It can handle complex LRGB astrophotography, asteroid searching and followup, photometry data acquisition, in short, all of your astronomical imaging needs. Pointing, guiding, focusing, filter changes, image stacking... the entire process is managed by ACP.

ACP and other programs work together. Each program is useful in its own right, but when operated together by ACP and a pre-written or custom script, they form a system for acquiring images that blows away the competition. ACP provides the automation hub for the observatory. It sequences the observations and controls the telescope, CCD imager, filter wheel, auto-guider and focuser via scriptable drivers and other scriptable programs and devices.

ACP V3.1.2 will run for 60 days after installation, with all features including internet servers. After that you must purchase a license. Requires the ASCOM Platform, as well as PinPoint 3.0 (available for 30 day evaluation) and MaxIm DL/CCD 3.20.

Features include:
- Simple image acquisition or real time integration
- Long exposure acquisition with the following cameras (modified following Steve Chambers' design) : Philips Vesta-SC, Toucam-SC, Quickcam Pro3000-SC
- Image resolution up to 800x600
- Focusing aid based on a star's apparent size (FWHM), along with sound indicator for remote tuning
- Focusing aid on complex objects,along with a sound indicator for remote tuning
- Image stabilization and automatic tracking of the object in the camera's field of view.
- Automatic Dark or Flat-Field processing
- Can let you make pseudo long exposures without tracking needed.
- Automatic image selection based on each frame's quality (planetary imaging).
- Manual or automatic saving of bitmaps.
- Very fast and precise Polar aligning aid using two popular drift align methods : Bigourdan and King.
- Can display a configurable graduated reticle
- Can measure objects in real time.
- Can measure the P.E. (periodic error) of your mount displaying a graph, as well as tracking speed error.
- Can help you determine the declination of a star.
- Motion detection (for shooting stars).
- and many more....

Features:

• variable image resolution
• Bitmap or JPEG output
• correction of atmospheric refraction
• contrast enhancement
• image quality filter
• guiding capability for LX-200 or Powerflex MTS-3

AstroVideo can create an effect similar to long exposure photography, by automatically integrating a large number of video frames to acheive far greater sensitivity than is normally possible with a low-cost video camera or webcam.

AstroVideo has provision for assembling an even greater effective exposure time by co-adding a number of multi-frame images. Astrovideo can automatically align the images, even if the telescope tracking is not perfect.

For planetary imaging, AstroVideo allows you to capture a large number of individual frames, automatically to select those with the best stability and then to combine them, with automatic registration, to make a composite image.