From: Milton Aupperle <milton@outcastsoft.com>

Date: July 7, 2008 10:34:29 AM MDT

To: Astro_IIDC@yahoogroups.com

Subject: Re: [Astro_IIDC] Long exposure problems


Tim;


On 7-Jul-08, at 9:52 AM, Tim wrote:

Milton:


Apologies up front, because I think I've had this particular problem

before and you've told me what the fix was, but I seem to have forgotten.


I have both a Flea and a Flea2 and other than your GPIO plug being screwed up, they work fine here.



In Astro IIDC 4, I am unable to take extended exposures with my two

Flea cameras.


Which version of Astro IIDC?  4.00.00 or 4.00.01,4.00.02 or 4.00.03 or 4.01.00A001 or 4.01.00A002 or 4.01.00A003??


What Version of OS X (i.e. 10.5.4, 10.4.12 etc.) and what Mac model is this?


Flea:  I can "see" all the exposure times selectable up to 60 minutes

duration, but if I select anything longer than .533 seconds, the image

doesn't refresh.  I verified that it doesn't by clicking the reticle

on or off (doesn't come on).  If I select .533 seconds, refreshes

resume and things proceed nominally.


Do you have the GPIO Plug up on the camera or not to put it in Hardware Bulb Mode? If you don't have it connected or it's not working right (i.e. you bent the pins so they touch instead of soldering them and now they have come apart), then it will not complete an exposure time over 533 ms. We can't tell if it's connected, we simply send the commands to close the circuit and it's up to you to make sure it's connected to the right pins.



Flea2:  Exposure times beyond 4 seconds are grayed out.  This is true

whether I have the "allow extended exposures for Pt Grey cameras"

selected in the preferences or not


Did you Close the Camera Control window after setting the "allow extended exposures for Pt Grey cameras" flag or not? It will not take affect until you release the camera because of the registers we have to re-write, which don't work right if your switching back and forth.


Milton J. Aupperle