An Imaging System is a named rig: one site, one telescope, one camera, working together. Examples: “Dome A – EdgeHD 8 – ASI2600MM” or “Backyard – RedCat 51 – ASI533”. Nearly everything downstream is organized per system: projects belong to one, the simulator schedules one at a time, and each NINA installation identifies itself as one.
Creating a System #
In the Equipment panel, create a system by picking a site, telescope, and camera from your library and giving it a name. If you upgraded from an older version, systems were created automatically from the combinations found in your existing projects.
Default Exposure Plan #
Each system can carry a default exposure plan, built with the Exposure Plan Builder in the Filters & Exposure Plans panel. New projects created for that system start with the plan pre-applied – a big time-saver when most of your projects use the same LRGB or SHO recipe.
Per-System Scheduler Settings #
The simulator’s Step 1 settings – strategy, sort chain, dithering, filter switching, flats, and the rest – are stored per imaging system. Your wide-field rig can run Proportional Time with aggressive filter rotation while the long-focal-length rig runs Manual Priority; each remembers its own tuning.
How NINA Uses Systems #
In the NINA plugin Options you select which imaging system that NINA installation is. From then on the plugin filters cloud targets to that rig and pulls its scheduler settings before every nightly schedule build – so changes you make in the desktop app reach the observatory automatically. See Connecting NINA to Astro PM.