Second 30 Video Source Figure 10 The Video Source button now exposes this manufacturer s window Properes e Crossbar Input Output 1 Video Composite In fo Video Decoder Out X 1 Video Composite In 2 Video SVideo In 3 Video Composite In Video Side in Related Pin 6 Audio Line In 1 Audio Decoder Out Link Related Streams Figure 11 Video Tuner In means that the board is going to receive input from the TV tuner S Video and Composite inputs can also be selected as input sources We don t know why this board has two Video SVideo In selections TV Tuner The Capture Device section also now includes a TV Tuner button which provides access to the board manufacturer s TV Tuner settings window 37 andy avi 5 0 User s Manual Country r Tuning Space
293. without making any changes Enter the SMTP address you wrote down into the HandyAvi SMTP field in Figure 40 PON Da Email Particulars This area lets you type in the specifics of your Email messages From Enter your Email address To Enter the Email address of the person you want the message sent to Normally this would be the same as your From Email address Subject Type in whatever you want your subject line to say Text Type in any text you want included in the message Normally this would be left blank Email Still Image Transmission Settings These are options defining the images to be sent in the Email messages and whether any Email messages should be sent Full Size Image When motion is detected the first image usually contains very little information For example if a person walks into the motion detection area you might only see his foot in the first frame So HandyAvi lets you choose the first or second or third or whichever image frame you want to send when a new motion detection sequence is triggered If the check box is not checked this image will not be transmitted If for example you choose the 30th frame and the motion does not last that long and only 10 images are captured there is a 2 second timer that will cause the 10 image to be sent Thumbnail Images When motion is detected this option allows you to Email an image containing as many thumbnail small 100 pixel max images as desired Each
294. x 480 bytes approximately because there may be some pad bytes at the end of each line There is also a small amount of header data describing the size color content length and width of the images etc 3 x 640 x 480 Bytes is 921600 bytes or almost 1 Megabyte If your AVI video camera is running at 30 frames images per second then you will be storing 30 x 921600 Bytes per second or 27 6 Megabytes per second 10 minutes of video would require 16 588 800 000 bytes or 16 5 Gigabytes That is why video compression is usually a good idea You would like to make the file smaller without messing up the images too much 78 Image Capture Modes Lossless Compression Lossless compression refers to a compression scheme that compresses the data without losing any of the information in the picture If you compress an image using a lossless compression scheme the restored image when decompressed is IDENTICAL to the original image An example of lossless compression is Run Length Encoding used in FAX machines Run length encoding for a black and white image consists of looking at each row of pixels in the original image and creating a file that tells how many white pixels are followed by how many black pixels are followed by how many white pixels etc across the row If you are sending a printed text document there are usually a LOT of white pixels then a few black pixels then a LOT of white pixels etc in a row You can actually get very good com
295. y cause the quality to be higher or lower HandyAvi s Quality slider has no effect 24 Image Capture Modes Configure MainConcept DY Codec Main Concept Ltd 1999 2001 S A Grigoriey 1999 2001 Commercial Edition Release 2 0 4 Encoder l Change Fields Order IV Fastest 16 9 Decoder I Change Field Order P YUY2 disable F Preview Quality M UYVWY disable Default Cancel Figure 27 DVSD Codec DVSD allow you just two Quality options Either Fastest or not HandyAvi s Quality slider has no effect E intel Indeo Video 4 4 Encoder Configuration Encoder Controls Access Key l Enable Scalability Bidirectional Prediction Load Default Transparency Minimum Viewport Size None bul Width fo Quality Best v Height fo Figure 28 V41 CODEC IV41 allows just two Quality settings Quick Compress or not HandyAvi s Quality slider DOES control quality for this CODEC 25 tandyavi 5 0 User s Manual E ndeo video 5 10 Encoder Configuration Encoder Controls Access Key Quick Compress F Enable Scalability Transparency None v Miewport Size Full image X Figure 29 IV50 CODEC IV50 allows just two Quality settings Quick Compress or not HandyAvi s Quality slider DOES control quality for this CODEC Configure PICVideo M JPEG 3 M JPEG Decompressor View Settings r Single User Single CPU D
296. y your files will not get this big If you have 100 Gigabytes of disk space available then you could set N to 50 and you would not exceed the 100 Gigabytes available Help Brings up this help window that describes file recycling Autoplay newly created videos Select this option if you want movies to automatically begin playing when you open them Maximum AVI File Size AVI files are limited to 2 Gigabytes We have provided a default maximum AVI file size of 1 9 Gigabytes What this means is that if you are recording data to an AVI file using one of the Capture menu items and the size of the file exceeds the limit then the current file will be closed and a new file will be created The system will continue recording to the new file A new file will be created and used whenever the current file exceeds the size limit The new file names are generated automatically Checks are made to ensure that the new file name does not match an existing file name In case of a match the file name suffix counts up until it finds a name that is not being used New file names are the same as the original file name except that they contain a suffix such as 0001 For example if the original file is named myAviFile avi then when its length exceeds 1 9 Gigabytes it will be closed and a new file with the name myAviFile 0001 avi will be generated If that name is not already the name of an existing file in the current folder then it will be used as the name of
297. ystem which makes additional registration adjustments RegiStax also contains some image processing subsystems such as wavelet processing that allow you to sharpen image details and additional features to adjust brightness and contrast to further improve the image Additional image processing was then done on one of the above images which were stored as JPG files We used various programs such as RegiStax Paint Shop Pro MaximDL We used Lucy Richardson deconvolution in MaximDL in addition to other operations Figure 47 The image after additional image processing operations HandyAvi allows you to capture all of the frames to one AVI file or you can capture each group to a different file where HandyAvi automatically generates new sequentially numbered files 62 Image Capture Modes Jupiter makes one rotation every 9 hours and 55 minutes You could set up HandyAvi to take 1000 frames every 10 minutes Then after one night if Jupiter was visible for most of the night you might have data showing nearly one complete rotation of Jupiter 10 hours worth of data if each 1000 frame group were stored in a separate file would result in 60 files If each file were post processed using RegiStax and stored as JPG files then you would have 60 JPG files If you gave those files sequential names then you could use HandyAvi s new Make Movie from Still Images tool to make a movie of Jupiter that would show it rotating You would probably want

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