We (I mean I lol) would love it if you could do a video on setting up the Allsky software on a remote hosting service. I'm about to do this but am really lost as to where to start. Love your videos! Very concise yet easy to understand!
@@PatriotAstro yes an as I’m interface that can extract the telescope position from the Mount and overlay it on the image. Also, cloud detection. Kind regards Robert
@cleverson_sa_ Do you have your observatory mounted permanently? Are you in a hot climate? I'm trying to decide if I should build my all-sky camera to be permanently mounted, and I'm worried about the raspberry pi overheating.
@@jowah Hello, Yes I do, not only the RPi with ALL Sky but a second 2B for GPS clock and WWV simulator with a x86 mini itx board for SDR Server. The RPi won't overheat If you have It mounted with a fan and heatsync (that's I used) and a simple cooling system in the storage container (two 10mm fans with a thermal controller). My project worked ALL weather by 3months 24x7, but It stopped due condensation on the camera (that killed my SDR Server after some water drops, but not the PI). Só my advice with my experience is use a heatsync and fan for PI, and keep eye on water condensation. Regards.
It was summer at Brazil when the observatory was deployed, so the temperatures were about 28~35 oC Celsius. Now we are on Winter, the temperatures are about 10-26o Celsius. Regards.
Love your video. Unfortunately All Sky hasn't kept up with camera releases. Some of the new ZWO all sky cameras (676) aren't supported and even though the issue has been reported as long ago as May nothing has been done. An alternative is INDI-Allsky which installs very similarly. In fact only a couple of changes to commands will install that software which handles these newer devices much easier. Again, your video series is great and helped me considerably understanding how to use the Pi and communications with my PC.
Thank you for the very helpful guide. I'm def a better visual/tactile learner than by reading an installation page. I do have a few more questions tho (if you have time) -- b/c I already have a few Pi-HQ cams around w/ a 220 degree and a 180 degree lens for them. Idk if 12MP Pi-HQ would look better than a 2-5MP ZWO, which can easily range $200+) - Pi-HQ cam vs ZWO (is one far superior to the other? Even if the ZWO is only 2-5MP) - Is it worth using a Pi5 if I can? (or would the benefit be negligible) - Have you tried a passive cooling case? Any better/worse? - Will leaving it permanently mounted in the sunlight eventually damage the camera's sensor? - Do you add any outside air pathways for the airflow to circulate (maybe w/ a baffle to avoid water getting in)
Super High quality Tutorial I'm almost a total newbie with raspberries, and everything worked like a charm following your tutorial. If you could explain now how to set up the overlay ( constellations, messiers, etc...), that would be awesome, because this part looks a bit tricky! Congrats for the great work Chad!
Hello, I am writing to you from Spain, you cannot imagine what you have taught me in the use of NINA, that is why I wanted to thank you. Since I can't understand your language, I use the TH-cam subtitles and the Spanish translation. I would like to ask you to please activate the subtitles of the video so that I can configure its translation. Again, thank you very much for your knowledge and your time for those of us who do not know, we can carry out our sessions satisfactorily. If you ever needed it, here's your every.
You have some outstanding astro pic on your web site. I have just got into astro awhile back still learning, your Hubble pallet work is really good. I'm learning pixinsight now. Just wanted to say thanks for sharing this info.
Thank you so much! We are ALL always still learning. There’s always something we could do differently. My suggestion early on is to save your data. You will be learning new techniques that’ll allow you to get better final images out of old datasets. Plus, it’s great for when you have a multi-week rainy window of time… Gives you something to do. :)
Thanks for the logging command. I totally missed it and was searching for a log file that doesn't even exist. Anyway found out why auto stretch wasn't working because it said "unknown command at line 48" which is the stretch amount command. I accidentally added a space after the = sign and it stopped working. The next issue I need to solve is why is 80% of the night images clipped to 0. Could be the darks fault. I built this project 6 months ago but somehow I can't get the night images right, they all look super dark with few stars even on a new moon night. Daytime images look completely normal.
I’m glad the logging helped you. I’m convinced it could help solve well over 75% of the initial issues people have. What’s worse is that when people don’t know what is wrong, they start haphazardly manipulating settings. I know I’ve done it too! :) Definitely reach out to the discussion board for guidance on the images. I’m sure it’s a simple setting. I know I’ve had to play with brightness and gain a couple times especially with the newer bullseye OS changing the values.
Great video! I'm trying an allsky camera with the raspiHQ, but my concern is about lens. I understand should be a 180° angle, but what about focal length ? 6mm,25mm? Any advices? Thanks
Thanks for this video! It helped us build one for the Von Braun Astronomical Society in Huntsville, AL, which we made a video about: th-cam.com/video/8XJC9vlxAkE/w-d-xo.html We had some interesting problems including: Heat - our first build of the enclosure had the camera exposed to the sun, and during the summer months it really started cooking. The camera’s metal case became so hot that it would burn your hand if you touched it, and we worried about it melting some of the plastic or destroying the Raspberry Pi. For that reason, we redesigned the case so that the camera can sit inside of it (like the one shown earlier in this thread), out of direct sunlight, and get better airflow around the body. Moisture - we didn’t have any trouble with dew on the outside of the acrylic dome because the heat of the camera and Raspberry Pi act as a dew heater. But we did have issues with moisture building up inside the dome. The problem was that there was no airflow, so any moisture that made its way into the enclosure had nowhere to go. To help with this, we added two fans inside the enclosure, and a breather valve on the top. You’ll still see the occasional water droplets on the inside of the dome, but they usually dry up within 24 hours. Storage - we ran out of disk space. 64 GB was not enough to store more than a couple of days of data. So we updated the software to upload our images to the cloud in an Amazon S3. That allows us to access it from anywhere. Ladybugs - no matter how hard we tried, hundreds of ladybugs managed to nest inside of the enclosure, and even made their way into the dome. We think they like the heat given off by the Pi. We’ve tried sealing off all holes in the enclosure, but we may just have to live with this problem.
look forward to see how ya do it mate. i've been procrastinating this very idea for all too long myself. seems like such a neat thing to have, i currently set up a wyze cam facing the sky while imaging, but its not permanent and only covers about 130 degrees while some of these do 170-180 degrees. seems hard to source that wider lens that everyone is recommending now though
@@AmritP in all fairness, those WYZE 3 cams are pretty amazing in their own right and do a fairly good job. Building a permanent fixture though is a fun project to take on.
Great vid but quick question. So, once I complete the setup, if I want to use this, I need to attach a keyboard and screen so I can then log onto the Raspberry Pi SH before I can access through the Web-UI?
I'm not sure... It is pretty painful, and quite specific to the web hosting provider. I'd be lying if I said there wouldn't be at least one hurdle to jump per install.
Hello, fisrtly thank you so much for information, I have an Issue, Could you help me please. I make all instruction , following the video, but , in the step sudo gui/install.sh the rpi tell me command not found thank you
Can you please make a part 3 where you show how to host this on a website? I have a synology nas and I have absolutely NO idea how to do this... there are no tutorials on doing this. Also just hosting this on the pi and access it remotly would be enough if you dont know how to do this on nas. Right now I can only see it locally but I want to see it when im not at home...
I plan on updating this video to match the very latest update very soon. I am not sure whether or not I’ll still go too far into what you ask only because there are soooooo many variables. I’ll see how it all looks when I get into the new version and make a decision then. If I can, I certainly will. I know it is a hot topic.
I realize this post is some time after the vid was released. I have a new pi 5. Is the red led supposed to stay on where there is power? I'm using the ac plugin with USB c. The USB c connection to the pi is lousy. It doesn't take much to come loose. However when I power up, the red light comes on, then goes off. The green light does flash and then stays on steady. I can ping the IP address of the device as shown in my home wifi router app. I cannot ping the hostname, which is default...I cannot successfully run putty or run the ssh command either. Do I have a faulty pi?
I've got an annoying issue I was hoping someone could me with. I'm trying to setup access to my RPi running allsky using microsoft remote desktop. I followed online instructions that walked me through installing xrdp. However, it said that I can't log on with my default RPi user but had to create a new user. This isn't the user I used to install allsky. Now, when I connect via MRD, it won't process the allsky commands since it's the wrong user. Anyone know how to use MRD with ANY users?
I have two options to buy the ZWO ASI462MC Color Camera or ZWO ASI482MC Color Camera or ZWO ASI178MC Color Camera or ZWO ASI224MC Color Camera better and then ZWO ASI120MC-S that I'm currently using right now.
I just replied via email too, but ZWO has a few new cameras coming out that are replacements for the 485, 178, 174, and 462... so, I would wait a month or 2 OR pre-order now to get in front of the line.
I do plan on doing a video on this as well as potentially some other ways to get some other all sky style imaging done. The bonus to the version you mentioned in your comment is that you can run it along side your imaging software. If you plan on only dragging this out when running a telescope simultaneously, that can be a huge benefit in not running two different pieces of hardware. I’ll try to get this video done sooner than later so we can put it to bed. :)
I'll try to post something on the community page soon (should show up in your YT feed if you are supscribed). I'm always changing the setup and never 100% happy... :)
This video inspired me to build one and publish it on the web. I purchased a little clear dome to cover my camera and it is prone to dew. I wonder if anyone makes a dew heater for something like the 4 inch diameter dome or some other idea. Thanks for the video.
@@PatriotAstro Just in case you are interested, I have some resistors (which act as little heaters) that are controlled by an Arduino with temp, humidity and lux sensors. When night is detected, the resistors are turned on. If the light is above a certain threshold, the Arduino checks temp and/or humidity to see what the conditions are and will then turn the resistors on. I am using a MOSFET transistor to switch the resistors. It overcomes the dew inside the dome. A small fan is controlled by the temp sensor to help circulate the air in the dome part. I am not sure how effective the fan will be when the temp in the shade is 40C so I have another much larger fan that sucks out the heat. The camera sensor gets very hot in direct sunlight even though the ambient temp is around 12 C.
@@stephen2615 I'm dealing with similar temperatures here in South Texas. I haven't yet built my all-sky camera, so I'm trying to think ahead about how to deal with cooling and moisture. I just had an idea about incorporating venturis in the ventilation system to force cool the incoming air, but that is really just an idea at this point. Any pointers you can give me before I start would be appreciated.
@@jowah Dealing with heat is much more difficult than the cold at least here where - 10C is the the coldest it gets. I stop Allsky from running once the camera (ZWO ASI 178MC) sensor hits 45 C which is the operational limit recommended by the manufacturer and start it again an hour before sunset. Storage max (insitu in the container) is 60 C. I haven't measured that yet but I expect it is a possibility. The container the camera sits in is big enough to put in a TEC kit and I have considered that if the temps get out of hand. I have holes at the bottom of the container with two fans blowing the air out but I didn't bother putting in a hole for fresh air. I ended up buying an Allsky dew heater.
I haven't looked into it yet, it maybe in the documentation but is there a way to hide the lat/long from the web interface? That's not something I'd really want on my publicly facing website. Last resort of if I can't find any info on it, I know html/web programming I could probably find the relevant section an manually hide that particular part.
I’m pretty sure you can hide that but mine is offline for a couple days while I work out weatherproofing. You are right though, worst case, edit the html.
I've been considering building an All Sky cam, but the options I was looking at were way more expensive. I'll have to make a list of everything needed. I'd also like to make it self sufficient, with batteries and a solar panel maybe. I have seen there are battery backup options for Raspberry Pi maybe one of those would work. Weather proofing though may add more complications I'm sure. Lol I'd also like to be able to have it cast to my TH-cam channel. Temporarily I could just have a browser source in OBS pointed at the web interface I guess.
I need to connect to a wireless network at my school that doesn't have a password, and the Raspberry Pi Imager software does not allow for entering nothing for the password. What should I do? Thanks in advance.
That is called "an OPEN network". Google around and look for where they tell you to stop/kill wpa_supplicant and maybe hostapd. Then there are a couple other steps. All command-line steps BTW.
You can certainly give it a shot. I’m only holding off so far, especially in a video like this, because the 64-bit is not compatible with all of the older versions of raspberry pi hardware that people may be trying to re-purpose as an allsky camera. I think it also was only just officially made a release version on February 1 of this year, so I’d like to give it a little bit more time to bake in with everyone’s projects before I make a recommendation. If you give it a whirl, let me know how it goes, I’d love to hear.
Hi, thanks for the great guide. It will be very helpful. I have a Pi4 on the way but sadly I could only get the 1GB version. I have bought a Player One 178 camera to use for the All Sky project. But today when cruising through AliExpress the Pi Cam caught my eye. For around $10 Australian? Really? So I have a question. I want to have a nice detailed sky view for astronomy reasons. Can I do an adequate job using a Pi camera? the 178 is a 6MP camera from memory. What is the recommend Cam hardware for a Pi Camera? Thanks again.
Thanks for the video! Question though. Is there a specific type of camera AllSky needs? Ive googled but dont see my issue. I have a pi camera module installed. I can test it with libcamera hello and raspistill -o and I can create a test.jpg. The Allsky installer even seems my camera when the installer pops up and asks me to select it in the list, but when I get to the end of the Allsky installation it says "no camera found; one must be connected and working...etc" and stops the install. At that point, I can literally say ok, and run libcamera-still -o test5.jpg and it works and saves a jpg. Any ideas why the allsky installer doesnt like it?
I assembled the Allsky camera with the PiHQ camera. I am having some issues with exposure and gain. It starts out ( both and night) with a properly exposed image, however with auto gain and auto exp on the exposure slowly turns dark. I do not see a way to correct this or set manual exposure / gain.
Thanks for the fantastic content! I’ve been wanting to set an Allsky up for about a year now. I do have one silly question. What program are you using to initially connect to your pi at the 15:06 mark “get it up to date”. Thanks!
@wetcoast5286 he's using ssh to connect to the pi. The command to do that is ssh @ Earlier in the video, he covered how to enable ssh during the install of operating system. I just noticed you asked this question 11 months ago. hahaha. I hope you've got your camera up and running! Also, if you have any pointers about how to deal with enclosure heat, I could use some. Warm climate here.
Great video! I got all my parts but what do you think about high heat being outside? Any ideas of keeping it cool but at the same time keeping it water proof?
@MikeDebarbierisjr I'm currently considering the same problem, and I just had an idea. I don't know if you're familiar with venturis, but they are basically funnels. When air is pulled through the smaller side of a funnel, the air naturally cools as it's forced into a smaller space. I only know about them because I'm familiar with carburetors. Specifically carburetors in small general aviation aircraft. In that application, when the conditions are right, the carburetor can actually freeze over with ice because the venturi cools the air so much. Which is why usually there is a carburetor heater, because a frozen carb is not ideal. So I was just thinking about this, and wondering if a venturi(s) could be integrated into the 4" pvc camera housing in such a way that it would cool the inside of the enclosure, without introducing too much moisture. Anyway, thought I would lob that idea at you and see what you think. Maybe we can shade-tree engineer our way to a solution for reducing the heat in the camera enclosure. Edit to add: I'm imagining a small squirrel cage fan, with it's air intake routed through one or more venturis.
@@jowah Thank you for the information. I was able to add vents to all four sides. I have two fans, one pulling air in the box and across is another fan that draws air out the box. Sort of like a keeps a desktop computer cool. We will see how this runs.
As I use RMS software for meteor recording I would have also used your software, but one problem is your software won't connect to my local IP cameras.
Yep, fair enough. If you have suggestions or some ideas about this, head over to the project and open a discussion on it. You might peek peoples interest enough to get some development going in that direction.
Hi, thank you 1000 x the video that allowed me to start the system. Only note, since there are few of videos like this, for those who are not native speakers like me it is very difficult to follow given the too fastness of the explanations, I would ask you to explain more calmly .. anyway thank you 1000
Hello, I am about to make myself an all sky cam. Could I maybe expect to capture more stars during this time of year, as opposed to the archived timelapses available from your all sky cameras which seem to be from May and June? What is the Bortle rating at your location?
I have plans to do another video with a different software package that would run on a low end windows computer. This was just a fun raspberry pi specific project.
Raspberry Pi is relatively low cost and easy to setup (physically) if you wanted to set this up on say, your roof. Theoretically you could set it up with a battery to power it over night and solar panels to charger the battery. It could totally be a set and forget sort of thing.
@@smassky I agree completely with what you say. My concern is my ability to set up the software/ op system. There are very small 12 volt fanless windows 10 units out there for less $ then the pi. So for me at the same price point I can make either work except I will struggle with all but the simplest software set up. I welcome your suggestions.
This was very helpful as I'm got a spare pi4b 8gb and 4gb board and want to use one for this. I am near many airports and wonder how it would be for getting those as well in time lapses if I mess with the settings enough it should be fun Todo and my niece to learn another pi project and this to her will be much more interesting then ham radio stuff. I recently did a NES emulator project for n64 and the older Nintendo as well and got the USB cloned controllers and she had a blast learning how to make that work with a 3b+ . I compare it to when I got my first computer when I was turning 5 in 97 my father said I can't afford one but we can get all the parts and make you one. And that he did with spare parts from base and work 😅 we whipped up a pentium 2 and in 99 for my birthday I got a GeForce graphics card and 512mb of ram and would ya know it a pentium 3 motherboard I was the happiest kid alive. I was 8 years old and was saying loud and proud that when the world ends in the year 2000 I'll be on my computer flying through the interwebs on a ball of light through the wire exploring. Mom thought I was nuts and dad just said have fun. My niece turning 9 has the same level of understanding and interest ever since I introduced raspberry pi projects with her and she sees these hour or twos worth of work and being forced to listen to me lecture on everything I'm doing and general networking theory with her she sees this tangible thing she made work and really remembers a lot of what I'm telling her and teaching her. I love raspberry pis I know the clone ones are faster or people say better in general but I'm just a a pi guy. This will be a very nice addition to my collection of pi projects I have made.
Love it! BTW, I would love to do some basic radio stuff here with my son (via a Pi-based project). Listening only to start is fine, but if you have any suggestions on software and hardware adds to the pi for this, please reach out to me at the email on this TH-cam about page. Thanks!
That is fantastic! I sure will shoot you a email tonight, I have some really great stuff lined that you can do for simple up to more advanced. Even some experimental stuff with HAM PI integration I have bin currently working on now with a small team of MERN ecomm fellas to potentially push into field use testing. Which is all very exciting to me because they are allowed to encrypt where HAM you cannot and that is so cool for someone like me to be a part of. I really love raspberry pis so much there's so many possibilities. Even as well as with the pen testing environment there are some very fun toys and gadgets to make from pi zero w. I will pick up a pi zero w 2 soon and see what I can manage to make it do perhaps Some Kali A.L.O.A fun.
@@raspberrypimilitant2242 Kali can be fun for sure! I think infosec is the only thing that moves faster than astro development (well, maybe AI LLM too... :) ) I'll be on the lookout for the email! thanks!
I’ve tried to login with the password, but when I get to that prompt I am unable to type in the password. I’ve reinstalled the os and tried again and still the same error.
I'm here because my buddy swears up and down he saw a UFO and I want to monitor that spot, brother's wife said the same at about the same spot a couple years ago
We (I mean I lol) would love it if you could do a video on setting up the Allsky software on a remote hosting service. I'm about to do this but am really lost as to where to start. Love your videos! Very concise yet easy to understand!
This is a great tutorial and I have my All Sky up and running
I plan to re-update it soon for current code. If you have ideas, or needed additional clarity, please let me know.
@@PatriotAstro yes an as I’m interface that can extract the telescope position from the Mount and overlay it on the image. Also, cloud detection.
Kind regards Robert
Hi. I followed all the video steps and now I have my own night observatory fully working! :) Thanks for such great content!
@cleverson_sa_ Do you have your observatory mounted permanently? Are you in a hot climate? I'm trying to decide if I should build my all-sky camera to be permanently mounted, and I'm worried about the raspberry pi overheating.
@@jowah Hello, Yes I do, not only the RPi with ALL Sky but a second 2B for GPS clock and WWV simulator with a x86 mini itx board for SDR Server. The RPi won't overheat If you have It mounted with a fan and heatsync (that's I used) and a simple cooling system in the storage container (two 10mm fans with a thermal controller). My project worked ALL weather by 3months 24x7, but It stopped due condensation on the camera (that killed my SDR Server after some water drops, but not the PI). Só my advice with my experience is use a heatsync and fan for PI, and keep eye on water condensation. Regards.
@@cleverson_sa_ Thank you for the information! How hot do the temperatures get in your area?
It was summer at Brazil when the observatory was deployed, so the temperatures were about 28~35 oC Celsius. Now we are on Winter, the temperatures are about 10-26o Celsius. Regards.
Love your video. Unfortunately All Sky hasn't kept up with camera releases. Some of the new ZWO all sky cameras (676) aren't supported and even though the issue has been reported as long ago as May nothing has been done. An alternative is INDI-Allsky which installs very similarly. In fact only a couple of changes to commands will install that software which handles these newer devices much easier. Again, your video series is great and helped me considerably understanding how to use the Pi and communications with my PC.
Thank You Chad for spending time making the AllSky Video Tutorial, and I also have Subscribed to your TH-cam Channel.
Thanks! Think in a person who has to view the video many times!
Glad to help!
very useful video, gonna start all sky project again for the observatory. Thank you very much
Great! It’s certainly a fun project and pertains to the hobby we all love.
Thank you for the very helpful guide. I'm def a better visual/tactile learner than by reading an installation page.
I do have a few more questions tho (if you have time) -- b/c I already have a few Pi-HQ cams around w/ a 220 degree and a 180 degree lens for them. Idk if 12MP Pi-HQ would look better than a 2-5MP ZWO, which can easily range $200+)
- Pi-HQ cam vs ZWO (is one far superior to the other? Even if the ZWO is only 2-5MP)
- Is it worth using a Pi5 if I can? (or would the benefit be negligible)
- Have you tried a passive cooling case? Any better/worse?
- Will leaving it permanently mounted in the sunlight eventually damage the camera's sensor?
- Do you add any outside air pathways for the airflow to circulate (maybe w/ a baffle to avoid water getting in)
Super High quality Tutorial
I'm almost a total newbie with raspberries, and everything worked like a charm following your tutorial.
If you could explain now how to set up the overlay ( constellations, messiers, etc...), that would be awesome, because this part looks a bit tricky!
Congrats for the great work Chad!
Hello, I am writing to you from Spain, you cannot imagine what you have taught me in the use of NINA, that is why I wanted to thank you.
Since I can't understand your language, I use the TH-cam subtitles and the Spanish translation.
I would like to ask you to please activate the subtitles of the video so that I can configure its translation.
Again, thank you very much for your knowledge and your time for those of us who do not know, we can carry out our sessions satisfactorily. If you ever needed it, here's your every.
Nice tutorial my friend! Easy to understand and explanations were detailed. you always provided reason why. Thank you for this great resource
Thank you! I hope to update this video soon to the latest software version. Stay tuned.
You have some outstanding astro pic on your web site. I have just got into astro awhile back still learning, your Hubble pallet work is really good. I'm learning pixinsight now. Just wanted to say thanks for sharing this info.
Thank you so much! We are ALL always still learning. There’s always something we could do differently. My suggestion early on is to save your data. You will be learning new techniques that’ll allow you to get better final images out of old datasets. Plus, it’s great for when you have a multi-week rainy window of time… Gives you something to do. :)
Thanks for the logging command. I totally missed it and was searching for a log file that doesn't even exist. Anyway found out why auto stretch wasn't working because it said "unknown command at line 48" which is the stretch amount command. I accidentally added a space after the = sign and it stopped working. The next issue I need to solve is why is 80% of the night images clipped to 0. Could be the darks fault. I built this project 6 months ago but somehow I can't get the night images right, they all look super dark with few stars even on a new moon night. Daytime images look completely normal.
I’m glad the logging helped you. I’m convinced it could help solve well over 75% of the initial issues people have. What’s worse is that when people don’t know what is wrong, they start haphazardly manipulating settings. I know I’ve done it too! :) Definitely reach out to the discussion board for guidance on the images. I’m sure it’s a simple setting. I know I’ve had to play with brightness and gain a couple times especially with the newer bullseye OS changing the values.
Great video! I'm trying an allsky camera with the raspiHQ, but my concern is about lens. I understand should be a 180° angle, but what about focal length ? 6mm,25mm? Any advices? Thanks
Thanks for this video! It helped us build one for the Von Braun Astronomical Society in Huntsville, AL, which we made a video about:
th-cam.com/video/8XJC9vlxAkE/w-d-xo.html
We had some interesting problems including:
Heat - our first build of the enclosure had the camera exposed to the sun, and during the summer months it really started cooking. The camera’s metal case became so hot that it would burn your hand if you touched it, and we worried about it melting some of the plastic or destroying the Raspberry Pi. For that reason, we redesigned the case so that the camera can sit inside of it (like the one shown earlier in this thread), out of direct sunlight, and get better airflow around the body.
Moisture - we didn’t have any trouble with dew on the outside of the acrylic dome because the heat of the camera and Raspberry Pi act as a dew heater. But we did have issues with moisture building up inside the dome. The problem was that there was no airflow, so any moisture that made its way into the enclosure had nowhere to go. To help with this, we added two fans inside the enclosure, and a breather valve on the top. You’ll still see the occasional water droplets on the inside of the dome, but they usually dry up within 24 hours.
Storage - we ran out of disk space. 64 GB was not enough to store more than a couple of days of data. So we updated the software to upload our images to the cloud in an Amazon S3. That allows us to access it from anywhere.
Ladybugs - no matter how hard we tried, hundreds of ladybugs managed to nest inside of the enclosure, and even made their way into the dome. We think they like the heat given off by the Pi. We’ve tried sealing off all holes in the enclosure, but we may just have to live with this problem.
You need to do a talk at a convention about this that is loosely titled "Forget the Jet Stream, Ladybugs are the real issue" - LOL Great work!
Excellent video, I have been wanting to setup an all sky camera so will definitely be following along with this video.
look forward to see how ya do it mate. i've been procrastinating this very idea for all too long myself. seems like such a neat thing to have, i currently set up a wyze cam facing the sky while imaging, but its not permanent and only covers about 130 degrees while some of these do 170-180 degrees. seems hard to source that wider lens that everyone is recommending now though
@@AmritP I’m using Nest cam at present but not enough detail so need a better solution. I think I have spare Pi lying around.
It’s a fun little project. I’m always looking for new ways to expand what I’m doing in this hobby and this was just a perfect next step.
@@AmritP in all fairness, those WYZE 3 cams are pretty amazing in their own right and do a fairly good job. Building a permanent fixture though is a fun project to take on.
Great vid but quick question. So, once I complete the setup, if I want to use this, I need to attach a keyboard and screen so I can then log onto the Raspberry Pi SH before I can access through the Web-UI?
Chad, great video. Would you be willing to make a short video on how to install the Website on a remote installation?
I'm not sure... It is pretty painful, and quite specific to the web hosting provider. I'd be lying if I said there wouldn't be at least one hurdle to jump per install.
Hello, fisrtly thank you so much for information, I have an Issue, Could you help me please. I make all instruction , following the video, but , in the step sudo gui/install.sh the rpi tell me command not found
thank you
Hi did you ever figure this out? I have the same issue.
Can you please make a part 3 where you show how to host this on a website? I have a synology nas and I have absolutely NO idea how to do this... there are no tutorials on doing this. Also just hosting this on the pi and access it remotly would be enough if you dont know how to do this on nas. Right now I can only see it locally but I want to see it when im not at home...
I plan on updating this video to match the very latest update very soon. I am not sure whether or not I’ll still go too far into what you ask only because there are soooooo many variables. I’ll see how it all looks when I get into the new version and make a decision then. If I can, I certainly will. I know it is a hot topic.
@@PatriotAstro thank you 🙌
I realize this post is some time after the vid was released. I have a new pi 5. Is the red led supposed to stay on where there is power? I'm using the ac plugin with USB c. The USB c connection to the pi is lousy. It doesn't take much to come loose. However when I power up, the red light comes on, then goes off. The green light does flash and then stays on steady. I can ping the IP address of the device as shown in my home wifi router app. I cannot ping the hostname, which is default...I cannot successfully run putty or run the ssh command either. Do I have a faulty pi?
Great video. How about if I want to install it on the SSD connected with a Pi?
Excellent tutorial and straight to the point, thanks
Thanks! for the great tutorials.
Sorry I missed this - thanks!!!!
I've got an annoying issue I was hoping someone could me with. I'm trying to setup access to my RPi running allsky using microsoft remote desktop. I followed online instructions that walked me through installing xrdp. However, it said that I can't log on with my default RPi user but had to create a new user. This isn't the user I used to install allsky. Now, when I connect via MRD, it won't process the allsky commands since it's the wrong user. Anyone know how to use MRD with ANY users?
Curious to know where would be the best place to upload images for viewing?? I don't have a website.
Nice project! I may do this!
One of the ZWO links is broken.
I have two options to buy the ZWO ASI462MC Color Camera or ZWO ASI482MC Color Camera or ZWO ASI178MC Color Camera or ZWO ASI224MC Color Camera better and then ZWO ASI120MC-S that I'm currently using right now.
I just replied via email too, but ZWO has a few new cameras coming out that are replacements for the 485, 178, 174, and 462... so, I would wait a month or 2 OR pre-order now to get in front of the line.
Would like to hear more about the AllSkEye Pro version shown on your website. Better or different? I see it is a Windows app.
I do plan on doing a video on this as well as potentially some other ways to get some other all sky style imaging done. The bonus to the version you mentioned in your comment is that you can run it along side your imaging software. If you plan on only dragging this out when running a telescope simultaneously, that can be a huge benefit in not running two different pieces of hardware. I’ll try to get this video done sooner than later so we can put it to bed. :)
Great video. Could you post a pic on how you have your all sky cam set up outside? Is it under a dome cover? Is is stand alone or wired? Thanks
I'll try to post something on the community page soon (should show up in your YT feed if you are supscribed). I'm always changing the setup and never 100% happy... :)
how did you get the fisheye lens to focus? mine is 100% blurry and can't make anything out at all.
This video inspired me to build one and publish it on the web. I purchased a little clear dome to cover my camera and it is prone to dew. I wonder if anyone makes a dew heater for something like the 4 inch diameter dome or some other idea. Thanks for the video.
Getting to the final permanent build is where it gets tricky. Heat, dew, waterproofing, reflections,... the big 4 'not fun' parts of the project.
@@PatriotAstro Just in case you are interested, I have some resistors (which act as little heaters) that are controlled by an Arduino with temp, humidity and lux sensors. When night is detected, the resistors are turned on. If the light is above a certain threshold, the Arduino checks temp and/or humidity to see what the conditions are and will then turn the resistors on. I am using a MOSFET transistor to switch the resistors. It overcomes the dew inside the dome. A small fan is controlled by the temp sensor to help circulate the air in the dome part. I am not sure how effective the fan will be when the temp in the shade is 40C so I have another much larger fan that sucks out the heat. The camera sensor gets very hot in direct sunlight even though the ambient temp is around 12 C.
@@stephen2615 I'm dealing with similar temperatures here in South Texas. I haven't yet built my all-sky camera, so I'm trying to think ahead about how to deal with cooling and moisture. I just had an idea about incorporating venturis in the ventilation system to force cool the incoming air, but that is really just an idea at this point. Any pointers you can give me before I start would be appreciated.
@@jowah Dealing with heat is much more difficult than the cold at least here where - 10C is the the coldest it gets. I stop Allsky from running once the camera (ZWO ASI 178MC) sensor hits 45 C which is the operational limit recommended by the manufacturer and start it again an hour before sunset. Storage max (insitu in the container) is 60 C. I haven't measured that yet but I expect it is a possibility. The container the camera sits in is big enough to put in a TEC kit and I have considered that if the temps get out of hand. I have holes at the bottom of the container with two fans blowing the air out but I didn't bother putting in a hole for fresh air. I ended up buying an Allsky dew heater.
@@stephen2615 Thank you for the information. I will consider all of that for my build.
I haven't looked into it yet, it maybe in the documentation but is there a way to hide the lat/long from the web interface? That's not something I'd really want on my publicly facing website.
Last resort of if I can't find any info on it, I know html/web programming I could probably find the relevant section an manually hide that particular part.
I’m pretty sure you can hide that but mine is offline for a couple days while I work out weatherproofing. You are right though, worst case, edit the html.
I've been considering building an All Sky cam, but the options I was looking at were way more expensive.
I'll have to make a list of everything needed. I'd also like to make it self sufficient, with batteries and a solar panel maybe.
I have seen there are battery backup options for Raspberry Pi maybe one of those would work. Weather proofing though may add more complications I'm sure. Lol
I'd also like to be able to have it cast to my TH-cam channel. Temporarily I could just have a browser source in OBS pointed at the web interface I guess.
I need to connect to a wireless network at my school that doesn't have a password, and the Raspberry Pi Imager software does not allow for entering nothing for the password. What should I do? Thanks in advance.
That is called "an OPEN network". Google around and look for where they tell you to stop/kill wpa_supplicant and maybe hostapd. Then there are a couple other steps. All command-line steps BTW.
Hi Chad. Thanks for all your very well made and informative videos. Is there a reason why you do net recommend the 64bit light version of PI-OS?
You can certainly give it a shot. I’m only holding off so far, especially in a video like this, because the 64-bit is not compatible with all of the older versions of raspberry pi hardware that people may be trying to re-purpose as an allsky camera. I think it also was only just officially made a release version on February 1 of this year, so I’d like to give it a little bit more time to bake in with everyone’s projects before I make a recommendation. If you give it a whirl, let me know how it goes, I’d love to hear.
awesome video, I love it! Thanks
Thanks! Happy to help wherever I can!
i change locations alot. is it possible to connect a usb gps to it and have it auto get its coordinates?
Hi. Is there anything you would change to this build? I am researching to build my own.
Will the lens you show in the description work with the 120mm mini?
Hi, thanks for the great guide. It will be very helpful. I have a Pi4 on the way but sadly I could only get the 1GB version.
I have bought a Player One 178 camera to use for the All Sky project. But today when cruising through AliExpress the Pi Cam caught my eye. For around $10 Australian? Really?
So I have a question. I want to have a nice detailed sky view for astronomy reasons.
Can I do an adequate job using a Pi camera? the 178 is a 6MP camera from memory.
What is the recommend Cam hardware for a Pi Camera?
Thanks again.
Update, i think I will try the Version 3 Pi camera. A bit more expensive but more sensitive and more pixels, so more better. ;)
@@whereswa11y There are several Pi cams, but the PiHQ is the only one that will accept a lens that will provide good photos.
Thanks for the video! Question though.
Is there a specific type of camera AllSky needs? Ive googled but dont see my issue. I have a pi camera module installed. I can test it with libcamera hello and raspistill -o and I can create a test.jpg. The Allsky installer even seems my camera when the installer pops up and asks me to select it in the list, but when I get to the end of the Allsky installation it says "no camera found; one must be connected and working...etc" and stops the install. At that point, I can literally say ok, and run libcamera-still -o test5.jpg and it works and saves a jpg. Any ideas why the allsky installer doesnt like it?
I assembled the Allsky camera with the PiHQ camera. I am having some issues with exposure and gain. It starts out ( both and night) with a properly exposed image, however with auto gain and auto exp on the exposure slowly turns dark. I do not see a way to correct this or set manual exposure / gain.
Thanks for the fantastic content! I’ve been wanting to set an Allsky up for about a year now. I do have one silly question. What program are you using to initially connect to your pi at the 15:06 mark “get it up to date”. Thanks!
@wetcoast5286 he's using ssh to connect to the pi. The command to do that is
ssh @
Earlier in the video, he covered how to enable ssh during the install of operating system. I just noticed you asked this question 11 months ago. hahaha. I hope you've got your camera up and running! Also, if you have any pointers about how to deal with enclosure heat, I could use some. Warm climate here.
Great video! I got all my parts but what do you think about high heat being outside? Any ideas of keeping it cool but at the same time keeping it water proof?
@MikeDebarbierisjr I'm currently considering the same problem, and I just had an idea. I don't know if you're familiar with venturis, but they are basically funnels. When air is pulled through the smaller side of a funnel, the air naturally cools as it's forced into a smaller space. I only know about them because I'm familiar with carburetors. Specifically carburetors in small general aviation aircraft. In that application, when the conditions are right, the carburetor can actually freeze over with ice because the venturi cools the air so much. Which is why usually there is a carburetor heater, because a frozen carb is not ideal. So I was just thinking about this, and wondering if a venturi(s) could be integrated into the 4" pvc camera housing in such a way that it would cool the inside of the enclosure, without introducing too much moisture. Anyway, thought I would lob that idea at you and see what you think. Maybe we can shade-tree engineer our way to a solution for reducing the heat in the camera enclosure.
Edit to add: I'm imagining a small squirrel cage fan, with it's air intake routed through one or more venturis.
@@jowah Thank you for the information. I was able to add vents to all four sides. I have two fans, one pulling air in the box and across is another fan that draws air out the box. Sort of like a keeps a desktop computer cool. We will see how this runs.
@@MadMike78How are these things not getting fried in the rain?
Great video! Thanks!
As I use RMS software for meteor recording I would have also used your software, but one problem is your software won't connect to my local IP cameras.
Yep, fair enough. If you have suggestions or some ideas about this, head over to the project and open a discussion on it. You might peek peoples interest enough to get some development going in that direction.
Hi, thank you 1000 x the video that allowed me to start the system. Only note, since there are few of videos like this, for those who are not native speakers like me it is very difficult to follow given the too fastness of the explanations, I would ask you to explain more calmly .. anyway thank you 1000
Just use Ring system. Works perfectly well and info on phone.
Hello,
I am about to make myself an all sky cam. Could I maybe expect to capture more stars during this time of year, as opposed to the archived timelapses available from your all sky cameras which seem to be from May and June? What is the Bortle rating at your location?
can anyone tell me how to stop running the log once I started it?
CTRL+C should do it
Excellent vidio as always thank you. Why not just use a low end computer.
I have plans to do another video with a different software package that would run on a low end windows computer. This was just a fun raspberry pi specific project.
Raspberry Pi is relatively low cost and easy to setup (physically) if you wanted to set this up on say, your roof.
Theoretically you could set it up with a battery to power it over night and solar panels to charger the battery. It could totally be a set and forget sort of thing.
@@smassky I agree completely with what you say. My concern is my ability to set up the software/ op system. There are very small 12 volt fanless windows 10 units out there for less $ then the pi. So for me at the same price point I can make either work except I will struggle with all but the simplest software set up. I welcome your suggestions.
This was very helpful as I'm got a spare pi4b 8gb and 4gb board and want to use one for this. I am near many airports and wonder how it would be for getting those as well in time lapses if I mess with the settings enough it should be fun Todo and my niece to learn another pi project and this to her will be much more interesting then ham radio stuff. I recently did a NES emulator project for n64 and the older Nintendo as well and got the USB cloned controllers and she had a blast learning how to make that work with a 3b+ . I compare it to when I got my first computer when I was turning 5 in 97 my father said I can't afford one but we can get all the parts and make you one. And that he did with spare parts from base and work 😅 we whipped up a pentium 2 and in 99 for my birthday I got a GeForce graphics card and 512mb of ram and would ya know it a pentium 3 motherboard I was the happiest kid alive. I was 8 years old and was saying loud and proud that when the world ends in the year 2000 I'll be on my computer flying through the interwebs on a ball of light through the wire exploring. Mom thought I was nuts and dad just said have fun. My niece turning 9 has the same level of understanding and interest ever since I introduced raspberry pi projects with her and she sees these hour or twos worth of work and being forced to listen to me lecture on everything I'm doing and general networking theory with her she sees this tangible thing she made work and really remembers a lot of what I'm telling her and teaching her. I love raspberry pis I know the clone ones are faster or people say better in general but I'm just a a pi guy. This will be a very nice addition to my collection of pi projects I have made.
Love it! BTW, I would love to do some basic radio stuff here with my son (via a Pi-based project). Listening only to start is fine, but if you have any suggestions on software and hardware adds to the pi for this, please reach out to me at the email on this TH-cam about page. Thanks!
That is fantastic! I sure will shoot you a email tonight, I have some really great stuff lined that you can do for simple up to more advanced. Even some experimental stuff with HAM PI integration I have bin currently working on now with a small team of MERN ecomm fellas to potentially push into field use testing. Which is all very exciting to me because they are allowed to encrypt where HAM you cannot and that is so cool for someone like me to be a part of. I really love raspberry pis so much there's so many possibilities. Even as well as with the pen testing environment there are some very fun toys and gadgets to make from pi zero w. I will pick up a pi zero w 2 soon and see what I can manage to make it do perhaps Some Kali A.L.O.A fun.
@@raspberrypimilitant2242 Kali can be fun for sure! I think infosec is the only thing that moves faster than astro development (well, maybe AI LLM too... :) ) I'll be on the lookout for the email! thanks!
Thank you for this. Now if I could just find a Pi. Really dont want to use the one out of one of my ASIAIR Pros.
I’ve tried to login with the password, but when I get to that prompt I am unable to type in the password. I’ve reinstalled the os and tried again and still the same error.
Latitude and Longitude cannot be saved?
I’ve started working on the updated video, it’s a little slow because my raspberry pi actually failed for some reason. I had to wait for a new one. :(
Hi, I've managed to get the Allsky camera running. Your video was very helpful though. Thanks
Google translate
The images are not saved
Will this work for a Pi 5 ?
I have RPi 5, 8gb. Why 32 bit vs 64bit?
Is it working on the pi5?
I'm here because my buddy swears up and down he saw a UFO and I want to monitor that spot, brother's wife said the same at about the same spot a couple years ago
So was it a UFO
A pi zero sounds Perfect if you do all the processing elsewhere.
2023 video not current 😞
I just saw your other comment. Yep, working on it.