Sky View is a full planetarium built into Astro PM – an interactive sky canvas with real survey imagery, deep-sky catalogs, and your equipment’s actual field of view drawn on the stars. This page covers the framing workflow and the Position & Equipment toolbar; companion pages cover surveys & star rendering, overlays & catalogs, and time controls.
Search & Position #
The search box auto-completes as you type from the built-in deep-sky catalog (top ten matches appear in a popup – press Enter or Down-arrow to take a suggestion). Searching centers the sky on the object and opens the Selected Target HUD in the top-left corner: object name, type and magnitude, formatted coordinates, and three quick-research buttons – Web, Astrobin, and SIMBAD – each opening the object in your browser.
Below the search box, precise coordinate entry: RA as hours / minutes / seconds and Dec as degrees / arcminutes / arcseconds (sign accepted). Every keystroke updates the FOV reticle and the timeline curve live – decimal input is also accepted and converted.
Imaging System & Equipment #
The center of the toolbar selects what you are framing with:
- Imaging System – pick a saved rig to set Site, Scope, and Camera in one click. Manually changing any of the three afterward switches the selector to (custom).
- Site – drives the timeline’s twilight bands, the horizon overlays, and local time.
- Scope / Camera – together they derive the FOV rectangle. All selections persist between sessions.
The FOV Readout & Reticle #
The FIELD OF VIEW block shows the live numbers for the current scope + camera: width × height in decimal degrees, the same in arcminutes, and the diagonal. On the canvas the FOV appears as a draggable rectangle – drag it to reposition; the RA/Dec inputs follow.
The small color chip next to the camera selector sets the reticle color – eight presets (Yellow, Red, Green, Cyan, Orange, Magenta, White, Lime), default yellow.
Rotation #
The Rotation slider (0-360°, 1° steps, editable text box for decimals, and a reset-to-0° button) rotates the FOV rectangle for composition. The angle is saved with the project and travels to NINA, which rotates the camera to match – and flat handling takes flats at each rotation used.
Mosaic Controls #
The MOSAIC block turns the single FOV into a panel grid:
| Control | Range | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| H Panels | 1-16 | columns, +/- buttons |
| V Panels | 1-16 | rows |
| Overlap | 0-99% | shared edge between adjacent panels |
The grid redraws live as you adjust, rotating with the rotation slider. Panel centers and rotations are computed for you and stored when you create the project – see Mosaic Planning for how panels are scheduled and tracked.
Comparison Setup (Second FOV) #
Tick Enable comparison setup to overlay a second rig: choose Telescope 2 and Camera 2 and a second reticle appears as a dashed rectangle (default cyan, own color chip) with its own FOV readout line. Ideal for deciding which rig suits a target, or planning a dual-rig campaign on the same object.
Actions: New Project, Fullscreen, Stellarium #
- Start New Project – creates a project from the current framing: coordinates, rotation, and mosaic layout all carried in.
- Fullscreen – hides the toolbar, side tabs, and timeline for a pure sky canvas; an Exit Fullscreen button restores everything.
- Stellarium sync (shown when Stellarium is configured in settings) – two arrows: pull the currently selected Stellarium object into Sky View, or push Sky View’s position out to Stellarium.