Blog


Power*Star Pro Tips: Oops!

Before getting into the latest edition of Pro Tips, I want to remind you of the nebula pictured above, Sh2-132.  When I first shot this about 5 years ago I immediately saw a motorcycle and ghostly rider, which made me think of the “Ghost Rider” movie.  Some people refer to this as the Lion Nebula (which I don’t see at all), but there is some disagreement about that name, so I’m trying to get it changed to the Ghost Rider Nebula.  To that end I am re-shooting this, and plan to collect at least 20 hours. Back to Pro Tips:  […]


Lunar Eclipse (and more)

No, this isn’t the eclipse that happened this morning, but one from many years ago.  It was mostly cloudy here last night, although I could see the Moon through some thin clouds before I went to bed around midnight.  I hope you got to see it! I intended to post about it here yesterday, and thought I did, but must have done something wrong.  It’s been such a long time since I posted here that I may have forgotten how to do it.  Part of the reason I haven’t posted is that I’ve been busy with non-astronomy things.  But also, […]


Power*Star Pro Tips: Fault Detection

One of the most valuable features of Power*Star is something you might never have to deal with, its fault detection and protection system. The first protection mechanism is the reverse polarity protection. When the input voltage is connected “backwards” (with reversed polarity) a large power transistor blocks the voltage from reaching either the internal circuitry or the connected devices. This can easily save you from a very expensive mistake, although when using the standard PowerPole connectors at both ends of the cable and a (carefully) prewired power source, there is very little chance of it ever happening. The only downside […]


More From First Star Party

Here is another image from the recent star party, the “Seahorse Nebula”, also known as Barnard 150.  It is a dark nebula, meaning that the shape is defined by a cloud of dense dust that blocks light from the stars behind it (a silhouette).  It is located in the constellation Cepheus, but I don’t know how far away it is. This was captured with a Stellarvue SVX80T with a focal reducer (for an effective focal length of 355mm and focal ration of f/4.44), and cropped a bit.  Seeing was very good for the 2 nights I captured this target.  I […]


First Star Party of 2022

Amateur astronomers in the Portland area have had to contend with bad weather for the first half of the year, but it shifted dramatically last weekend, and we were finally able to make a trip to a dark sky location.  For me it was even more special because I hadn’t done any imaging at all this year prior to this.  The object above is the Rho Ophiuchi Nebula, captured from Goldendale, WA.  I’ve shot this before, but this version is definitely better, even though I haven’t yet put a lot of effort into processing it.  I think that a bit […]


Power*Star Pro Tips: Information Display

I recently returned from the first star party of the season, and the first time I’ve done any astrophotography for more than 6 months.  Hopefully, I’ll have a couple of images ready for you soon. This edition of Pro Tips will explore some details of how Power*Star displays useful information.  The embedded processor in P*S spends most of its time monitoring and reporting system status and faults. The P*S app queries this status frequently and provides a wealth of information for the user. Perhaps the most important thing to understand is that the per-port current report is a direct measurement, […]


Power*Star Pro Tips: Auto Dew Control

Before diving into today’s Pro Tip I want to comment that with the recent availability of Power*Star units I now have 3 customers who have purchased a second P*S unit.  To be sure, they are all “power users” who run multiple telescopes and therefore need multiple P*S units, but I see it as a strong vote of confidence that after using P*S for some time these users liked it enough that they wanted another one.  Thank you! My tip for today covers the Auto Dew Control feature, a very useful, but sometimes overlooked feature.  The Power tab in the P*S […]


Power*Star Pro Tips #2

My first tip today is very simple, and very useful:  Each of the power outputs, dew heaters, and USB ports can be assigned a name so that you don’t have to remember where each device is plugged in.  In the setup menu simply click in the field under “Change Name” and type in the name you want.  Usually this would be the name of the device, such as “ASI1600”, or “Filter Wheel”, but you can use any text you want (as long as it’s not too many characters).  For example, you could enter “LEAVE ON!”, which kind of leads to […]


Power*Star Pro Tips

  While all Power*Star users are quite experienced astrophotographers, there are quite a few small features that may be overlooked or misunderstood, so I’ve decided to do a few blog posts to explore them.  The first topic is one that comes up frequently in my own use of Power*Star, the “Close Options”. When you are ending an imaging session you may shut down some or all components of the system.  For use in the field we usually turn everything off to conserve battery power, but in an observatory with AC power some things may be left on for various reasons.  […]


It’s Back!

Almost 2 years ago I built the first batch of 100 Power*Star units, and except for 1 that I use myself and 1 that failed quality control, all of them were sold (about 85% of them to a wholesale customer). This is good, but I could have sold many more if I had been able to build them. Supply chain issues have made it impossible to source several key components. However, I was recently able to find enough parts to build 10 more units, and they are now available to my direct customers. The shortage of parts, and inflation made […]