Last night I had my first real good session with my new 416xt. As many have remarked, the software is full of bugs and the documentation deserves a D (at best) in a technical writing course. However, I am pleased to say that with careful treatment (hold your breath, stand on one leg and face south southwest) the camera and software produce fabulous results. I have some truly great images of Saturn and Jupiter crisp and full of detail. I am fumbling through the image processing and have a question for the group. Although it may seem simple I can not find a step by step description on how to take a dark frame and a f.

When I go to the camera pull down menu at the top of the software window and select take a dark frame nothing seems to happen. A window pops up and disappears quickly. I do not hear the shutter go off. When I go to the camera icon at the top of the window and depress it, it seems to take an image and downloads. Where are the settings for exposure and camera temperature and so forth. I am assuming that what ever settings are selected in the window at the top are the settings for the dark frame. Is this the methodology to take a dark frame. Depress the take dark frame setting then depress the camera icon? Can you simply take a dark frame by covering the camera and depressing the camera Icon?

To make a long story short. How do you take a dark frame and a how do you take a flat field. The first time I tried it on the camera pull down menu it froze up the program and the pictor box (which I assume is mainly for looks with all those numbers and arrows) indicates it is retransmitting.

Is anyone else getting the retransmitting error frequently? I have reset the delay times in the pictor.ini file in an effort to prevent the problem. I am using the camera the serial mode at 115200 bps. IS there anyway to snap the camera and software out of the coma it succumbs to when it is in the retransmittng mode. It seems that I have to repower up the camera and restart the computer. What a pain!

Anyone care to assist me?
Emilio J. Robau, P.E.

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