•
The grabber took too long to get a frame (error signal that capture has been
aborted): A quick decreasing scale of 5 beeps from high pitch to low pitch.
•
Accumulating frame (for each frame of a multi-frame average): A single beep of
medium high pitch.
•
Start of a pre-capture countdown: Three beeps decreasing in pitch.
•
Beginning of a capture event (individual, average or sequence): Two beeps of
medium high pitch. This acknowledges that you activated the ‘Save Image’
button.
•
End of a capture event: Three long low pitch beeps.
The ‘
Save Image
’ button is used to start a
capture event
. A capture event involved
saving one or more captured frames to disc. It is one of the following:
1. Take a single frame picture.
2. Take a multi-frame average picture.
3. Take a series of several pictures (each of which can be a single frame picture or
a multi-frame average picture but which of these two must be constant for any
given series).
Which of these 3 occur depends on how the user has configured the ‘Custom settings’
(see later). In any case, the capture event may start immediately or it may start after a
time delay count-down, the duration of which is set via the settings controls discussed
later. So in that case activating the ‘Save Image’ button will start the count down
followed by the capture event.
When a series capture is in progress the ‘Save Image’ button will change its text to a
bold red ‘Cancel Series’ label. Clicking the button when it shows this label will terminate
the series capture sequence after the current picture is saved.
Key bindings
: As an aid to working in dark conditions where moving a mouse about to
specific locations may be impractical, there are some keyboard strokes that will perform
certain functions as long as the main program window has focus. They are:
•
Press 'g' to activate the 'Save Image' button
•
Press 'h' to print out a help message to stdout (the console window).
•
Press 'a' to toggle the ‘Use beeps’ on/off.
The last one (‘a’) is particularly useful in a headless situation (where you don’t have a
monitor or the monitor is switched off to avoid light pollution) because you can use it to
detect when the main program window has focus (and so when the other key bindings
will work). If you press ‘a’ and don’t hear either of the ‘Use beeps’ toggle sounds then
you know the main window is not in focus. Press Alt+Tab and try again. If still no
OptArc AF51 Camera Page 64 of 99 User Guide v1.02
