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Digicamcontrol Script Collaboration

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#1 XM381

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Posted 17 February 2024 - 06:32 PM

I liked the idea of the Solar Eclipse Maestro Script Collaboration thread, so I thought I'd start a Digicamcontrol one. I posted this in another thread unrelated to Digicamcontrol, so I thought I'd post here for better visibility. 

 

Because of issues between my equipment and the various softwares available, my plan... as of today, is to use Digicamcontrol ( https://digicamcontrol.com ). Digicamcontrol supports Canon, Nikon and Sony. It has live view, can take pics from live view, and is scriptable including triggers based upon the current time.

A guy named "jerryd" posted a very nicely done 2017 eclipse script here: https://digicamcontr...opic.php?t=1823

I cleaned it up, because the formatting was lost in the post, and have run it multiple times without issues.

I think I'll run live view, manually take a pic every 10 minutes during partial, check focus along the way, and a few minutes before totality launch the script for corona brackets. You do have to close live view windows before running the script, but that's just one click.

I've attached a copy of the script. To use it one has to put in their specific times, it still has the 2017 times.

Attached Files



#2 AndrewXnn

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Posted 18 February 2024 - 11:52 AM

XM381;

 

Thank-you for sharing.

I appreciate Digicam control too, but this will be first time using a script.

 

Digicam control also has a bracketing feature. 

So, I was originally thinking of using that.

I plan to use a Nikon Z6 with an Askar FMA180 pro lens.

I was thinking of exposures between 1/4000 to 1 second to capture the full

range of chromosphere, prominences and corona out to 8R.

 

I'll noodle over this script and post later with some thoughts and/or comments.


Edited by AndrewXnn, 18 February 2024 - 12:11 PM.


#3 XM381

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Posted 20 February 2024 - 08:36 AM

Andrew,

 

Unfortunately the bracketing feature in DCC is not exposed in the scripting language, but building your own brackets is easy enough to do.

 

 

I cleaned up this script to more suit my needs and run it dozens of times with my Nikon D5300 and Nikon 500mm f/8 N Reflex-NIKKOR lens without issue.

 

 

If you want to give it a try, the only settings you might want to change are in the setup section. The settings in there are based on Fred Espenak's exposure guide for an F8 system, but you'll want to tweak for your system. I've not implemented partial eclipse settings, just Bally's beads and totality.

 

This is the settings area in the script:

 

#-----------------------------------Setup---------------------------------------------------
# set times for my location
set eclipseC1 [clock scan "2024-04-08 12:25:13 PM"]
set eclipseC2 [clock scan "2024-04-08 01:42:43 PM"]
set eclipseC3 [clock scan "2024-04-08 01:46:13 PM"]
set eclipseC4 [clock scan "2024-04-08 03:04:13 PM"]

 

# set shuttter speeds for phases
set partialshutter {"1/1000" "1/500" "1/250"}
set beadsshutter {"1/4000" "1/2000" "1/1000" "1/500"}
set totalshutter {"1/4000" "1/2000" "1/500" "1/30" "1/8" "1/4" "1/2" "2"}

 

# set ISO for phases
set partialiso 100
set beadsiso 100
set totaliso 200

 

# how many seconds before and after C2 and also C3 to use "beads" settings
# in between these times "total" settings will be used
set beadtimer 15

 

# how many milliseconds between photos (camera cycle time)
set cycletime 1500
#-------------------------------End Setup---------------------------------------------------

Attached Files


Edited by XM381, 20 February 2024 - 08:38 AM.


#4 racunniff

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Posted 06 March 2024 - 05:05 PM

One of my cameras will be my trusty old 5D Mk IV with the Canon EF 8-15mm f/4 L fisheye. In 2017, I used the same lens with a 5D Mk II set to "Av" with -1.7 Ev compensation to create the time lapse for this video: https://youtu.be/1rIUFto7NhE

 

I think I can do substantially better by scripting the sequence. Since there will be no filter, and there is no sense in trying to capture a diamond ring with a 180-degree FOV lens, I am going to try digiCamControl. To that end, I took M. Waldron's script (thanks!) and adapted it for my own use. Rather than explicitly setting exposures I'm going to go with Av and exposure compensation again. The partial phases will be shot at ISO 100, -2 EV. The total phase will be shot across 7 stops from -3 to 3 Ev, varying ISO to keep the shutter speed reasonable (and increase the number of shots taken during totality).

 

Attached is the script which does all this. I've done some basic testing; I'll test it and likely tweak it further before April. Thanks for pointing me in this direction!

 

Attached File  fisheye.tcl.txt   4.97KB   33 downloads

 



#5 Francois314

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Posted 08 March 2024 - 11:39 PM

thanks for sharing your script !



#6 Francois314

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Posted 08 March 2024 - 11:43 PM

right now i am taking picture every seconds, anyone knows how to accelerate the process

 

i should be able to take 11 picture in one second, this means if we can speed up the process for the short exposures 1/1000 to 1/100 then i would have a lot more time for the long exposure (necessary if we want to get the corona far away from the solar disc)



#7 woodworkt

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Posted 10 March 2024 - 01:46 PM

I just saw this and downloaded Digicamcontrol to start testing it; I may end up using it for the eclipse, so thanks for starting this thread.  It has the advantage (in theory) of being able to control Sony mirrorless cameras like my A7Riii which Eclipse Orchetrator can't.  I had been planning on Eclipse Maestro, but the one older Mac laptop we had got upgraded to OSX Big Sur somewhere along the way, which means it can no longer control my camera directly.

 

Very likely I may end up seeing if I can get Eclipse Orchestrator to generate timing information for me based on where I hope to observe from, and then use that information to update a script for Digicamcontrol.

 

Otherwise, my next best bet is using Sharpcap to see if I can set up a series of video recordings with a planetary cam for a lucky imaging approach.

 

In 2017 I had ok results with an Nikon D800 and an intervalometer, but I'd like to be able to automate more this time, and the older Nikon just doesn't have the hardware for computer control (and the Sony has a better sensor).



#8 bbryant

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Posted 10 March 2024 - 04:55 PM

Does anyone know how to get milliseconds in digicamcontrol?   The M Waldron 2024-02-20 script listed above displays time in hours, minutes, and seconds with echo "systemTime = [clock format $systemTime -format {%D %H:%M:%S}]".  I would like to add milliseconds display to the script.

 

Thanks 

 

Bob



#9 jrsbww1

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Posted 11 March 2024 - 06:15 PM

I trying to figure out how to use this TCL script.... can anyone explain how to run this script... I suspect from a terminal window?  What does that call look like?   Also the script contains call to dcc... dcc is not found.  Do I need to make a path variable for dcc that contains the path to digicamcontrol.exe?  sorry can't seems to find a lot of clear infomation and the eclipse is coming fast... :-). Ugh!  



#10 XM381

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Posted 11 March 2024 - 10:22 PM

Bob,

 

 

EDIT: ok I should have read your question better! Don't know on the display in milliseconds!

 

***********************************************************************************************************************

 

The "Clock Scan" resolution is in seconds. You'd have to use "Clock milliseconds" to get milliseconds. You have to change other things in the code to support milliseconds, like "SystemTime".

 

But.... I think Digicamcontrol uses a subset of the TCL scripting language so I don't know if that is supported. 

 

Here are the full TCL commands, but as I said, all may not be supported:

 

https://www.tcl.tk/m...d/clock.htm#M10


Edited by XM381, 11 March 2024 - 10:28 PM.


#11 XM381

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Posted 11 March 2024 - 10:25 PM

Jrsbww1,

 

From the program: "Plugins", "Tools", Script Execution" then in the script window: "File", "Open". Once you've got your script loaded and are ready to go, click "Run".


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#12 bbryant

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Posted 12 March 2024 - 03:32 PM

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Thanks for the response.  I looked at the tcl link and it list milliseconds and microseconds resolutions for the clock.  I tried "set systemTimex [clock milliseconds]" and set systemTimex [clock microseconds and both instructions caused digcamcontrol to hang.  I did notice the instruction "set eclipseC3 [clock scan "2024-04-08 01:36:36.2 PM"] in " M Waldron script that includes a tenth of a second, but I have not found any way to display tenths of a seconds in time.

 

thanks again.

 

Bob



#13 woodworkt

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Posted 12 March 2024 - 06:47 PM

I'm by no means a TCL expert, but maybe something else to try:  Stack overflow lists this as a procedure and use of the procedure to get milliseconds under TCL:

 

proc divmod {numerator divisor} {
    list [expr {$numerator / $divisor}] [expr {$numerator % $divisor}]
}

lassign [divmod [clock milliseconds] 1000] sec milli
set timestamp [format {%s.%03d} [clock format $sec -format %T] $milli]



#14 jrsbww1

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Posted 13 March 2024 - 04:43 PM

XM381,   Thank you... I got it figured out... part of it was using a large monitor and when I went to tools... the drop down menu showed on the laptop monitor.   DUH!    So I've now done a few scripts and plenty of test runs and continue to perfect my approach, and all other issues i'm coming across.  I really like the approach of the script... basing what you are shooting based on real time.  Love the arrays too!   My exposure test script is a loop inside a loop, looping through ISO's and exposures.  Then each run I manually adjust F stop.    



#15 Greg Mueller

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Posted 17 May 2024 - 08:18 AM

I've been trying to post on the digicam forum and it has been sitting there waiting for approval for a couple days. Are they are on vacation or something?

Anyone know?




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