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2026-03-10T14:24:07Z

Dvida: /* Meteor detection station */

Welcome to the Global Meteor Network wiki page!

The Global Meteor Network (GMN) is a world-wide organization of amateur and professional astronomers. The goal is to observe the night sky using low-light video cameras and produce meteor trajectories in a coordinated network of recording stations. Here, you can find information about the purpose and structure of the GMN, and how to assemble and operate your own meteor camera. You also will discover how to contribute to the development of RMS (the GMN software) and how your observations as a citizen scientist contribute to the ongoing understanding of our solar system's formation and evolution.

'''<span style="color:red">If you are here to find out how to build and set up a camera from scratch, jump ahead to [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Build_%26_Install_%26_Setup_your_camera_-_The_complete_how-to this] section!</span>'''

'''<span style="color:red">For German speakers, there is "Build camera from scratch" documentation written by students of [https://fsg-preetz.de/ Friedrich-Schiller-Gymnasium in Preetz] available [http://wiki.linux-astronomie.de/doku.php?id=ceres here]. This version is maintained by Friedrich-Schiller-Gymnasium in Preetz. </span>'''

== Global Meteor Network overview ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=141 Our mission] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=363 A brief history of the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Video introduction - Overview of the Global Meteor Network (IMC2020)] ===

=== [https://youtu.be/oM7lfQ4nmyw Video overview - Meteor tracking and the GMN from Astro Imaging Channel presentation] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ Some 'live' GMN data products] ===

== Meteor detection station ==

What is an RMS GMN station? An RMS-based GMN station consists of a Raspberry Pi (RPi) single board computer, a low light level security video camera, the RMS software, and a connection to the Internet via Wifi. The camera is securely mounted in a weatherproof housing, pointed at the sky, and connected to the RPi with a Power Over Ethernet (POE) cable. To be a part of the GMN network, you need a fairly powerful Raspberry Pi (Pi 4, 5, or better) and a reasonably fast Internet connection. The internet connection is required only for data upload to a central server each morning and to provide automatic updates for the RMS software.

Nightly, the RPi records video from the camera shortly after local sunset, then continuously compressing and storing the video data on a local SSD drive. Each morning before sunrise, when capture is complete, the RPi analyzes the video and extracts meteor observations from the previous night. These extracted video clips of detected meteors are archived and then uploaded to a server. On a 'busy' night, the clips can total hundreds of megabytes as a result of a heavy meteor shower or a night with a lot of false detections.
: '''NOTE:''' Continuous progress is being made on the detection software to filter out false detections.

The server finds meteors that were observed from more than one station, which allows the server to triangulate meteor trails in 3D and calculate the orbits of the meteors.

=== What do I need? ===

You need a Raspberry Pi computer, RMS software, and a camera kit.
: '''NOTE:''' We strongly recommend the Pi 4 or 5 model.
The software can run on a Pi3, but it is much slower and it is no longer supported. A list with everything you need is available here: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Shopping_list_and_tools_needed page].

You can run multiple cameras on a Linux PC, and details are available '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Advanced_RMS_installations_and_Multi-camera_support this page]'''.

=== How do I obtain a camera? ===
There are two options - buy a camera or build a camera.

==== Buy a Camera ====
You can buy a camera and prebuilt Pi, and ready to install. Cameras are available from several suppliers, as well as the Croatian Meteor Network, as explained here: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=136 this page].
If you are in the UK, you can contact the UK Meteor network for advice. [https://ukmeteornetwork.org/ UK Meteor Network].
: '''NOTE:''' As of 2024, UK Meteor network can no longer sell cameras directly.

==== Build your own from scratch ====
This option requires an intermediate level of DIY skills and familiarity with the Raspberry Pi, but do not be put off. The instructions are comprehensive and, if you get stuck, you can ask for advice in the forum here: '''[https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork groups.io]''' forum.

You can find out more about this option here: '''[[Build & Install & Setup your camera - The complete how-to]]'''.

=== Advanced RMS installations and multi-camera support ===
If you would like to explore advanced RMS installation options for various platforms or run multiple cameras on a single Linux computer, complete information is available on '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Advanced_RMS_installations_and_Multi-camera_support this page]'''.

If you plan to run RMS software on the Raspberry Pi 4 or 5, the best supported and easiest solution is our prepared image. Complete information is available in an '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Build_%26_Install_%26_Setup_your_camera_-_The_complete_how-to extensive guide]'''.

If you want to run single or multiple cameras on the Raspberry Pi 5, please see
'''[https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/lkq0731w8ba8oomux32m2/Read_Me_Pi5.pdf?rlkey=6k3plpgco8v1lodrkov5l5nf9&st=gvap3tyq&dl=1 Read_Me_Pi5.pdf]''',
and for more detailed documentation
'''[https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/wg0uhvyhtqidbvq3ieusv/MultiCam-on-Pi5.pdf?rlkey=g04zxck1c97wgrjcnra3lumos&dl=1 MultiCam on Pi5.pdf]'''.

=== Can I use a commercial all-sky camera? ===

Generally, this is not a good idea because these cameras lack sufficient sensitivity. More information is available here: '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=163 See this recent experiment]'''.

== Operate and maintain your GMN station ==

=== Overview ===

: '''NOTE:''' GMS is a nascent operation, so you may share some of our growing pains if you choose to be involved. We are constantly solving bugs and making improvements, which is an opportunity for you to help if you have programming skills! The workload of day-to-day operation can be non-zero, and may require some of your time.

Ideally, you should monitor your RMS Pi systems daily to identify freezes, glitches, or other problems. For example, you may see birds nesting or soiling the camera window, someone may unintentionally unplug the power cord, or animals (mice, cats, or dogs) may chew on the camera Ethernet cable. Although we make constant progress, the GMS network is not yet a 'power up and forget about it' system.

By its nature, the GMS network is staffed by lots of people who are willing to help newcomers get started. Here are some suggestions for daily operation of your RMS camera.

=== What does the meteor camera do over the course of 24 hours? ===

The RMS python-based system calculates the sundown to sunrise interval, and schedules video camera capture all night. Based on the video camera and capabilities of the Pi, the camera captures at least 25 frames per second between evening and morning twilight. During each nightly continuous image capture, the station processes captured image data and identifies frames that contain a minimum number of stars (usually around 20) that are worth reviewing for meteor detections. When data capture is complete, the station begins processing all frames it flagged with possible detections, then refines the astrometric accuracy of every positive detection. Using the station plate parameters (platepar) calibration file, processing iterates to find the best astrometry and photometry solution for each detected meteor. After this process analyzes each detection, summary files are created.

The summary files include many types of information.
* Text file data presentation in several widely accepted formats (such as ''CAMS'' and ''UFOorbit'').
* Graphic plots of detection frequencies throughout the night.
* Plot of all detections, showing any identified radiants.
* Plots of photometry, astrometry, and camera pointing drift in arc minutes throughout the course of the night as the mount or building flexes.
* Thumbnail images of detections.
* Thumbnail images of data captured throughout the night.
* Single image with all detections stacked together.
* Single image with all captured images stacked together.
* Flat file for correcting images.
* An ''.mp4'' movie time lapse of the night's captured images.
* Meteor shower flux charts, if specific showers are detected.
* Observation summary data of hardware and data recording characteristics.

'''Detailed information about plots is available [[ Plots Explained | here ]]'''

When you click a meteor track, its data displays in the lower data window. Ultimately, all results are combined into a single compressed archive that automatically uploads each morning to the central server.

Each morning, you can review the result files on the RPi and copy anything you want to your computer or tablet.

===Archive data ===

Your primary scientific data is automatically uploaded to the central server every morning after data processing is complete.
: '''NOTE:''' When the night's results are uploaded, RMS purges the oldest data to free up space for the next night's run. As a result, you may want to copy some of the data to a PC, NAS, or the cloud for further analysis.
: You should consider backing up the content of '''~/RMS_data/ArchivedFiles''', which holds individual files and data that RMS determined were probably meteors.

Details about backing up data is beyond the scope of the GMN Wiki. Tools such as Robocopy for Windows and rsync for Linux/MacOS are ideal, and they can 'mirror' data across a network. Help to configure these tools is available in the '''Globalmeteornetwork''' group on '''groups.io'''.

In addition, we added some automated tools that can help you back up data to a thumb drive inserted into the RPi. Assistance about these tools also is available in the '''Globalmeteornetwork''' group on '''groups.io'''.

===Backup and restore the configuration and RSA keys===

:'''NOTE:''' If you are on an older Buster image, you must replace username ''rms'' with username ''pi''. For example, enter ''/home/pi'' instead of ''/home/rms''.

To determine which username to use, run
::''ls /home/rms home/pi''
to display the username that is your home directory.

'''Back up the configuration'''

1. Open a terminal and run the command ''Scripts/RMS_Backup.sh''.

: A compressed ''.zip'' file, with all important configuration files and keys, is created in your user home directory with the prefix ''RMS_Backup'' and the ''.zip'' extension.
: For example, ''/home/rms/RMS_Backup_XX0001_2023-01-28.zip''.

2. Copy the ''.zip'' file to a safe place outside RPi.

: Later, it will be useful to restore the system in case of failure. The ''.zip'' file contains the RSA public and private keys used to contact GMN servers, so keep it secret.

'''Restore the configuration'''

1. Unzip the backup file in any folder on the RPi.

2. Copy the files ''.config'', ''platepar_cmn2010.cal'', and ''mask.bmp'' to the folder ''/home/rms/source/RMS/''.

3. Copy the files ''id_rsa'' and ''id_rsa.pub'' to the folder ''/home/rms/.ssh/'', as shown in this example:

: ''cp .config platepar_cmn2010.cal mask.bmp /home/rms/source/RMS/''
: ''cp id_rsa id_rsa.pub /home/rms/.ssh/''

4. To make sure that permission bits in the RSA key files are correct, enter:

: ''chmod 400 ~/.ssh/id_rsa*''

=== View the data ===

To view data, you can use '''CMN_binViewer''' software [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer], which is included in the RMS SD image.
: '''NOTE:''' There also is a Windows version [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer/releases] you can install.

: '''IMPORTANT:''' You can open images in astronomical FITS viewers, such as '''FITS Liberator''' or '''Pixinsight''', but what you see may be surprising. For example, in '''FITS Liberator''', the image is upside down, which is an artefact of how the software reads the image.

In space, there is no 'up' or 'down', so the FITS specification does not dictate if pixel (0,0) is at a specific corner. Some software, notably '''FITS Liberator''', specifies the top left corner as the origin location, which causes terrestrial images to display vertically mirrored.

=== GMN Plots and Images Explained ===

'''[https://IstraStream.com IstraStream.com]''' was an independent hosting site primarily intended for cameras sold by IstraStream. In mid-2023, Istrastream stopped listing camera image output and the IstraStream data display was replaced with the '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/weblog/ GMN weblog]'''.

The GMN weblog is a quick way to review the status of cameras in your area. The section '''[[ Plots Explained | GMN Plots and Images ]]''' was originally written as a guide to understanding the IstraStream data display.

=== Using RMS Images for Raspberry Pi ===
Please see this section for information on [[ Using RMS Images for Raspberry Pi ]]

=== Tools and utilities ===

There are many tools available.

* '''[https://www.realvnc.com/en/connect/download/viewer/ RealVNC]''', '''[https://www.nomachine.com/ NoMachine]''', '''[https://anydesk.com/en AnyDesk]''', or '''[https://rustdesk.com/ RustDesk]''' remote connect tools provide station access from anywhere. Access to your station from outside your network is enabled by an OpenVPN connection address that is available to meteor stations.
: With '''VNC''' and '''Teamviewer''', you can create an account and team on their websites, and then remotely access your station.
* '''Samba''' data directory access allows you to copy data results directly from your RPi to your computer or tablet.
* '''[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer CMN_binViewer]''' allows you to view standard FITS image files that contain meteor detections. It runs on the RPi, and it can run under Windows.
* '''[https://sonotaco.com/soft/e_index.html UFO Orbit]''' allows you to process data from multiple stations, and generate unified radiants of two or more stations that see the same meteor. '''[https://sonotaco.com/soft/e_index.html UFO Orbit]''' can plot the shared object ground path and orbital characteristics, and it can output a summary file of all objects seen by more than one station.
* RMS software can be installed under Windows to allow much of the RMS python-based code to run on your computer. This means you can run RMS against meteor station data that was transferred to your computer from the RPi.

You also can run RMS python jobs on the RPi to sample captured image files, and then condense them into an ''.mp4'' video. Sometimes, these videos are mesmerizing summaries that can run for more than two minutes of winter time data.

== What can I do with my GMN station? ==

=== Use SkyFit2 for astrometric and photometric calibration + Manually reduce observations of fireballs and compute their trajectories ===
* '''[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao3J9Jf0iLQ Updated 2023 video tutorial]'''
* '''[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOjb3qxDlX4 Old 2021 video tutorial]'''

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/fov3d/ Generate a Google Earth KML file to show your station's field of view] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=253 Use the UFO Orbit program to estimate meteor trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=221 Urban meteor observing] ===

== Data analysis with SkyFit2 ==

'''SkyFit2''', a program in the RMS library, allows you to analyze optical meteor data in most of the optical formats in current use. The program supports popular video formats (''.mp4'', ''.avi'', and ''.mkv''), sequences of static images, and single images with shutter breaks.

A '''[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao3J9Jf0iLQ video tutorial]''' explains how to useg '''SkyFit2''' to run astrometric and photometric calibrations on GMN data, and it can manually reduce observations of fireballs and compute their trajectories.

A more detailed description of '''SkyFit2''' is available on the '''[[SkyFit2|SkyFit2]]''' page.

== FAQ ==

=== What should I back up when I re-flash an SD card or a USB disk? ===

You should backup the ''.config'', platepar, and mask files that are in the RMS source directory, plus the entire content of the hidden directory ''/home/pi/.ssh''. Refer to the section titled, '''Back up the configuration'''.

If your SD card or USB disk fails or becomes corrupted, you can fetch the config files from the server because they are uploaded every day, together with the data.
: '''NOTE:''' The content of ''.ssh'' is essential for connection to the server, so you also must save these files.

After you set up a new SD card or USB disk, return the files to their original location.

=== What are the values in the ''FTPdetectinfo_*'' file designated as hnr mle bin Pix/fm Rho Phi? ===

Some of these values (hnr mle bin) are not used in RMS but they are used in CAMS, so their presence is to conform to the standard. As a result, these values are all zeros.

There are other values:
* Pix/fm is the average angular speed of the meteor, in pixels, per frame.
* Rho, Phi are parameters that define the line of the meteor in polar coordinates, see this '''[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hough_transform#Theory page]''' for more detail.
: ''Rho'' is the distance of the line from the center of the image.
: ''Phi'' is the angle of the line, as measured from the positive direction of the Y axis. (Basically, this is a line from the center of the image to the top of the image.) The positive angles are measured clockwise, although the CAMS standard may define these parameters a bit differently, with the Y axis flipped.
The ''intensity'' is the sum of all pixel intensities of the meteor on a given frame.

For example, you could represent an area around the meteor on a given frame, as shown in the figure, where the numbers are pixel intensities on an 8-bit image (so they can range from 0 to 255) and the pixel values inside the red boundary represent the meteor blob on the frame. The result? The intensity is the sum of all numbers inside the red boundary.
: '''NOTE:''' Later, this value is used to compute the magnitude.

[[File:Intensity_sum.png |Intensity_sum.png ]]

The magnitude is computed as
: ''mag = -2.5*log10(intensity sum) + photometric_offset''

To estimate the photometric offset in '''SkyFit''', fit the line with slope -2.5 through pairs of known magnitudes of stars and logartihms of their pixel intensity sum. Fundamentally, the photometric offset is the intercept of that line.
: '''NOTE:''' The constant slope of -2.5 comes from the '''[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apparent_magnitude#Calculations Definition of stellar magnitudes]'''.

== GMN data policy ==

The Global Meteor Network produces three levels of data products.
* Level 1 - The lowest level data (as close to 'raw' as possible) are the FF image and FR video files saved to the RPi by the capture code and the fireball detector.
* Level 2 - Data is used in three ways:
:* The meteor detector extracts positional and brightness information of individual meteors (''FTPdetectinfo'' file).
:* Images are used for astrometric and photometric calibration (platepar file).
:* Meteor and star detections are used to generate a range of plots, such as the single-station shower association graph and the camera drift graph. The calibrated meteor measurements are uploaded to the GMN server, together with the raw images of individual meteors.
* Level 3 - Software on the server correlates individual observations and computes multi-station meteor trajectories, which are published daily on the '''GMN [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ Data website]'''. This data is made public under the '''[https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ CC BY 4.0 license]'''.

Operators of individual GMN stations exclusively own the Level 1 and Level 2 data their stations produce. In practice, this means they are free to share this data with other meteor networks if they wish. The data that is uploaded to the GMN server is not shared publicly or with other parties without the operator's consent. However, the data may be used internally by the GMN coordinators to manually produce other data products, such as the trajectory of a meteorite dropping fireball or an analysis of a meteor shower.
: '''IMPORTANT:''' All station operators are credited for their data in all GMN publications.

== For more information ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=43 Contact the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork Join the Global Meteor Network Forum] ===

=== [https://github.com/markmac99/ukmon-pitools/wiki UK Meteor Network Wiki]===
This wiki has numerous FAQs and tips on maintaining, monitoring and managing your system, and several explainers such as how to calibrate and create a mask, how to copy data and so forth.

=== Important GMN resources ===

There are two additional web pages you should know about.

* The '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/status GMN status page]''' provides access to the '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/weblog/ GMN weblog]'''.
* A mapping utility website that is directly derived from GMN data: '''[https://tammojan.github.io/meteormap Meteor map]'''.
: '''NOTE:''' This map takes quite a while to load. When you review the map, you must scroll down to see the full power of the data display.

=== GMN talks ===

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tV7WBo0RrQ 2025 GMN Meeting Session 1 (February 2025)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z23aJeIg7wo 2025 GMN Meeting Session 2 (February 2025)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLmQ5Bvz4ACYJLYfswIeAipapoeGeI6QWy GMN talk for Society for Astronomical Sciences workshop 2024 (The first 3 videos)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juOvRTtoqhs 2024 GMN Meeting Session 1 (February 2024)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MXhVIxrz2ks 2024 GMN Meeting Session 2 (February 2024)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IfUyCHjMATc 2023 GMN Meeting Session 1 (February 2023)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I78KwF5-1GE 2023 GMN Meeting Session 2 (February 2023)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDdrG_FCyGk 2022 GMN Meeting Session 1 (February 2022)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_75CDPzjI4 2022 GMN Meeting Session 2 (February 2022)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6x9_WCVphY GMN talk at the European Space Agency's Fireball Workshop (June 2021)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXBTLPnPDWs 2021 GMN Meeting] - [https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ia9vagug5lxm8k9/AAB_i_1jcWThUdAHO_2gF_Ksa?dl=0 Link to slides]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Overview of the GMN - IMC2020 (September 2020)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oM7lfQ4nmyw Overview of the GMN, Astro Imaging Channel presentation (May 2020)]

=== GMN-related publications ===

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2206.11365 Vida, D., Blaauw Erskine, R. C., Brown, P. G., Kambulow, J., Campbell-Brown, M., & Mazur, M. J. (2022). Computing optical meteor flux using global meteor network data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 515(2), 2322-2339.]

: [https://academic.oup.com/mnras/advance-article/doi/10.1093/mnras/stab2557/6368869 Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T., & Vida, D. (2021). Meteor shower radiant dispersions in Global Meteor Network data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 508(1), 326-339.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2107.12335 Vida, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P. S., Brown, P. G., McIntyre, M. J., Dijkema, T. J., Pavletić, L., Kukić, P., Mazur, M.J., Eschman, P., Roggemans, P., Merlak, A., & Zubović, D. (2021). The Global Meteor Network–Methodology and first results. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 506(4), 5046-5074.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.05458/ Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T. D., & Vida, D. (2020). Realistic gravitational focusing of meteoroid streams. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 494(2), 2982-2994.]

: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Kukic-et-al-2018-Rolling-shutter.pdf Kukić, P., Gural, P., Vida, D., Šegon, D. & Merlak, A. (2018) Correction for meteor centroids observed using rolling shutter cameras. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46:5, 154-118.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_sun_skirter_final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Kukić, P., & Merlak, A. (2018). Compressive strength of a skirting Daytime Arietid-first science results from low-cost Raspberry Pi-based meteor stations. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 113-118.]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.02979.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - I. Theory. arXiv:1911.02979v4 [astro-ph.EP] 21 Apr 2020]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.11734.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - II. Results. arXiv:1911.11734v1 [astro-ph.EP] 26 Novr 2019]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_first_results-final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Zubović, D., Kukić, P., Parag, F., & Macan, A. (2018). First results of a Raspberry Pi based meteor camera system. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 71-78.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Vida_IMC2016_proceedings_final.pdf Vida, D., Zubović, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P., & Cupec, R. (2016). Open-source meteor detection software for low-cost single-board computers. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference (IMC2016), Egmond, The Netherlands (pp. 2-5).]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Zubovic_IMC2015_priceedings_final.pdf Zubović, D., Vida, D., Gural, P., & Šegon, D. (2015). Advances in the development of a low-cost video meteor station. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference, Mistelbach, Austria (pp. 27-30).]

Main Page

2025-10-30T20:19:02Z

Dvida: /* Advanced RMS installations and multi-camera support */

Welcome to the Global Meteor Network wiki page!

The Global Meteor Network (GMN) is a world-wide organization of amateur and professional astronomers. The goal is to observe the night sky using low-light video cameras and produce meteor trajectories in a coordinated network of recording stations. Here, you can find information about the purpose and structure of the GMN, and how to assemble and operate your own meteor camera. You also will discover how to contribute to the development of RMS (the GMN software) and how your observations as a citizen scientist contribute to the ongoing understanding of our solar system's formation and evolution.

'''<span style="color:red">If you are here to find out how to build and set up a camera from scratch, jump ahead to [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Build_%26_Install_%26_Setup_your_camera_-_The_complete_how-to this] section!</span>'''

'''<span style="color:red">For German speakers, there is "Build camera from scratch" documentation written by students of [https://fsg-preetz.de/ Friedrich-Schiller-Gymnasium in Preetz] available [http://wiki.linux-astronomie.de/doku.php?id=ceres here]. This version is maintained by Friedrich-Schiller-Gymnasium in Preetz. </span>'''

== Global Meteor Network overview ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=141 Our mission] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=363 A brief history of the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Video introduction - Overview of the Global Meteor Network (IMC2020)] ===

=== [https://youtu.be/oM7lfQ4nmyw Video overview - Meteor tracking and the GMN from Astro Imaging Channel presentation] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ Some 'live' GMN data products] ===

== Meteor detection station ==

What is an RMS GMN station? An RMS-based GMN station consists of a Raspberry Pi (RPi) single board computer, a low light level security video camera, the RMS software, and a connection to the Internet via Wifi. The camera is securely mounted in a weatherproof housing, pointed at the sky, and connected to the RPi with a Power Over Ethernet (POE) cable. To be a part of the GMN network, you need a fairly powerful Raspberry Pi (Pi 4, 5, or better) and a reasonably fast Internet connection. The internet connection is required only for data upload to a central server each morning and to provide automatic updates for the RMS software.

Nightly, the RPi records video from the camera shortly after local sunset, then continuously compressing and storing the video data on a local SSD drive. Each morning before sunrise, when capture is complete, the RPi analyzes the video and extracts meteor observations from the previous night. These extracted video clips of detected meteors are archived and then uploaded to a server. On a 'busy' night, the clips can total hundreds of megabytes as a result of a heavy meteor shower or a night with a lot of false detections.
: '''NOTE:''' Continuous progress is being made on the detection software to filter out false detections.

The server finds meteors that were observed from more than one station, which allows the server to triangulate meteor trails in 3D and calculate the orbits of the meteors.

=== What do I need? ===

You need a Raspberry Pi compluter, RMS software, and a camera kit.
: '''NOTE:''' We strongly recommend the Pi 4 or 5 model.
The software can run on a Pi3, but it is much slower and it is no longer supported. A list with everything you need is available here: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Shopping_list_and_tools_needed page].

You can run multiple cameras on a Linux PC, and details are available '''[https://docs.google.com/document/d/16PSFi8RAqbenPdluhulCRaIenOkEzgs5piUhkX3yaOc/edit here]'''.

=== How do I obtain a camera? ===
There are two options - buy a camera or build a camera.

==== Buy a Camera ====
You can buy a camera and prebuilt Pi, and ready to install. Cameras are available from several suppliers, as well as the Croatian Meteor Network, as explained here: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=136 this page].
If you are in the UK, you can contact the UK Meteor network for advice. [https://ukmeteornetwork.org/ UK Meteor Network].
: '''NOTE:''' As of 2024, UK Meteor network can no longer sell cameras directly.

==== Build your own from scratch ====
This option requires an intermediate level of DIY skills and familiarity with the Raspberry Pi, but do not be put off. The instructions are comprehensive and, if you get stuck, you can ask for advice in the forum here: '''[https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork groups.io]''' forum.

You can find out more about this option here: '''[[Build & Install & Setup your camera - The complete how-to]]'''.

=== Advanced RMS installations and multi-camera support ===
If you would like to explore advanced RMS installation options for various platforms or run multiple cameras on a single Linux computer, complete information is available on '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Advanced_RMS_installations_and_Multi-camera_support this page]'''.

If you plan to run RMS software on the Raspberry Pi 4 or 5, the best supported and easiest solution is our prepared image. Complete information is available in an '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Build_%26_Install_%26_Setup_your_camera_-_The_complete_how-to extensive guide]'''.

=== Can I use a commercial all-sky camera? ===

Generally, this is not a good idea because these cameras lack sufficient sensitivity. More information is available here: '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=163 See this recent experiment]'''.

== Operate and maintain your GMN station ==

=== Overview ===

: '''NOTE:''' GMS is a nascent operation, so you may share some of our growing pains if you choose to be involved. We are constantly solving bugs and making improvements, which is an opportunity for you to help if you have programming skills! The workload of day-to-day operation can be non-zero, and may require some of your time.

Ideally, you should monitor your RMS Pi systems daily to identify freezes, glitches, or other problems. For example, you may see birds nesting or soiling the camera window, someone may unintentionally unplug the power cord, or animals (mice, cats, or dogs) may chew on the camera Ethernet cable. Although we make constant progress, the GMS network is not yet a 'power up and forget about it' system.

By its nature, the GMS network is staffed by lots of people who are willing to help newcomers get started. Here are some suggestions for daily operation of your RMS camera.

=== What does the meteor camera do over the course of 24 hours? ===

The RMS python-based system calculates the sundown to sunrise interval, and schedules video camera capture all night. Based on the video camera and capabilities of the Pi, the camera captures at least 25 frames per second between evening and morning twilight. During each nightly continuous image capture, the station processes captured image data and idenitfies frames that contain a minimum number of stars (usually around 20) that are worth reviewing for meteor detections. When data capture is complete, the station begins processing all frames it flagged with possible detections, then refines the astrometric accuracy of every positive detection. Using the station plate parameters (platepar) calibration file, processing iterates to find the best astrometry and photometry solution for each detected meteor. After this process analyzes each detection, summary files are created.

The summary files include many types of information.
* Text file data presentation in several widely accepted formats (such as ''CAMS'' and ''UFOorbit'').
* Graphic plots of detection frequencies throughout the night.
* Plot of all detections, showing any identified radiants.
* Plots of photometry, astrometry, and camera pointing drift in arc minutes throughout the course of the night as the mount or building flexes.
: '''NOTE:''' Detailed information about plots is available here: '''[https://docs.google.com/document/d/132aHGn0QPzhpVN2s2n6FT6rJn39LAsPkchWJqXQb8Qk/edit?usp=sharing Explanation of GMN plots]'''
* Thumbnail images of detections.
* Thumbnail images of data captured throughout the night.
* Single image with all detections stacked together.
* Single image with all captured images stacked together.
* Flat file for correcting images.
* An ''.mp4'' movie time lapse of the night's captured images.
* Meteor shower flux charts, if specific showers are detected.
* Observation summary data of hardware and data recording characteristics.

When you click a meteor track, its data displays in the lower data window. Ultimately, all results are combined into a single compressed archive that automatically uploads each morning to the central server.

Each morning, you can review the result files on the RPi and copy anything you want to your computer or tablet.

===Archive data ===

Your primary scientific data is automatically uploaded to the central server every morning after data processing is complete.
: '''NOTE:''' When the night's results are uploaded, RMS purges the oldest data to free up space for the next night's run. As a result, you may want to copy some of the data to a PC, NAS, or the cloud for further analysis.
: You should consider backing up the content of '''~/RMS_data/ArchivedFiles''', which holds individual files and data that RMS determined were probably meteors.

Details about backing up data is beyond the scope of the GMN Wiki. Tools such as Robocopy for Windows and rsync for Linux/MacOS are ideal, and they can 'mirror' data across a network. Help to configure these tools is available in the '''Globalmeteornetwork''' group on '''groups.io'''.

In addition, we added some automated tools that can help you back up data to a thumb drive inserted into the RPi. Assistance about these tools also is available in the '''Globalmeteornetwork''' group on '''groups.io'''.

===Backup and restore the configuration and RSA keys===

:'''NOTE:''' If you are on an older Buster image, you must replace username ''rms'' with username ''pi''. For example, enter ''/home/pi'' instead of ''/home/rms''.

To determine which username to use, run
::''ls /home/rms home/pi''
to display the username that is your home directory.

'''Back up the configuration'''

1. Open a terminal and run the command ''Scripts/RMS_Backup.sh''.

: A compressed ''.zip'' file, with all important configuration files and keys, is created in your user home directory with the prefix ''RMS_Backup'' and the ''.zip'' extension.
: For example, ''/home/rms/RMS_Backup_XX0001_2023-01-28.zip''.

2. Copy the ''.zip'' file to a safe place outside RPi.

: Later, it will be useful to restore the system in case of failure. The ''.zip'' file contains the RSA public and private keys used to contact GMN servers, so keep it secret.

'''Restore the configuration'''

1. Unzip the backup file in any folder on the RPi.

2. Copy the files ''.config'', ''platepar_cmn2010.cal'', and ''mask.bmp'' to the folder ''/home/rms/source/RMS/''.

3. Copy the files ''id_rsa'' and ''id_rsa.pub'' to the folder ''/home/rms/.ssh/'', as shown in this example:

: ''cp .config platepar_cmn2010.cal mask.bmp /home/rms/source/RMS/''
: ''cp id_rsa id_rsa.pub /home/rms/.ssh/''

4. To make sure that permission bits in the RSA key files are correct, enter:

: ''chmod 400 ~/.ssh/id_rsa*''

=== View the data ===

To view data, you can use '''CMN_binViewer''' software [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer], which is included in the RMS SD image.
: '''NOTE:''' There also is a Windows version [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer/releases] you can install.

: '''IMPORTANT:''' You can open images in astronomical FITS viewers, such as '''FITS Liberator''' or '''Pixinsight''', but what you see may be surprising. For example, in '''FITS Liberator''', the image is upside down, which is an artefact of how the software reads the image.

In space, there is no 'up' or 'down', so the FITS specification does not dictate if pixel (0,0) is at a specific corner. Some software, notably '''FITS Liberator''', specifies the top left corner as the origin location, which causes terrestrial images to display vertically mirrored.

=== Tools and utilities ===

There are many tools available.

* '''[https://www.realvnc.com/en/connect/download/viewer/ RealVNC]''', '''[https://www.nomachine.com/ NoMachine]''', '''[https://anydesk.com/en AnyDesk]''', or '''[https://rustdesk.com/ RustDesk]''' remote connect tools provide station access from anywhere. Access to your station from outside your network is enabled by an OpenVPN connection address that is available to meteor stations.
: With '''VNC''' and '''Teamviewer''', you can create an account and team on their websites, and then remotely access your station.
* '''Samba''' data directory access allows you to copy data results directly from your RPi to your computer or tablet.
* '''[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer CMN_binViewer]''' allows you to view standard FITS image files that contain meteor detections. It runs on the RPi, and it can run under Windows.
* '''[https://sonotaco.com/soft/e_index.html UFO Orbit]''' allows you to process data from multiple stations, and generate unified radiants of two or more stations that see the same meteor. '''[https://sonotaco.com/soft/e_index.html UFO Orbit]''' can plot the shared object ground path and orbital characteristics, and it can output a summary file of all objects seen by more than one station.
* RMS software can be installed under Windows to allow much of the RMS python-based code to run on your computer. This means you can run RMS against meteor station data that was transferred to your computer from the RPi.

You also can run RMS python jobs on the RPi to sample captured image files, and then condense them into an ''.mp4'' video. Sometimes, these videos are mesmerizing summaries that can run for more than two minutes of winter time data.

== What can I do with my GMN station? ==

=== Use SkyFit2 for astrometric and photometric calibration + Manually reduce observations of fireballs and compute their trajectories ===
* '''[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao3J9Jf0iLQ Updated 2023 video tutorial]'''
* '''[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOjb3qxDlX4 Old 2021 video tutorial]'''

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/fov3d/ Generate a Google Earth KML file to show your station's field of view] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=253 Use the UFO Orbit program to estimate meteor trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=221 Urban meteor observing] ===

== Data analysis with SkyFit2 ==

'''SkyFit2''', a program in the RMS library, allows you to analyze optical meteor data in most of the optical formats in current use. The program supports popular video formats (''.mp4'', ''.avi'', and ''.mkv''), sequences of static images, and single images with shutter breaks.

A '''[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao3J9Jf0iLQ video tutorial]''' explains how to useg '''SkyFit2''' to run astrometric and photometric calibrations on GMN data, and it can manually reduce observations of fireballs and compute their trajectories.

A more detailed description of '''SkyFit2''' is available on the '''[[SkyFit2|SkyFit2]]''' page.

== FAQ ==

=== What should I back up when I re-flash an SD card or a USB disk? ===

You should backup the ''.config'', platepar, and mask files that are in the RMS source directory, plus the entire content of the hidden directory ''/home/pi/.ssh''. Refer to the section titled, '''Back up the configuration'''.

If your SD card or USB disk fails or becomes corrupted, you can fetch the config files from the server because they are uploaded every day, together with the data.
: '''NOTE:''' The content of ''.ssh'' is essential for connection to the server, so you also must save these files.

After you set up a new SD card or USB disk, return the files to their original location.

=== What are the values in the ''FTPdetectinfo_*'' file designated as hnr mle bin Pix/fm Rho Phi? ===

Some of these values (hnr mle bin) are not used in RMS but they are used in CAMS, so their presence is to conform to the standard. As a result, these values are all zeros.

There are other values:
* Pix/fm is the average angular speed of the meteor, in pixels, per frame.
* Rho, Phi are parameters that define the line of the meteor in polar coordinates, see this '''[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hough_transform#Theory page]''' for more detail.
: ''Rho'' is the distance of the line from the center of the image.
: ''Phi'' is the angle of the line, as measured from the positive direction of the Y axis. (Basically, this is a line from the center of the image to the top of the image.) The positive angles are measured clockwise, although the CAMS standard may define these parameters a bit differently, with the Y axis flipped.
The ''intensity'' is the sum of all pixel intensities of the meteor on a given frame.

For example, you could represent an area around the meteor on a given frame, as shown in the figure, where the numbers are pixel intensities on an 8-bit image (so they can range from 0 to 255) and the pixel values inside the red boundary represent the meteor blob on the frame. The result? The intensity is the sum of all numbers inside the red boundary.
: '''NOTE:''' Later, this value is used to compute the magnitude.

[[File:Intensity_sum.png |Intensity_sum.png ]]

The magnitude is computed as
: ''mag = -2.5*log10(intensity sum) + photometric_offset''

To estimate the photometric offset in '''SkyFit''', fit the line with slope -2.5 through pairs of known magnitudes of stars and logartihms of their pixel intensity sum. Fundamentally, the photometric offset is the intercept of that line.
: '''NOTE:''' The constant slope of -2.5 comes from the '''[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apparent_magnitude#Calculations Definition of stellar magnitudes]'''.

== GMN data policy ==

The Global Meteor Network produces three levels of data products.
* Level 1 - The lowest level data (as close to 'raw' as possible) are the FF image and FR video files saved to the RPi by the capture code and the fireball detector.
* Level 2 - Data is used in three ways:
:* The meteor detector extracts positional and brightness information of individual meteors (''FTPdetectinfo'' file).
:* Images are used for astrometric and photometric calibration (platepar file).
:* Meteor and star detections are used to generate a range of plots, such as the single-station shower association graph and the camera drift graph. The calibrated meteor measurements are uploaded to the GMN server, together with the raw images of individual meteors.
* Level 3 - Software on the server correlates individual observations and computes multi-station meteor trajectories, which are published daily on the '''GMN [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ Data website]'''. This data is made public under the '''[https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ CC BY 4.0 license]'''.

Operators of individual GMN stations exclusively own the Level 1 and Level 2 data their stations produce. In practice, this means they are free to share this data with other meteor networks if they wish. The data that is uploaded to the GMN server is not shared publicly or with other parties without the operator's consent. However, the data may be used internally by the GMN coordinators to manually produce other data products, such as the trajectory of a meteorite dropping fireball or an analysis of a meteor shower.
: '''IMPORTANT:''' All station operators are credited for their data in all GMN publications.

== GMN Plots and Images Explained ==

This document explains the data summaries produced on your system and displayed on the GMN Weblog every morning '''[https://docs.google.com/document/d/132aHGn0QPzhpVN2s2n6FT6rJn39LAsPkchWJqXQb8Qk/edit?pli=1&tab=t.0 GMN Plots and Images]'''.

'''[https://IstraStream.com IstraStream.com]''' was an independent hosting site primarily intended for cameras sold by IstraStream. In mid-2023, Istrastream stopped listing camera image output and the IstraStream data display was replaced with the '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/weblog/ GMN weblog]'''.

== For more information ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=43 Contact the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork Join the Global Meteor Network Forum] ===

=== [https://github.com/markmac99/ukmon-pitools/wiki UK Meteor Network Wiki]===
This wiki has numerous FAQs and tips on maintaining, monitoring and managing your system, and several explainers such as how to calibrate and create a mask, how to copy data and so forth.

=== Important GMN resources ===

There are two additional web pages you should know about.

* The '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/status GMN status page]''' provides access to the '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/weblog/ GMN weblog]'''.
* A mapping utility website that is directly derived from GMN data: '''[https://tammojan.github.io/meteormap Meteor map]'''.
: '''NOTE:''' This map takes quite a while to load. When you review the map, you must scroll down to see the full power of the data display.

=== GMN talks ===

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tV7WBo0RrQ 2025 GMN Meeting Session 1 (February 2025)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z23aJeIg7wo 2025 GMN Meeting Session 2 (February 2025)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLmQ5Bvz4ACYJLYfswIeAipapoeGeI6QWy GMN talk for Society for Astronomical Sciences workshop 2024 (The first 3 videos)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juOvRTtoqhs 2024 GMN Meeting Session 1 (February 2024)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MXhVIxrz2ks 2024 GMN Meeting Session 2 (February 2024)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IfUyCHjMATc 2023 GMN Meeting Session 1 (February 2023)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I78KwF5-1GE 2023 GMN Meeting Session 2 (February 2023)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDdrG_FCyGk 2022 GMN Meeting Session 1 (February 2022)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_75CDPzjI4 2022 GMN Meeting Session 2 (February 2022)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6x9_WCVphY GMN talk at the European Space Agency's Fireball Workshop (June 2021)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXBTLPnPDWs 2021 GMN Meeting] - [https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ia9vagug5lxm8k9/AAB_i_1jcWThUdAHO_2gF_Ksa?dl=0 Link to slides]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Overview of the GMN - IMC2020 (September 2020)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oM7lfQ4nmyw Overview of the GMN, Astro Imaging Channel presentation (May 2020)]

=== GMN-related publications ===

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2206.11365 Vida, D., Blaauw Erskine, R. C., Brown, P. G., Kambulow, J., Campbell-Brown, M., & Mazur, M. J. (2022). Computing optical meteor flux using global meteor network data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 515(2), 2322-2339.]

: [https://academic.oup.com/mnras/advance-article/doi/10.1093/mnras/stab2557/6368869 Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T., & Vida, D. (2021). Meteor shower radiant dispersions in Global Meteor Network data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 508(1), 326-339.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2107.12335 Vida, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P. S., Brown, P. G., McIntyre, M. J., Dijkema, T. J., Pavletić, L., Kukić, P., Mazur, M.J., Eschman, P., Roggemans, P., Merlak, A., & Zubović, D. (2021). The Global Meteor Network–Methodology and first results. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 506(4), 5046-5074.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.05458/ Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T. D., & Vida, D. (2020). Realistic gravitational focusing of meteoroid streams. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 494(2), 2982-2994.]

: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Kukic-et-al-2018-Rolling-shutter.pdf Kukić, P., Gural, P., Vida, D., Šegon, D. & Merlak, A. (2018) Correction for meteor centroids observed using rolling shutter cameras. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46:5, 154-118.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_sun_skirter_final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Kukić, P., & Merlak, A. (2018). Compressive strength of a skirting Daytime Arietid-first science results from low-cost Raspberry Pi-based meteor stations. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 113-118.]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.02979.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - I. Theory. arXiv:1911.02979v4 [astro-ph.EP] 21 Apr 2020]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.11734.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - II. Results. arXiv:1911.11734v1 [astro-ph.EP] 26 Novr 2019]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_first_results-final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Zubović, D., Kukić, P., Parag, F., & Macan, A. (2018). First results of a Raspberry Pi based meteor camera system. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 71-78.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Vida_IMC2016_proceedings_final.pdf Vida, D., Zubović, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P., & Cupec, R. (2016). Open-source meteor detection software for low-cost single-board computers. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference (IMC2016), Egmond, The Netherlands (pp. 2-5).]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Zubovic_IMC2015_priceedings_final.pdf Zubović, D., Vida, D., Gural, P., & Šegon, D. (2015). Advances in the development of a low-cost video meteor station. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference, Mistelbach, Austria (pp. 27-30).]

Shopping list and tools needed

2025-09-30T14:58:50Z

Dvida: /* Cooled housing for Raspberry Pi */

Ordering the correct components is the most important aspect of your camera build. Review the entire list and make sure you order the correct options. If you are not sure, posta question in the forums. You also should review the list of tools to identify what may be missing.

= Parts and tools =
[[File:01_annotated.jpg|thumb|right|Annotated Parts List]]

Click the image to the right to see a larger version of the parts and tools.

# IMX291 sensor board (IMX307 sensor board if IMX291 sensor board is sold out)
# Lens with the lens holder - 4mm, 6mm are M16 mount as pictured, while other lenses might be CS which have a different holder
# 2x M2 screws, 6mm long - for mounting lens holder
# Camera housing
# Small cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Large cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Camera Power over Ethernet (PoE) cable (sometimes called a network cable by the sellers)
# Camera board holder (supplied with the housing)
# Holder metal plate (supplied with the housing)
# 4x M2 screws, 12 mm long for mounting camera module to bracket
# 1x M3-.50 screw, 6mm long for mounting camera module L-bracket to base plate
# Metal plate screws (supplied with the housing)
# Transparent weatherproof silicone
# Housing mounting bracket (supplied with the housing)
# Waterproof ethernet cable protector
# PoE injector to supply 48v to the camera (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi 5 (recommended) or Raspberry Pi 4 Model B 2GB (minimum) with official power supply (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi housing (not shown)
# 128 GB or greater microSD card (not shown)
# Self-amalgamating tape (not shown)

= Purchasing parts =
For consistency across the network and to facilitate collaborative support, it is best to use only the camera and lens listed below, instead of assembling alternatives only because they are conveniently available. The selected camera and lenses are proven and known to work well. Feel free to source other components from any convenient seller.

Many components, such as the Pi and microSD cards, are are available from many vendors. However, AliExpress (the Chinese equivalent of eBay) is the preferred online source for a lens, camera, and housing. AliExpress serves most of the globe and has been reliably suppling parts for a long time.

: '''NOTE:''' Links are to current sellers but inventory levels can vary. If a link is dead or the seller is out of stock, you should be able to find an equivalent from other sellers on AliExpress.

== Sensor ==
The bare IP security camera selected for the RMS system features a Sony IMX291, available from many sellers on AliExpress. Of the options offered, choose ''With 48V POE cable'' and ''No lens''.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002315913099.html IMX-291 Hi3516Cv300]

If the IMX-291 camera is sold out from that vendor and you cannot find another IMX-291 vendor, you may be able to locate a suitable IMX-307 sensor.
: '''NOTE:''' Many vendors sell IMX-307 sensor boards that are not suited for nighttime meteor recording. It is important to buy the correct IMX-307 because only a specific hardware version combined with a specific firmware version work correctly to record meteors.

One RMS/GMN tester offered these thoughts:

* The only IMX-307 worth trying is the Hangzhou Jiefeng Technology GK7205V210, aka IVG-G3S, which is distinguishable by a white square on the board. I do not recommend a blanket ‘get-any-IMX-307’ statement for new cameras because sensor boards can be very different from each other.

* The only acceptable IMX-307 sensor boards I've found includes the firmware version:
: V5.00.R02.000739AG.10010.140400.00'''20000'''.

* A firmware version with a similar number is NOT acceptable:
: V5.00.R02.000739AG.10010.140400.00'''20010'''.

* Here is a link to Hangzhou Jiefeng Technology: [https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256805867050500.html Hangzhou Jiefeng Technology].

* When you place an order, it is best to specify the characteristics of the IMX-307. For example, your request could be something like this:
: ''GK7205V210 (IVG-G3S), with white square on circuit board, and firmware version V5.00.R02.000739AG.10010.140400.0020000''.

: '''IMPORTANT:''' These recommendations are likely to change over time, so you should check our parts list and vendor recommendations before you place an order.

== Lens ==

: '''IMPORTANT:''' Buy a lens separately and select only from these options.

Most cameras available on AliExpress are sold with a choice of lenses. The preferred lens is a 4mm f/0.95 M16 lens, which provides a ~88x45° field of view (FOV). The lens also is available separately at this link.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32876034491.html 4mm f/0.95 M16].

Alternative lenses (4mm and 6 mm) are available here:
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005003145991079.html 4mm OR 6mm f/0.95 M16]

If you live in an area with heavy light pollution, other options are available. We recommend using only lenses from the [[Lens Options|following list]]. Other options may not be as sensitive or may have significant distortions. See [[Lens Options|this page for more lens options]].

== Housing ==
A security camera housing provides weather-tight protection without the distortion of a plastic dome. From the options offered, select ''Plate and Bracket''. The plate holds a 38x38mm bare IP camera module on an L-shaped mounting bracket.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32355130687.html IP66 CCTV Camera Housing with Plate and Bracket]

This combination also provides a pair of cable glands and some essential screws.

== Power over Ethernet (PoE) injector, PoE switch (optional), and PoE replacement camera side cables (optional, but recommended) ==

This combination uses network cables to connect the Raspberry Pi and the camera sensor, and injects 48V DC into the network cable to power the camera. From the list, select a plug style that is appropriate for your location.

This is an example of plug styles available.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002704227705.html PoE Injector 48V 0.5A]

: '''NOTE:''' Over short cable lengths (up to about 5m), you also can use plain PoE connectors. These connectors feed 12V from a power supply into the ethernet and extract it at the other end. Over short distances, this configuration can supply the camera with adequate power without the need for 48V injectors.

If you operate several cameras, you can use a PoE ''switch'' instead of a PoE ''injector'', and connect all the cameras to your network.

: '''NOTE:''' You must source a PoE switch locally.
: [https://www.tendacn.com/product/tef1110p-8-63w.html TEF1110P-8-63W 10-Port 10/100M Desktop Switch with 8-Port PoE]

: '''GOOD PRACTICE:''' Maintain one or more spare PoE camera side cables.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/4001297174234.html Poe cable - Select RJ45 or RJ45DC]

'''Alternative cable'''

The picture shows only two connectors, but you will receive all connectors needed for the IMX291 board:
* 1 pcs 2pin port (2.0mm)
* 1 pcs 4pin port (1.25mm)
* 1 pcs 6pin port (1.25mm)
* 1 pcs 8pin port (1.25mm))

: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002598310068.html Poe Cable]

== Cooled housing for Raspberry Pi ==

Please buy one of the two cases below. We have tried many others, but they are not as good.

* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32959825297.html Fan-cooled case.] It has relatively quiet fans, and it's sturdy. From the options offered, ensure you select one that says "for Pi 4" if you are using a Raspberry Pi 4, or "for Pi 3B Plus" if you are using a Raspberry Pi 3B+. '''IMPORTANT:''' There is a case variation that is fully enclosed and has no fans; do not select this option.

* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002510605065.html Passively cooled case.] It has no fan and so is silent without the need to replace fans in future. Many operators have found this one satisfactory if the Pi is operated in an air controlled environment. Some operators reported a diminished WiFi strength when using passive fans due to the metal covering the small antenna.

If the Pi is in a hot environment, then choose the case with the fan. If silent operation is the priority, then go fanless but pay attention to the free circulation of air around the Pi.

For the Raspberry Pi 5, the OEM fan assembly should be purchased, which has a heat sync and fan speed controlled by the operating system as it responds to CPU temperature.

== Real time clock (RTC) for Raspberry Pi ==
: [[File:rtc.jpg|thumb|RTC installation|200px]]

Precise timing is essential for processing meteor data, and an RTC module assures that Raspberry Pi always has the precise time, even when power or internet is unreliable. AliExpress sells a pack of 10 but they are inexpensive, so you may want to share extras among other camera constructors in your area.

The AliExpress store lists two RTC modules - one labelled ''DS3231 module'' and another labelled ''mini DS3231 module''. Select the ''mini DS3231 module'' option, which is designed for the Raspberry Pi. (It has 5 pins and includes a battery.)
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32770348851.html DS3231 RTC]

After you plug the RTC into the Pi (see image on the right), verify that the current time is correct on the Pi, then open the terminal and run:

<pre>
sudo hwclock -w
</pre>

This command sets the current computer time to the RTC. When the Pi boots up, it reads the correct time from the RTC.

== Pin header ==

This pin raises the height of the Raspberry GPIO bins so the RTC sits proud of the Raspberry Pi case. You need only 1, but the pack of 20 costs only about a dollar.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32549850046.html Tall header pins]

== Network cabling ==

You need two lengths of network cabling, one (quite short) between the Raspberry Pi and the PoE injector, and the other between the PoE injector and the camera. You should be able to easily find both of these locally, but you also can order them from AliExpress.

Some people have found that a thin, flat network cable (shown in the figure) is useful to avoid drilling holes in walls or eaves when you want to snake a wire through a window or door. Regardless of you choice, additional sealant or insulation is required to seal the cable at the PoE connector of the camera.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002311509668.html Cat6 Flat Ethernet Cable]

== Waterproof cable connector ==

One end of the network cable is outdoors, connected to the PoE cable from the camera, so it must be sealed. (This connection carries data as well as 48V DC power.)

Place the waterproof connector over the end of the network cable connector, plug the network cable into the PoE cable on the camera, then lock the connector onto the end of the PoE cable.

: '''GOOD PRACTICE:''' For extra weatherproofing, wrap the connector in self-amalgamating tape.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32834472563.html RJ45 Waterproof Connector Cap]

== 128GB micro SD card or 256GB USB flash drive ==

You can use either an SD card and a USB flash drive, but there is no need to have both. You must have at least 64GB of storage, but 128GB is recommended because 20GB of data - or more - is collected every night. The card should be fast - Class 10 UHS-1 or better. As with the cables, you can purchase a card locally or [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32676225311.html from AliExpress].

: '''WARNING:''' There is an '''[https://photographylife.com/fake-memory-cards ongoing problem with the production and sale of fraudulent memory cards that misrepresent the available storage]'''. Even supplies from a reputable outlet can be affected, so you should test any card you purchase. The AliExpress link has been used successfully to obtain suitable micro SD cards. If you live in North America, Costco is a reliable local source.

If you prefer to use a USB flash drive, the [https://www.kingston.com/en/usb-flash-drives/datatraveler-kyson-high-performance-usb-flash-drive Kingston DataTraveler Kyson 256 GB] has been verified to work well. We recommend you source it locally or on [https://www.amazon.com/Kingston-DataTraveler-Kyson-256GB-DTKN/dp/B08KHZY581 amazon.com].

== Raspberry Pi 4 or 5 ==
You should be able to purchase these purchased locally as well as from a domestic online source. You must have at least a 2GB RAM model, and the Raspberry Pi Model 4B is now the minimum spec. Previously, a Raspberry Pi Model 3B+ was considered the minimum spec, but Pi3 does not have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers.

: '''NOTE:''' The Pi3 runs on Python 2. After July 1, 2025, we will no longer support this version.

: IMPORTANT:''' Purchase only the official 5.1V 3A 15.3W power supply to go with your Pi. Most problems with Raspberry Pi units can be traced to inadequate power supplies.

== Additional items and tools ==
* Micro-HDMI cable: Connect a RPi 4B to a monitor.
* M2 and M3 screw: You may find these locally but, in some places, they may be quite difficult to locate. You may want to order hardware from the [https://www.aliexpress.com/store/4714020?spm=a2g0o.detail.1000007.1.5fc666d9tN1f8i ScrewHome Store] on AliExpress. Each [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32981714992.html?spm=a2g0o.store_pc_groupList.8148356.10.be65539dLjPgfh packet of 50 M2x6mm, M2x12mm, and M3x6mm] machine screws costs only a few dollars.
* Silicone sealant: Seal the glass window and front screws in the housing.
* Self-amalgamating tape: Wrap and seal the cable connectors so they are weathertight.
* Tools:
: * Small wire cutters or a sharp knife
: * Assorted screwdrivers
: * Drill
: * RJ45 crimper to attach connectorsto the ends of the ethernet cable.
: * Some cameras come with a slightly different cable with a separate 12V socket for power input, as shown [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/images/d/dc/Alternatecable.jpg here]. If the power input port has a small cap, you can cover it and use the PoE on the ethernet port. If it is open, you need a pair of PoE adapters (seen in that picture in the background).
: * '''VLC''' software: To test and focus the camera, you must have this software. It is preinstalled on the Pi, but it also is available for Mac, Windows, or Linux from [https://www.videolan.org/vlc/ VideoLan].

At this point, you have completed this section or you are waiting for parts. It is a good time to review the instructions for building the camera or to actually begin the process. Either way - have fun!

[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Build_%26_Install_%26_Setup_your_camera_-_The_complete_how-to Back to the signpost page.]

Shopping list and tools needed

2025-09-30T14:53:23Z

Dvida: /* Cooled housing for Raspberry Pi */

Ordering the correct components is the most important aspect of your camera build. Review the entire list and make sure you order the correct options. If you are not sure, posta question in the forums. You also should review the list of tools to identify what may be missing.

= Parts and tools =
[[File:01_annotated.jpg|thumb|right|Annotated Parts List]]

Click the image to the right to see a larger version of the parts and tools.

# IMX291 sensor board (IMX307 sensor board if IMX291 sensor board is sold out)
# Lens with the lens holder - 4mm, 6mm are M16 mount as pictured, while other lenses might be CS which have a different holder
# 2x M2 screws, 6mm long - for mounting lens holder
# Camera housing
# Small cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Large cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Camera Power over Ethernet (PoE) cable (sometimes called a network cable by the sellers)
# Camera board holder (supplied with the housing)
# Holder metal plate (supplied with the housing)
# 4x M2 screws, 12 mm long for mounting camera module to bracket
# 1x M3-.50 screw, 6mm long for mounting camera module L-bracket to base plate
# Metal plate screws (supplied with the housing)
# Transparent weatherproof silicone
# Housing mounting bracket (supplied with the housing)
# Waterproof ethernet cable protector
# PoE injector to supply 48v to the camera (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi 5 (recommended) or Raspberry Pi 4 Model B 2GB (minimum) with official power supply (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi housing (not shown)
# 128 GB or greater microSD card (not shown)
# Self-amalgamating tape (not shown)

= Purchasing parts =
For consistency across the network and to facilitate collaborative support, it is best to use only the camera and lens listed below, instead of assembling alternatives only because they are conveniently available. The selected camera and lenses are proven and known to work well. Feel free to source other components from any convenient seller.

Many components, such as the Pi and microSD cards, are are available from many vendors. However, AliExpress (the Chinese equivalent of eBay) is the preferred online source for a lens, camera, and housing. AliExpress serves most of the globe and has been reliably suppling parts for a long time.

: '''NOTE:''' Links are to current sellers but inventory levels can vary. If a link is dead or the seller is out of stock, you should be able to find an equivalent from other sellers on AliExpress.

== Sensor ==
The bare IP security camera selected for the RMS system features a Sony IMX291, available from many sellers on AliExpress. Of the options offered, choose ''With 48V POE cable'' and ''No lens''.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002315913099.html IMX-291 Hi3516Cv300]

If the IMX-291 camera is sold out from that vendor and you cannot find another IMX-291 vendor, you may be able to locate a suitable IMX-307 sensor.
: '''NOTE:''' Many vendors sell IMX-307 sensor boards that are not suited for nighttime meteor recording. It is important to buy the correct IMX-307 because only a specific hardware version combined with a specific firmware version work correctly to record meteors.

One RMS/GMN tester offered these thoughts:

* The only IMX-307 worth trying is the Hangzhou Jiefeng Technology GK7205V210, aka IVG-G3S, which is distinguishable by a white square on the board. I do not recommend a blanket ‘get-any-IMX-307’ statement for new cameras because sensor boards can be very different from each other.

* The only acceptable IMX-307 sensor boards I've found includes the firmware version:
: V5.00.R02.000739AG.10010.140400.00'''20000'''.

* A firmware version with a similar number is NOT acceptable:
: V5.00.R02.000739AG.10010.140400.00'''20010'''.

* Here is a link to Hangzhou Jiefeng Technology: [https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256805867050500.html Hangzhou Jiefeng Technology].

* When you place an order, it is best to specify the characteristics of the IMX-307. For example, your request could be something like this:
: ''GK7205V210 (IVG-G3S), with white square on circuit board, and firmware version V5.00.R02.000739AG.10010.140400.0020000''.

: '''IMPORTANT:''' These recommendations are likely to change over time, so you should check our parts list and vendor recommendations before you place an order.

== Lens ==

: '''IMPORTANT:''' Buy a lens separately and select only from these options.

Most cameras available on AliExpress are sold with a choice of lenses. The preferred lens is a 4mm f/0.95 M16 lens, which provides a ~88x45° field of view (FOV). The lens also is available separately at this link.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32876034491.html 4mm f/0.95 M16].

Alternative lenses (4mm and 6 mm) are available here:
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005003145991079.html 4mm OR 6mm f/0.95 M16]

If you live in an area with heavy light pollution, other options are available. We recommend using only lenses from the [[Lens Options|following list]]. Other options may not be as sensitive or may have significant distortions. See [[Lens Options|this page for more lens options]].

== Housing ==
A security camera housing provides weather-tight protection without the distortion of a plastic dome. From the options offered, select ''Plate and Bracket''. The plate holds a 38x38mm bare IP camera module on an L-shaped mounting bracket.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32355130687.html IP66 CCTV Camera Housing with Plate and Bracket]

This combination also provides a pair of cable glands and some essential screws.

== Power over Ethernet (PoE) injector, PoE switch (optional), and PoE replacement camera side cables (optional, but recommended) ==

This combination uses network cables to connect the Raspberry Pi and the camera sensor, and injects 48V DC into the network cable to power the camera. From the list, select a plug style that is appropriate for your location.

This is an example of plug styles available.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002704227705.html PoE Injector 48V 0.5A]

: '''NOTE:''' Over short cable lengths (up to about 5m), you also can use plain PoE connectors. These connectors feed 12V from a power supply into the ethernet and extract it at the other end. Over short distances, this configuration can supply the camera with adequate power without the need for 48V injectors.

If you operate several cameras, you can use a PoE ''switch'' instead of a PoE ''injector'', and connect all the cameras to your network.

: '''NOTE:''' You must source a PoE switch locally.
: [https://www.tendacn.com/product/tef1110p-8-63w.html TEF1110P-8-63W 10-Port 10/100M Desktop Switch with 8-Port PoE]

: '''GOOD PRACTICE:''' Maintain one or more spare PoE camera side cables.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/4001297174234.html Poe cable - Select RJ45 or RJ45DC]

'''Alternative cable'''

The picture shows only two connectors, but you will receive all connectors needed for the IMX291 board:
* 1 pcs 2pin port (2.0mm)
* 1 pcs 4pin port (1.25mm)
* 1 pcs 6pin port (1.25mm)
* 1 pcs 8pin port (1.25mm))

: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002598310068.html Poe Cable]

== Cooled housing for Raspberry Pi ==

Please buy one of the two cases below. We have tried many others, but they are not as good.

* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32959825297.html Fan-cooled case.] It has relatively quiet fans, and it's sturdy. From the options offered, ensure you select one that says "for Pi 4" if you are using a Raspberry Pi 4, or "for Pi 3B Plus" if you are using a Raspberry Pi 3B+. '''IMPORTANT:''' There is a case variation that is fully enclosed and has no fans; do not select this option.

* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002510605065.html Passively cooled case.] It has no fan and so is silent without the need to replace fans in future. Many operators have found this one satisfactory if the Pi is operated in an air controlled environment.

If the Pi is in a hot environment, then choose the case with the fan. If silent operation is the priority, then go fanless but pay attention to the free circulation of air around the Pi.

For the Raspberry Pi 5, the OEM fan assembly should be purchased, which has a heat sync and fan speed controlled by the operating system as it responds to CPU temperature.

== Real time clock (RTC) for Raspberry Pi ==
: [[File:rtc.jpg|thumb|RTC installation|200px]]

Precise timing is essential for processing meteor data, and an RTC module assures that Raspberry Pi always has the precise time, even when power or internet is unreliable. AliExpress sells a pack of 10 but they are inexpensive, so you may want to share extras among other camera constructors in your area.

The AliExpress store lists two RTC modules - one labelled ''DS3231 module'' and another labelled ''mini DS3231 module''. Select the ''mini DS3231 module'' option, which is designed for the Raspberry Pi. (It has 5 pins and includes a battery.)
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32770348851.html DS3231 RTC]

After you plug the RTC into the Pi (see image on the right), verify that the current time is correct on the Pi, then open the terminal and run:

<pre>
sudo hwclock -w
</pre>

This command sets the current computer time to the RTC. When the Pi boots up, it reads the correct time from the RTC.

== Pin header ==

This pin raises the height of the Raspberry GPIO bins so the RTC sits proud of the Raspberry Pi case. You need only 1, but the pack of 20 costs only about a dollar.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32549850046.html Tall header pins]

== Network cabling ==

You need two lengths of network cabling, one (quite short) between the Raspberry Pi and the PoE injector, and the other between the PoE injector and the camera. You should be able to easily find both of these locally, but you also can order them from AliExpress.

Some people have found that a thin, flat network cable (shown in the figure) is useful to avoid drilling holes in walls or eaves when you want to snake a wire through a window or door. Regardless of you choice, additional sealant or insulation is required to seal the cable at the PoE connector of the camera.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002311509668.html Cat6 Flat Ethernet Cable]

== Waterproof cable connector ==

One end of the network cable is outdoors, connected to the PoE cable from the camera, so it must be sealed. (This connection carries data as well as 48V DC power.)

Place the waterproof connector over the end of the network cable connector, plug the network cable into the PoE cable on the camera, then lock the connector onto the end of the PoE cable.

: '''GOOD PRACTICE:''' For extra weatherproofing, wrap the connector in self-amalgamating tape.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32834472563.html RJ45 Waterproof Connector Cap]

== 128GB micro SD card or 256GB USB flash drive ==

You can use either an SD card and a USB flash drive, but there is no need to have both. You must have at least 64GB of storage, but 128GB is recommended because 20GB of data - or more - is collected every night. The card should be fast - Class 10 UHS-1 or better. As with the cables, you can purchase a card locally or [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32676225311.html from AliExpress].

: '''WARNING:''' There is an '''[https://photographylife.com/fake-memory-cards ongoing problem with the production and sale of fraudulent memory cards that misrepresent the available storage]'''. Even supplies from a reputable outlet can be affected, so you should test any card you purchase. The AliExpress link has been used successfully to obtain suitable micro SD cards. If you live in North America, Costco is a reliable local source.

If you prefer to use a USB flash drive, the [https://www.kingston.com/en/usb-flash-drives/datatraveler-kyson-high-performance-usb-flash-drive Kingston DataTraveler Kyson 256 GB] has been verified to work well. We recommend you source it locally or on [https://www.amazon.com/Kingston-DataTraveler-Kyson-256GB-DTKN/dp/B08KHZY581 amazon.com].

== Raspberry Pi 4 or 5 ==
You should be able to purchase these purchased locally as well as from a domestic online source. You must have at least a 2GB RAM model, and the Raspberry Pi Model 4B is now the minimum spec. Previously, a Raspberry Pi Model 3B+ was considered the minimum spec, but Pi3 does not have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers.

: '''NOTE:''' The Pi3 runs on Python 2. After July 1, 2025, we will no longer support this version.

: IMPORTANT:''' Purchase only the official 5.1V 3A 15.3W power supply to go with your Pi. Most problems with Raspberry Pi units can be traced to inadequate power supplies.

== Additional items and tools ==
* Micro-HDMI cable: Connect a RPi 4B to a monitor.
* M2 and M3 screw: You may find these locally but, in some places, they may be quite difficult to locate. You may want to order hardware from the [https://www.aliexpress.com/store/4714020?spm=a2g0o.detail.1000007.1.5fc666d9tN1f8i ScrewHome Store] on AliExpress. Each [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32981714992.html?spm=a2g0o.store_pc_groupList.8148356.10.be65539dLjPgfh packet of 50 M2x6mm, M2x12mm, and M3x6mm] machine screws costs only a few dollars.
* Silicone sealant: Seal the glass window and front screws in the housing.
* Self-amalgamating tape: Wrap and seal the cable connectors so they are weathertight.
* Tools:
: * Small wire cutters or a sharp knife
: * Assorted screwdrivers
: * Drill
: * RJ45 crimper to attach connectorsto the ends of the ethernet cable.
: * Some cameras come with a slightly different cable with a separate 12V socket for power input, as shown [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/images/d/dc/Alternatecable.jpg here]. If the power input port has a small cap, you can cover it and use the PoE on the ethernet port. If it is open, you need a pair of PoE adapters (seen in that picture in the background).
: * '''VLC''' software: To test and focus the camera, you must have this software. It is preinstalled on the Pi, but it also is available for Mac, Windows, or Linux from [https://www.videolan.org/vlc/ VideoLan].

At this point, you have completed this section or you are waiting for parts. It is a good time to review the instructions for building the camera or to actually begin the process. Either way - have fun!

[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Build_%26_Install_%26_Setup_your_camera_-_The_complete_how-to Back to the signpost page.]

Shopping list and tools needed

2025-09-30T14:30:02Z

Dvida: /* Cooled housing for Raspberry Pi */

Ordering the correct components is the most important aspect of your camera build. Review the entire list and make sure you order the correct options. If you are not sure, posta question in the forums. You also should review the list of tools to identify what may be missing.

= Parts and tools =
[[File:01_annotated.jpg|thumb|right|Annotated Parts List]]

Click the image to the right to see a larger version of the parts and tools.

# IMX291 sensor board (IMX307 sensor board if IMX291 sensor board is sold out)
# Lens with the lens holder - 4mm, 6mm are M16 mount as pictured, while other lenses might be CS which have a different holder
# 2x M2 screws, 6mm long - for mounting lens holder
# Camera housing
# Small cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Large cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Camera Power over Ethernet (PoE) cable (sometimes called a network cable by the sellers)
# Camera board holder (supplied with the housing)
# Holder metal plate (supplied with the housing)
# 4x M2 screws, 12 mm long for mounting camera module to bracket
# 1x M3-.50 screw, 6mm long for mounting camera module L-bracket to base plate
# Metal plate screws (supplied with the housing)
# Transparent weatherproof silicone
# Housing mounting bracket (supplied with the housing)
# Waterproof ethernet cable protector
# PoE injector to supply 48v to the camera (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi 5 (recommended) or Raspberry Pi 4 Model B 2GB (minimum) with official power supply (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi housing (not shown)
# 128 GB or greater microSD card (not shown)
# Self-amalgamating tape (not shown)

= Purchasing parts =
For consistency across the network and to facilitate collaborative support, it is best to use only the camera and lens listed below, instead of assembling alternatives only because they are conveniently available. The selected camera and lenses are proven and known to work well. Feel free to source other components from any convenient seller.

Many components, such as the Pi and microSD cards, are are available from many vendors. However, AliExpress (the Chinese equivalent of eBay) is the preferred online source for a lens, camera, and housing. AliExpress serves most of the globe and has been reliably suppling parts for a long time.

: '''NOTE:''' Links are to current sellers but inventory levels can vary. If a link is dead or the seller is out of stock, you should be able to find an equivalent from other sellers on AliExpress.

== Sensor ==
The bare IP security camera selected for the RMS system features a Sony IMX291, available from many sellers on AliExpress. Of the options offered, choose ''With 48V POE cable'' and ''No lens''.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002315913099.html IMX-291 Hi3516Cv300]

If the IMX-291 camera is sold out from that vendor and you cannot find another IMX-291 vendor, you may be able to locate a suitable IMX-307 sensor.
: '''NOTE:''' Many vendors sell IMX-307 sensor boards that are not suited for nighttime meteor recording. It is important to buy the correct IMX-307 because only a specific hardware version combined with a specific firmware version work correctly to record meteors.

One RMS/GMN tester offered these thoughts:

* The only IMX-307 worth trying is the Hangzhou Jiefeng Technology GK7205V210, aka IVG-G3S, which is distinguishable by a white square on the board. I do not recommend a blanket ‘get-any-IMX-307’ statement for new cameras because sensor boards can be very different from each other.

* The only acceptable IMX-307 sensor boards I've found includes the firmware version:
: V5.00.R02.000739AG.10010.140400.00'''20000'''.

* A firmware version with a similar number is NOT acceptable:
: V5.00.R02.000739AG.10010.140400.00'''20010'''.

* Here is a link to Hangzhou Jiefeng Technology: [https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256805867050500.html Hangzhou Jiefeng Technology].

* When you place an order, it is best to specify the characteristics of the IMX-307. For example, your request could be something like this:
: ''GK7205V210 (IVG-G3S), with white square on circuit board, and firmware version V5.00.R02.000739AG.10010.140400.0020000''.

: '''IMPORTANT:''' These recommendations are likely to change over time, so you should check our parts list and vendor recommendations before you place an order.

== Lens ==

: '''IMPORTANT:''' Buy a lens separately and select only from these options.

Most cameras available on AliExpress are sold with a choice of lenses. The preferred lens is a 4mm f/0.95 M16 lens, which provides a ~88x45° field of view (FOV). The lens also is available separately at this link.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32876034491.html 4mm f/0.95 M16].

Alternative lenses (4mm and 6 mm) are available here:
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005003145991079.html 4mm OR 6mm f/0.95 M16]

If you live in an area with heavy light pollution, other options are available. We recommend using only lenses from the [[Lens Options|following list]]. Other options may not be as sensitive or may have significant distortions. See [[Lens Options|this page for more lens options]].

== Housing ==
A security camera housing provides weather-tight protection without the distortion of a plastic dome. From the options offered, select ''Plate and Bracket''. The plate holds a 38x38mm bare IP camera module on an L-shaped mounting bracket.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32355130687.html IP66 CCTV Camera Housing with Plate and Bracket]

This combination also provides a pair of cable glands and some essential screws.

== Power over Ethernet (PoE) injector, PoE switch (optional), and PoE replacement camera side cables (optional, but recommended) ==

This combination uses network cables to connect the Raspberry Pi and the camera sensor, and injects 48V DC into the network cable to power the camera. From the list, select a plug style that is appropriate for your location.

This is an example of plug styles available.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002704227705.html PoE Injector 48V 0.5A]

: '''NOTE:''' Over short cable lengths (up to about 5m), you also can use plain PoE connectors. These connectors feed 12V from a power supply into the ethernet and extract it at the other end. Over short distances, this configuration can supply the camera with adequate power without the need for 48V injectors.

If you operate several cameras, you can use a PoE ''switch'' instead of a PoE ''injector'', and connect all the cameras to your network.

: '''NOTE:''' You must source a PoE switch locally.
: [https://www.tendacn.com/product/tef1110p-8-63w.html TEF1110P-8-63W 10-Port 10/100M Desktop Switch with 8-Port PoE]

: '''GOOD PRACTICE:''' Maintain one or more spare PoE camera side cables.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/4001297174234.html Poe cable - Select RJ45 or RJ45DC]

'''Alternative cable'''

The picture shows only two connectors, but you will receive all connectors needed for the IMX291 board:
* 1 pcs 2pin port (2.0mm)
* 1 pcs 4pin port (1.25mm)
* 1 pcs 6pin port (1.25mm)
* 1 pcs 8pin port (1.25mm))

: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002598310068.html Poe Cable]

== Cooled housing for Raspberry Pi ==

Please buy one of the two cases below. We have tried many others, but they are not as good.

* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32959825297.html Fan-cooled case.] It has relatively quiet fans, and it's sturdy. From the options offered, ensure you select one that says "for Pi 4" if you are using a Raspberry Pi 4, or "for Pi 3B Plus" if you are using a Raspberry Pi 3B+. '''IMPORTANT:''' There is a case variation that is fully enclosed and has no fans; do not select this option.

* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002510605065.html Passively cooled case.] It has no fan and so is silent without the need to replace fans in future. Many operators have found this one satisfactory if the Pi is operated in an air controlled environment.

If the Pi is in a hot environment, then choose the case with the fan. If silent operation is the priority, then go fanless but pay attention to the free circulation of air around the Pi.

== Real time clock (RTC) for Raspberry Pi ==
: [[File:rtc.jpg|thumb|RTC installation|200px]]

Precise timing is essential for processing meteor data, and an RTC module assures that Raspberry Pi always has the precise time, even when power or internet is unreliable. AliExpress sells a pack of 10 but they are inexpensive, so you may want to share extras among other camera constructors in your area.

The AliExpress store lists two RTC modules - one labelled ''DS3231 module'' and another labelled ''mini DS3231 module''. Select the ''mini DS3231 module'' option, which is designed for the Raspberry Pi. (It has 5 pins and includes a battery.)
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32770348851.html DS3231 RTC]

After you plug the RTC into the Pi (see image on the right), verify that the current time is correct on the Pi, then open the terminal and run:

<pre>
sudo hwclock -w
</pre>

This command sets the current computer time to the RTC. When the Pi boots up, it reads the correct time from the RTC.

== Pin header ==

This pin raises the height of the Raspberry GPIO bins so the RTC sits proud of the Raspberry Pi case. You need only 1, but the pack of 20 costs only about a dollar.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32549850046.html Tall header pins]

== Network cabling ==

You need two lengths of network cabling, one (quite short) between the Raspberry Pi and the PoE injector, and the other between the PoE injector and the camera. You should be able to easily find both of these locally, but you also can order them from AliExpress.

Some people have found that a thin, flat network cable (shown in the figure) is useful to avoid drilling holes in walls or eaves when you want to snake a wire through a window or door. Regardless of you choice, additional sealant or insulation is required to seal the cable at the PoE connector of the camera.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002311509668.html Cat6 Flat Ethernet Cable]

== Waterproof cable connector ==

One end of the network cable is outdoors, connected to the PoE cable from the camera, so it must be sealed. (This connection carries data as well as 48V DC power.)

Place the waterproof connector over the end of the network cable connector, plug the network cable into the PoE cable on the camera, then lock the connector onto the end of the PoE cable.

: '''GOOD PRACTICE:''' For extra weatherproofing, wrap the connector in self-amalgamating tape.
: [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32834472563.html RJ45 Waterproof Connector Cap]

== 128GB micro SD card or 256GB USB flash drive ==

You can use either an SD card and a USB flash drive, but there is no need to have both. You must have at least 64GB of storage, but 128GB is recommended because 20GB of data - or more - is collected every night. The card should be fast - Class 10 UHS-1 or better. As with the cables, you can purchase a card locally or [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32676225311.html from AliExpress].

: '''WARNING:''' There is an '''[https://photographylife.com/fake-memory-cards ongoing problem with the production and sale of fraudulent memory cards that misrepresent the available storage]'''. Even supplies from a reputable outlet can be affected, so you should test any card you purchase. The AliExpress link has been used successfully to obtain suitable micro SD cards. If you live in North America, Costco is a reliable local source.

If you prefer to use a USB flash drive, the [https://www.kingston.com/en/usb-flash-drives/datatraveler-kyson-high-performance-usb-flash-drive Kingston DataTraveler Kyson 256 GB] has been verified to work well. We recommend you source it locally or on [https://www.amazon.com/Kingston-DataTraveler-Kyson-256GB-DTKN/dp/B08KHZY581 amazon.com].

== Raspberry Pi 4 or 5 ==
You should be able to purchase these purchased locally as well as from a domestic online source. You must have at least a 2GB RAM model, and the Raspberry Pi Model 4B is now the minimum spec. Previously, a Raspberry Pi Model 3B+ was considered the minimum spec, but Pi3 does not have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers.

: '''NOTE:''' The Pi3 runs on Python 2. After July 1, 2025, we will no longer support this version.

: IMPORTANT:''' Purchase only the official 5.1V 3A 15.3W power supply to go with your Pi. Most problems with Raspberry Pi units can be traced to inadequate power supplies.

== Additional items and tools ==
* Micro-HDMI cable: Connect a RPi 4B to a monitor.
* M2 and M3 screw: You may find these locally but, in some places, they may be quite difficult to locate. You may want to order hardware from the [https://www.aliexpress.com/store/4714020?spm=a2g0o.detail.1000007.1.5fc666d9tN1f8i ScrewHome Store] on AliExpress. Each [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32981714992.html?spm=a2g0o.store_pc_groupList.8148356.10.be65539dLjPgfh packet of 50 M2x6mm, M2x12mm, and M3x6mm] machine screws costs only a few dollars.
* Silicone sealant: Seal the glass window and front screws in the housing.
* Self-amalgamating tape: Wrap and seal the cable connectors so they are weathertight.
* Tools:
: * Small wire cutters or a sharp knife
: * Assorted screwdrivers
: * Drill
: * RJ45 crimper to attach connectorsto the ends of the ethernet cable.
: * Some cameras come with a slightly different cable with a separate 12V socket for power input, as shown [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/images/d/dc/Alternatecable.jpg here]. If the power input port has a small cap, you can cover it and use the PoE on the ethernet port. If it is open, you need a pair of PoE adapters (seen in that picture in the background).
: * '''VLC''' software: To test and focus the camera, you must have this software. It is preinstalled on the Pi, but it also is available for Mac, Windows, or Linux from [https://www.videolan.org/vlc/ VideoLan].

At this point, you have completed this section or you are waiting for parts. It is a good time to review the instructions for building the camera or to actually begin the process. Either way - have fun!

[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Build_%26_Install_%26_Setup_your_camera_-_The_complete_how-to Back to the signpost page.]

Shopping list and tools needed

2025-07-11T16:03:06Z

Dvida: /* Lens */

Howdy! This is the most important section (as all the preparation steps are), please have a look at the list of parts you will need, order the correct ones with the correct options and if you are not sure just ask in the forums. Once ordered, you may wish to have a look at the tools that are required and make sure you have them at your disposal.

= Parts and Tools needed =
[[File:01_annotated.jpg|thumb|right|Annotated Parts List]]

Click on the image to the right to see a larger version with the parts labelled

# IMX291 sensor board (IMX307 sensor board if IMX291 sensor board is sold out)
# Lens with the lens holder - 4mm, 6mm are M16 mount as pictured, while other lenses might be CS which have a different holder
# 2x M2 screws, 6mm long - for mounting lens holder
# Camera housing
# Small cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Large cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Camera Power over Ethernet (PoE) cable (sometimes called a network cable by the sellers)
# Camera board holder (supplied with the housing)
# Holder metal plate (supplied with the housing)
# 4x M2 screws, 12 mm long - for mounting camera module to bracket
# 1x M3-.50 screw, 6mm long - for mounting camera module L-bracket to base plate
# Metal plate screws (supplied with the housing)
# Transparent weatherproof silicone
# Housing mounting bracket (supplied with the housing)
# Waterproof ethernet cable protector
# PoE injector to supply 48v to the camera (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi 5 (recommended) or Raspberry Pi 4 Model B 2GB (minimum) with official power supply (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi housing (not shown)
# 128 GB or greater microSD card (not shown)
# Self-amalgamating tape (not shown)

= Purchasing Parts =
For consistency across the network and to make collaborative support possible, it is recommended that the camera and lenses listed below are used in preference to random handy bits that are cobbled together. The selected components are proven and known to work well. Other components can be sourced from any convenient seller.

Many components such as the Pi and microSD cards are are readily available in most locations. For other items such as lens, camera and housing, AliExpress - the Chinese equivalent of eBay - is the preferred online source as it serves most of the globe and has been reliably suppling parts to date.

NB: Links are given to current sellers, but stock levels vary and if the link is dead or the seller is out of stock, you should be able to find an equivalent from another seller on AliExpress.

== Sensor ==
The bare IP security camera featuring a Sony IMX291 has been selected for the RMS system. This is available from many sellers on AliExpress. Out of the options offered, choose "With 48V POE cable" and "No lens":
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002315913099.html IMX291 Hi3516Cv300]

In case IMX291 is sold out, feel free to buy IMX307 sensor board. Out of the options offered, choose "With 48V POE cable" and "No lens":
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002676397053.html IMX307 Hi3516Ev100]

Always buy a lens separately from the list in the following section.

== Lens ==
Most cameras available on Aliexpress come with a choice of lenses. The preferred lens is a 4mm f/0.95 M16 lens providing ~88x45° field of view, which can also be bought separately for example via this link.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32876034491.html 4mm f/0.95 M16]
Alternative lenses (4mm and 6 mm) are available here:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005003145991079.html 4mm OR 6mm f/0.95 M16]

If you live in an area with heavy light pollution, other options are available. We wholeheartedly recommend only using lenses from the [[Lens Options|following list]], as others might not be as sensitive or might have large distortion. See [[Lens Options|this page for more lens options]].

== Housing ==
A security camera housing is used, providing weather-tight protection without distortion introduced by plastic domes. From the options offered, select "Plate and Bracket" to get a plate for mounting a 38x38mm bare IP camera module, and an L-shaped mounting bracket.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32355130687.html IP66 CCTV Camera Housing with Plate and Bracket] This will also provide a pair of cable glands and some essential screws.

== Power Over Ethernet Injector, PoE Switch (Optional) and PoE replacement camera side cables (Optional, but recommended) ==
This connects by network cables to both the Raspberry Pi and the camera sensor, and injects 48V DC onto the network cable to the camera to supply it with power. Pick a suitable plug style for your location from the options offered. An example unit is:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002704227705.html PoE Injector 48V 0.5A]

Note that over short lengths of up to about 5m you can also use plain PoE connectors. These simply feed 12V from a power supply into the ethernet and extract it at the other end. Over short distances this will supply the camera with adequate power without the need for 48V injectors.

Finally, if you are operating several cameras, you can use a PoE switch instead of a PoE injector and connect all the cameras to your network - '''please source locally'''.
* [https://www.tendacn.com/product/tef1110p-8-63w.html TEF1110P-8-63W 10-Port 10/100M Desktop Switch with 8-Port PoE]

It is a good idea to keep a replacement PoE camera side cable or two:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/4001297174234.html Poe cable - Select RJ45 or RJ45DC]
Alternative cable - please note that in the picture just 2 connectors are visible, but you will receive all the connectors needed for IMX291 board (1 pcs 2pin port (2.0mm), 1 pcs 4pin port (1.25mm), 1 pcs 6pin port (1.25mm), 1 pcs 8pin port (1.25mm)):
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002598310068.html Poe Cable]

== Cooled Housing for Raspberry Pi ==
This is one of the rare cases that fulfills our needs. It has a fan which is relatively quiet, it’s sturdy, and it can fit the RTC with the addition of riser pins. '''Please buy this case''', we have tried many others, but they are not as good. From the options offered, make sure you select one that says "for Pi 4" if you are using a Raspberry Pi 4, or "for Pi 3B Plus" if you are using a Raspbery Pi 3B+. Additionally there is a case variation that is fully enclosed and has no fans; do not select this option.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32959825297.html Raspberry Pi Aluminium Enclosure with fans]

== Real Time Clock for Raspberry Pi ==
[[File:rtc.jpg|thumb|RTC installation|200px]]

Very precise timing is essential to processing the meteor data, so unless you are confident in your internet connection an RTC module ensures the Raspberry Pi always has the precise time, even when power or internet is unreliable. AliExpress sells a pack of 10 but they are inexpensive - maybe share the extras among other camera constructors in your area. The AliExpress store lists two RTC modules, one labelled "DS3231 module" and the other "mini DS3231 module." Select the "mini DS3231 module" option; it is designed for the Raspberry Pi. It has 5 pins and includes a battery.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32770348851.html DS3231 RTC]

Once you plug it into the Pi (see image on the right) and make sure the current time is correct on the Pi, open the terminal and run:

<pre>
sudo hwclock -w
</pre>

This will set the current computer time to the RTC. Every time the Pi boots up, it will read the correct time from the RTC.

== Pin Headers ==
Required to raise the height of the Raspberry GPIO bins to allow the RTC to sit proud of the Raspberry Pi case. You only need 1 but the pack of 20 is available for only a dollar or so.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32549850046.html Tall header pins]

== Network cabling ==
You will need two lengths of network cabling, one (probably quite short) between the Raspberry Pi and the PoE injector and the other between the PoE injector and the camera. You can purchase suitable lengths locally or on AliExpress. Some people have found the following thin flat network cable to be useful for sneaking the wire through a window or door to avoid drilling holes in walls or eaves, although it will require some extra attention to seal the cable at the camera's PoE connector:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002311509668.html Cat6 Flat Ethernet Cable]

== Waterproof Cable Connector ==
One end of the network cable will be outside, connected into the PoE cable from the camera. This is not only carrying data but 48V DC power and needs to be kept sealed. This waterproof connector is fitted over the end of the network cable connector then after the network cable is plugged into the camera's PoE cable, the connector is locked into the end of the PoE cable. For extra weatherproofing, wrap in self-amalgamating tape.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32834472563.html RJ45 Waterproof Connector Cap]

== 128GB Micro SD Card or 256GB USB flash disk ==

You may choose between an SD card and a USB flash disk, no need to have both.

You need at least a 64GB card but a 128GB is recommended as 20+ GB of data is collected every night. Make sure it is a fast card eg Class 10 UHS-1 or better. A card can either be purchased locally or [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32676225311.html from AliExpress]. Be warned that there is an [https://photographylife.com/fake-memory-cards ongoing problem with the production and sale of fraudulent memory cards misreporting the available storage] and even supplies from a reputable outlet can be affected - test the card you purchase. The AliExpress link has been used successfully to obtain suitable micro SD cards. If you live in North America, buy your SD cards at Costco.

If you want to go for a USB flash disk, this one is verified to work well [https://www.kingston.com/en/usb-flash-drives/datatraveler-kyson-high-performance-usb-flash-drive Kingston DataTraveler Kyson 256 GB]. We recommend you source it locally, for the reference the link to get it on [https://www.amazon.com/Kingston-DataTraveler-Kyson-256GB-DTKN/dp/B08KHZY581 amazon.com]

== Raspberry Pi 4 or 5 ==
These are likely to be available to be purchased locally or from a domestic online source. You need at least a 2GB RAM model. The Raspberry Pi Model 4B is now the minimum spec. Previously, a Raspberry Pi Model 3B+ was considered the minimum but these do not have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers. Also, the Pi3 is stuck on Python 2 for which we will drop support on July 1, 2025.

Purchase the official 5.1V 3A 15.3W power supply to go with your Pi - most problems with Raspberry Pi units are due to inadequate power supplies being used instead of purchasing the official power pack. Note: to connect a RPi 4B to a monitor you will also need a micro-HDMI cable, so that might be necessary to add to the shopping cart also.

== Additional items and tools ==
* Source suitable M2 and M3 screws. It might be possible to find these locally but in some places they are just odd enough to be quite hard to find. You could order some hardware from the [https://www.aliexpress.com/store/4714020?spm=a2g0o.detail.1000007.1.5fc666d9tN1f8i ScrewHome Store] on AliExpress. Each [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32981714992.html?spm=a2g0o.store_pc_groupList.8148356.10.be65539dLjPgfh packet of 50 M2x6mm, M2x12mm, and M3x6mm] machine screws will cost only a few dollars.
* A tube of silicone sealant is used to seal the glass window for the housing and the front screws in the housing.
* Self-amalgamating tape can be used to wrap and seal the cable connector(s) to ensure they remain weathertight in all conditions.
* Tools such as small wire cutters or a sharp knife, various sized screwdrivers, a drill and screws to mount the camera bracket will be required.
* RJ45 crimper tool to finish the ethernet cable will be needed.

Some cameras come with a slightly different cable with a separate 12V socket for power input as shown [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/images/d/dc/Alternatecable.jpg here].
If the power input port has a small cap, then you can just cover it and use the PoE on the ethernet port. If it's open, then you will need a pair of PoE adapters (seen in that picture in the background).

To test and focus the camera you will need VLC. This software is preinstalled on the Pi but is also available for Mac, Windows or Linux from [https://www.videolan.org/vlc/ here].

You are now done with this section or you are waiting for the parts. Anyway, you may proceed to have a look at the build of the camera itself or to start actually building it. Have fun! [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Build_%26_Install_%26_Setup_your_camera_-_The_complete_how-to Back to the signpost page.]

The last steps

2025-06-01T22:20:01Z

Dvida: /* Determining the location of the camera */

Ahoj! In this section, you will put your camera into the production stream on the server side by finishing configuration of RMS software in Linux.

= Automated setup via script =
The script will guide you through this process, but you will need these in advance:
*'''Station code''' - you have requested it previously - if not please do so now by sending an email to denis.vida@gmail.com with a short introduction, stating that you are building the camera, stating from which country you are and asking for the station code. You will need it later when setting up the RMS software once your camera is fully installed and positioned.
*'''GPS coordinates of your camera''' - see the script, it is explaining how to obtain these or scroll down and check the section *Determining the location of the camera*

Once you got this information, proceed with the automated configuration script.

This is what you should see when you boot your Raspberry Pi and connect to it via VNC (or AnyDesk):
[[File:The_first_boot_raspi.png|1500px|center]]

Follow the instructions on the screen:
*Press Q to continue
*Press ENTER to continue

Now the script will explain what lies ahead of you:
[[File:The_first_boot_raspi_1.png|1500px|center]]

Follow the instructions on the screen:
*If you have flashed this SD card yourself, press ENTER.

Now the script will open a new window and give you exact instructions on how to expand the filesystem (to use the full capacity of the SD card/USB key). Follow these instructions:
[[File:The_first_boot_raspi_2.png|1500px|center]]

Now wait for the boot of your Raspberry Pi and once it is up, connect to it the usual way. Unfortunately, you will need to do all the previous steps except for the Filesystem expansion, where instead of pressing ENTER, you will press Q this time and then the script will check its Internet connection and asks you to change the password - please do so, use a strong password and save it in your favourite Password manager (e.g. KeePass). You will be asked to provide the current password, which is "rmsraspberry" without quotes.
[[File:The_first_boot_raspi_3.png|1500px|center]]

Now the SSH keys used to upload data to the GMN server will be generated - press ENTER, and wait until the SSH keys are generated. Send the SSH key to denis.vida@gmail.com as per instructions (if you are not sure, see the *Generating an SSH key*section below), you can reply to the email where you have received your station code.
[[File:The_first_boot_raspi_4.png|1500px|center]]

Press ENTER to continue. Now the RMS will update itself, please wait until done (this may take some time depending on the speed of your internet connection). Once it is done press ENTER to open the configuration file:
[[File:The_first_boot_raspi_5.png|1500px|center]]

A new window is open, move it and enlarge it so you have a better view. Edit your station code, latitude, longitude and elevation.

[[File:The_first_boot_raspi_6.png|1500px|center]]

Then save the file by clicking File -> Save (or CTRL + S) and close the window File -> Close window (or CTRL + Q). Then the RMS software will be started and you are ready for your first capture. It will look like this:
[[File:The_first_boot_raspi_7.png|1500px|center]]

Now you are finished with this section and you may scroll down the page or proceed directly there: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Build_%26_Install_%26_Setup_your_camera_-_The_complete_how-to Back to the signpost page.]

= Manual setup via command line =

== Capture software ==
The recording program is called RMS.StartCapture. A script that auto-updates the code is called RMS_FirstRun and it will start automatically when the RPi boots up, after which the recording loop will start. Note that during the update procedure, the config file will be reset. Please wait until the update is done, and your old config file will be copied back.

The capture will automatically start with sundown and stop with sunrise, although this is very dependent on the correct location of the camera being entered in the configuration file (see the Configuration section below).
Configuration
Changing the system password
If you haven’t changed your password during the initial configuration through the terminal window, so we strongly recommend that you change it.

== How to do it: ==
Boot up your RPi.
Open the terminal by clicking Start (RPi icon) → Accessories → Terminal
In the window that pops up, type passwd and press enter.
You will be asked to enter your current password - which is raspberry or rmsraspberry - and then your new password. Keep this new password in a secure place.

== Determining the location of the camera ==
To participate in the network, you will need a unique station code. We will generate one for you once you let us know the exact geographical location of the camera. Measuring the precise location of the camera is very important for triangulating meteor trajectories - the location of your camera will not be shared with anyone without your consent.

How to do it:
Even though GPS apps on your smartphone *claim* they're accurate to about 3 m, they can often be off 10x as much. The best source of coordinates is Google Earth, which provides an excellent estimate of terrain elevation. The final elevation should be terrain + height of the camera above the ground.
Please use the precision for the longitude and latitude of at least 5 decimal places (or to within one “), and the elevation to a meter.

=== Note about measuring elevation ===

The RMS config file expects height above the EGM96 geoid (mean sea level). Most professional and older GPS devices provide height above the WGS84 ellipsoid. The difference between the two conventions can be up to 100 m, depending on where on the planet you are.

Most phone apps report in EGM96 (unless stated otherwise), but their elevations can be significantly off from the real value due to measurement uncertainty.
Google Earth uses the EGM96 geoid for its elevation data, which represents mean sea level, so Google Earth elevations are compatible with what RMS expects. It uses an elevation dataset measured from orbit using radar, which is very accurate.

If using a dedicated GPS device that outputs raw ellipsoidal heights (WGS84), you'll need to apply a geoid correction. There is a converter in RMS (RMS/EGM96GeoidHeight.py), but the easiest is just to use Google Earth + structure height.

Using the RMS utility:

To convert WGS84 Ellipsoid height to EGM96 Geoid AMSL height:

python -m RMS.GeoidHeightEGM96 --inverse <latitude> <longitude> <wgs84_height>
python -m RMS.GeoidHeightEGM96 --inverse 40.7128 -74.0060 100.5

To convert EGM96 Geoid AMSL height to WGS84 Ellipsoid height:

python -m RMS.GeoidHeightEGM96 <latitude> <longitude> <egm96_height>
python -m RMS.GeoidHeightEGM96 40.7128 -74.0060 133.52

It simply looks up the delta in a database (that's the only way the natural shape of the geoid is defined), interpolated for the exact position, and applies the delta.

== Generating an SSH key ==
Every morning all meteor detections from the previous night are uploaded to the server, where trajectories and orbits of meteors are estimated. The system uses a secure way of talking to our server at the University of Western Ontario, and for that to work you need to generate an SSH key for your RPi and send it to us.

How to do it:
Boot up your RPi
Open the terminal by clicking Start (RPi icon) → Accessories → Terminal
Type: ssh-keygen -t rsa -m PEM and press enter
You will be asked where to save the SSH key, but just press enter.
If it asks you to overwrite the existing key, type y and press enter.
You will be asked for a passphrase two times. Don’t type anything and just press enter both times.
Type cat ~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub and press enter.
Your SSH key will be printed to the terminal. The key starts with “ssh-rsa”, followed by a long string of characters, and it ends with “pi@raspberry”. Copy the whole key and send it to yourself via e-mail, or in any other way to keep it for later.

== Obtaining the station code ==
Send an e-mail to denis.vida@gmail.com with a short description of your camera, the country where the camera is located in, the geographical coordinates and the SSH key you have generated and copied in the step above. Also, send an approximate pointing of the camera - the azimuth measured from due North, and the elevation. You can measure the azimuth using a compass (or an compass app), and you can eyeball the elevation (0 degrees being the horizon, 90 degrees the zenith, i.e. straight up).
You will receive your unique station code within a period of several days at most. The station code consists of the ISO Alpha-2 country code followed by four alphanumeric characters, e.g. US00A2.

== Modifying the configuration file ==
Boot up your RPi
On the desktop there is a file called “RMS config”, open it.
Under the “[System]” section, write the station ID and the coordinates of your camera, which should look something like this:
[System]
stationID: CA0003
latitude: 42.7961 ; +N in degrees
longitude: -81.84219 ; +E in degrees
elevation: 312 ; meters

Make sure to leave a space before the semicolon at the end of the line! For example:
Good: latitude: 42.7961 ; +N in degrees
Bad: latitude: 42.7961; +N in degrees

Under the “[Upload]” section, change:

upload_enabled: false

To:

upload_enabled: true

Save the file by pressing File → Save.
All done!

= Making a detection mask =

If there is something in the field of view of the camera, e.g. a tree, a building, roof, etc., it may interfere with the detection. The way to fix this is to create a detection mask.

'''If you don’t have anything in your field of view, you don’t have to do anything!'''

{{#evt:
service=youtube
|id=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao3J9Jf0iLQ
|alignment=center
}}

Alternatively you may ask Denis to help you with the detection mask @ denis.vida@gmail.com.

= Calibration =

After the first clear night of operation, the system will image some stars. Let Denis know @ denis.vida@gmail.com that your station uploaded some good data to the server, and based on that we will generate an astrometric plate. The plate is basically a way of converting image coordinates to celestial coordinates, and you will need to put on your RPi once we send it to you. We will send you a platepar_cmn2010.cal file, just ask us for one!

Download the platepar_cmn2010.cal to your RPi.
Copy it into ~/source/RMS/
All done!
Your system will automatically calibrate the data it records every night, and this data will be used to estimate meteor trajectories and orbits on the server!

If you want to do the calibration yourself, you can do that yourself on your Raspberry Pi following this video - it is fun and you will try software called SkyFit2:

{{#evt:
service=youtube
|id=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao3J9Jf0iLQ
|alignment=center
}}

You are now done with this section and now you may proceed with the optional steps, please make sure to at least go through the optional steps. [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Build_%26_Install_%26_Setup_your_camera_-_The_complete_how-to Back to the signpost page.]

Images checksums

2025-05-02T20:47:03Z

Dvida:

'''32-bit Jessie'''<br>
12/03/2019 10:48 PM 8,436,842,496 RMS_image_20191203.img<br>
Checksum: 58F7B1D9E300630F0AE1A59FF5F33D98<br>
Size: 7.85 GB<br>

12/04/2019 06:03 PM 3,354,220,537 RMS_image_20191203.zip<br>
Checksum: 24186A4F3FB0A0458107AE36B984282E<br>
Size: 3.13 GB<br>

'''32-bit Buster'''<br>
08/04/2023 05:55 PM 3,096,073,608 RMS_RPi4_image_20230804.img.xz<br>
Checksum: 32D9D545BED5B428A9700661751E8D3E<br>
Size: 2.88 GB<br>

'''64-bit Bullseye'''<br>
04/29/2025 03:54 PM 3,548,309,916 RMS_RPi4Bullseye_image_20250429.img.xz<br>
Checksum: D5AB2F514078D8E446DCF1AABB3D3C55<br>
Size: 3.30 GB<br>

'''64-bit Bookworm'''<br>
09/10/2024 01:19 PM 3,117,049,056 RMS_RPi5Bookworm_image_20240910.img.xz<br>
Checksum: A0E1B6BDD757A66BA3BF93AB6C37E468<br>
Size: 2.90GB<br>

Return to the [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Installing_OS_onto_a_Raspberry_Pi Installing OS onto a Raspberry Pi.]

Installing OS onto a Raspberry Pi

2025-05-02T03:44:16Z

Dvida: /* Flash image onto a microSD card/USB flash disk */

Ahoj! In this section, you will flash (or install if you wish) an OS Linux onto your SD card or USB flash key and boot your Raspberry Pi for the first time.

= Install OS by flashing the image =
== Flash image onto a microSD card/USB flash disk ==

''' The process is the same for an microSD card or a USB flash key, just the target will differ. '''

# Download the image for your Raspberry Pi model from the list below and save it on the PC somewhere.
#:* If you have '''Raspberry Pi 4B''' we recommend you will download and use [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/projects/sd_card_images/RMS_RPi4Bullseye_image_20250429.img.xz this image]. It is based on Bullseye 64-bit.
#:* If you have '''Raspberry Pi 5''' download [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/projects/sd_card_images/RMS_RPi5Bookworm_image_20240910.img.xz this image]. It is based on Bookworm 64-bit and this is the only image working with Raspberry Pi 5. '''Please note''' that it can be used for Raspberry Pi 4B, but there are some things not working there (RTC module) and you'll need to install AnyDesk yourself, so we see no advantage in running this image on Raspberry Pi 4B at the moment.
#:* '''For archive purposes''', you can download the previous 32-bit image for Raspberry Pi 4B based on Buster 32-bit [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/projects/sd_card_images/RMS_RPi4_image_20230804.img.xz here]. This image is not maintained and you should use it only if you really need it and know what you are doing.
#:* In case of trouble with the images please contact the technical support group https://globalmeteornetwork.groups.io/g/techsupport. [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Images_checksums Here] you can find a list of checksums and sizes of images.
# Download [https://www.balena.io/etcher/ BalenaEtcher], if you haven’t done it yet. The process shown below uses BalenaEtcher as it is the simplest tool for beginners, but if you are familiar with another USB flashing utility (e.g. Rufus or Raspberry Pi Imager) feel free to use these. But if they don’t work for you, please fall back to BalenaEtcher and the process documented below.
# Note;if you're using RPi imager, select "Custom" for the OS then select the image you downloaded. You can also configure the hostname, wifi details and ssh key details via Custom Settings. Howver DO NOT change the username and password as those are baked into the image.
# Insert a microSD card or a USB flash disk into your PC, and note the letter it was assigned.
# Run BalenaEtcher, and flash the image file onto your microSD card/USB flash disk: Select Flash from file, find the image file and select it. As Target select your USB flash disk. Normally the system disks are hidden but verify the name, letter and size of your USB flash disk to be sure you have the correct target. Click Flash, once again verify the target and confirm it. Wait for the process to finish. (In case you will receive an error you may need to run BalenaEtcher as administrator)
# Eject the USB flash disk in Windows if necessary and then remove your microSD card/USB flash disk from your PC and insert it into your Raspberry Pi, which should be connected to a TV or Monitor, and have a keyboard and mouse connected. If you don't have a TV or monitor you can connect then see [[#Booting without a TV/Monitor|these instructions]].
# Wait for the boot. If the boot takes too long to occur, please have a look at the next section. If it booted successfully, follow the on-screen instructions.

This is what the selection should look like:
[[File:BalenaEtcher_selection.png|center]]

This is what the process should look like:
[[File:BalenaEtcher_process.png|center]]

== Pre-2021 Raspberry Pi 4 Bootloader update - an USB flash disk ONLY ==

If you encountered a problem booting Raspberry Pi 4 from a USB device (common for all USB devices, not only flash disks), the most probable reason is that your Raspberry Pi 4 is from an older batch and its bootloader has to be updated. The procedure is simple and you will need a blank small MicroSD card to continue, the data are around 1MB in size, so any small microSD card will do the job. The process is nicely described in [https://www.raspberrypi.com/documentation/computers/raspberry-pi.html#updating-the-bootloader the raspberry pi official documentation].

* In case you are looking for more extensive USB booting guide click [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Booting_from_a_USB_device here]

* the pre-installed RMS software images incorporate an auto-updating feature, so that the RMS software is updated to the current release whenever your Raspberry Pi RMS is booted. This way, your station is always running the most recent set of updates.

== The first boot ==

This is how the first boot of RMS linux looks like:
[[File:The_first_boot_raspi.png|1500px|center]]

Now it is good time to send an email to denis.vida@gmail.com with short introduction, stating that you are building the camera, stating from which country you are and asking for the station code. You will need it later when setting up the RMS software once your camera is fully installed and positioned.

= [OPTIONAL] Install the software from scratch =
''' This is for users who wish to perform more advanced tasks, if you have gone for the previous section, do not continue with the sections below '''
'''Note: if you're setting up a Raspberry Pi you should use the prebuilt image as this comes with all necessary software installed and is ready to use.'''. If you really really '''really''' do want to install on the RPi from scratch, you can follow the instructions on [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Advanced_RMS_installations_and_Multi-camera_support this page].

You are now done with this section and now you are going to focus your camera and put all bits and pieces together for the first test. Exciting, isn't it? [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Build_%26_Install_%26_Setup_your_camera_-_The_complete_how-to Back to the signpost page.]

= Booting without a TV/Monitor =
If you don't have a TV or monitor that you can connect to the Pi while setting it up, you can still proceed but you will need to use VNC, a remote-access tool.

After burning the SD card, insert it into the Pi and switch the power on. You should see the lights on the pi flicker for a minute or two - if not, then its possible the SD card image didn't burn properly.

Wait at least two or three minutes after the lights stop flickering. There are several stages to the initial boot so don't rush things.

While you're waiting, download '''[https://www.realvnc.com/en/connect/download/viewer/ VNC Viewer]'''. You do not need to create an account or subscribe so ignore the various buttons and links. After a few seconds the download will start and then you can install the software.

To connect to the Pi using VNC you will need to know either its name or its IP address. If you didn't set the hostname while burning the SD card (this is an option available in Raspberry Pi Imager), then its name will probably be 'raspberrypi'. Otherwise you can run a tool called '''[https://www.advanced-ip-scanner.com/ Advanced IP Scanner]''' to find its IP address using the manufacturer name which will start with Raspberry Pi.

Open VNC Viewer and type the name or IP address into the box at the top. After a few seconds you should get a login dialog. The username is "rms" and the initial password is "rmsraspberry". Make sure you change this as soon as you have logged in.

You should now see the Pi's desktop and RMS_FirstBoot window.

Main Page

2024-09-28T22:20:16Z

Dvida: /* Generating a Google Earth KML file to show your station's field of view */

Welcome to the Global Meteor Network's wiki page!

The Global Meteor Network (GMN) is a world wide organization of amateur and professional astronomers alike, whose goal is to observe the night sky using low-light video cameras and produce meteor trajectories in a coordinated manner. Here you will find information on the purpose and structure of the GMN, assembling and operating your own meteor camera, contributing to the development of RMS the GMN software, as well as information on how your observations as a citizen scientist can contribute to the further understanding of our solar system's formation and evolution.

'''<span style="color:red">If you have come here to find out how to build and setup a camera from scratch, jump ahead to [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Build_%26_Install_%26_Setup_your_camera_-_The_complete_how-to this] section!</span>'''

'''<span style="color:red">For German speakers, there is the Build camera from scratch documentation written by students of [https://fsg-preetz.de/ Friedrich-Schiller-Gymnasium in Preetz] available [http://wiki.linux-astronomie.de/doku.php?id=ceres here]. This version is maintained by Friedrich-Schiller-Gymnasium in Preetz. </span>'''

== Global Meteor Network Overview ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=141 Our mission] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=363 A brief history of the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Video introduction - Overview of the Global Meteor Network (IMC2020)] ===

=== [https://youtu.be/oM7lfQ4nmyw Video overview - Meteor tracking and the GMN from Astro Imaging Channel presentation] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ Some 'live' GMN data products] ===

== Meteor Detection Station ==

=== What is an RMS GMN station? ===
: A RMS-based GMN station that is the subject of this Wiki consists of a Raspberry Pi (RPi) single board computer, a low light level security video camera, and the RMS software package. The camera is securely mounted in a weatherproof housing, pointed at the sky, and connected to the RPi with a POE (Power Over Ethernet) cable. The RPi is connected to the Internet via WiFi, and to be a part of GMN network, you’ll need a fairly powerful Raspberry Pi (RPi 3B+, RPi 4 or better) and a reasonably fast Internet connection. The internet connection is primarily required to enable data upload to a central server each morning as well as provide automatic updates for the RMS software.

: Nightly, the RPi starts recording video from the camera shortly after local sunset continuously compressing and storing the video data locally. Each morning before sunrise, after capture is complete, the RPi analyzes the video and extracts your nightly station’s meteor observations. These extracted video “clips” of detected meteors are then archived and uploaded to a server. The clips can total hundreds of megabytes on a “busy” night (e.g., in a heavy meteor shower, or a night with a lot of false detections--progress is being made on the detection software). The server finds meteors which were observed with more than one station and this enables the server to triangulate the meteor trails in 3D and calculate the orbits of the meteors.

=== What do I need? ===

You'll need a Raspberry Pi with the software on, and a camera kit. We strongly recommend the Pi4 model. The software will run on a Pi3 but it is much slower and now also not maintained option. The Shopping list with everything you will need can be found on this [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Shopping_list_and_tools_needed page].

It is also possible to run multiple cameras on a Linux PC. More details [https://docs.google.com/document/d/16PSFi8RAqbenPdluhulCRaIenOkEzgs5piUhkX3yaOc/edit here].

=== How do I obtain a camera? ===
There are two options:

==== Buy a Camera ====
You can buy a camera and Pi prebuilt and ready to install. These are available from a couple of suppliers. The Croatian Meteor Network sell prebuilt cameras as explained on [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=136 this page]. Alternatively, if you're in the UK, you can obtain contact the [https://ukmeteornetwork.org/ UK Meteor Network] for advice, though as of 2024 they are unable to sell cameras directly.

==== Build your own from scratch ====
This requires some basic DIY skills and some familiarity with the Raspberry PI, but don't be put off. The instructions are comprehensive and if you get stuck, you can ask for advice in the [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork groups.io] forum.

Click on this link if you want to '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Build_%26_Install_%26_Setup_your_camera_-_The_complete_how-to build a camera from scratch]'''.

=== Advanced RMS installations and Multi-camera support ===
If you would like to explore some advanced possibilities to install RMS software onto various platforms or to run multiple cameras on a single Linux computer, please have a look at [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Advanced_RMS_installations_and_Multi-camera_support this page]. In case you are planning to run RMS software on the Raspberry Pi 4, then please use the supported and easiest possibility by using the image we have prepared for you. More information is in [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Build_%26_Install_%26_Setup_your_camera_-_The_complete_how-to this extensive guide].

=== Can I use a commercial all-sky camera? ===

: Generally no due to the lack of sensitivity. [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=163 But see this recent experiment]

== Operating and maintaining your GMN station ==

=== Overview ===

: Please note that GMS is a nascent operation and you may share some growing pains if you choose to be involved -- we're still working out some bugs and making improvements here, which may be an opportunity to help if you have programming skills! ;-) So note that the workload of day-to-day operation can be non-zero, and might take a little bit of your time.

: Ideally, you'll want to monitor your RMS RPi system(s) daily to look for freezes or glitches or other problems... like birds nesting or soiling the camera window, people accidentally unplugging the power cord, mice (or cats or dogs!) chewing on the camera Ethernet cable, etc.

: Although we are getting close, this is not a "power up and forget about it" system yet.
: However, by its very nature, the GMS network is inhabited by a lot of people who are willing to help newcomers getting started. So, here are some clues for daily operation of your RMS camera.

=== So what does the meteor camera do over the course of 24 hours? ===

: The RMS Python based system calculates the sundown to sunrise interval and schedules video camera capture all night long. Depending on the video camera and capabilities of the RPi, the camera captures 25 or more frames per second between evening and morning twilight. During the continuous image capture, the station begins processing captured image data, doing a pre-screening to target frames with a suitable number of stars (usually around 20) that makes it worth looking for meteor detections. Once data capture has finished, the station switches into processing all the promising frames for detections, then refining the astrometric accuracy of every positive detection. Using the station platepar (plate parameters) calibration file, processing iterates to find the best astrometry and photometry solution for each detected meteor. Once this process has analyzed each detection, summary files are created.
: These summary files include text file data presentation in several widely accepted formats (CAMS and UFOorbit), as well as graphic plots of detection frequencies throughout the night, a set of thumbnail images of detections, a set of thumbnail images of data captured throughout the night, a single image with all detections stacked together, plots of photometry, astrometry, and camera pointing drift in arc minutes throughout the course of the night as the mount or building flexes, a flat file for correcting images, and a plot of all detections showing any identified radiants. Finally all results are combined into a single compressed archive, which is automatically uploaded each morning to the central server. Optionally, you can create a mp4 movie showing a time lapse of the night’s captured images.
: Each morning you can review the result files on the RPi, and copy anything you want to your computer or tablet.

===Archiving data ===

: Your primary scientific data is automatically uploaded to the central server every morning when data processing is done. However once it has done this, RMS will purge out the oldest data to free up space for the next night's run.

: So, you may want to copy some of the data to a PC, NAS or cloud for further analysis of your own. The data you should consider backing up are the contents of '''~/RMS_data/ArchivedFiles''', which holds the individual files and data that RMS determined were probably meteors. Full detail on how to nbare beyond the scope of the GMN Wiki, but tools such as robocopy (for Windows) and rsync(for Linux/MacOS) are ideal. These tools can 'mirror' data across a network. If you want help configuring these, ask in the Globalmeteornetwork group on groups.io.

: We've also built some automated tools that can help to back up any additional data to a thumb drive inserted into the RPi. Please ask in the group about these.

===Backup and restore configuration and RSA keys===

:'''Please note:''' in case you are on older Buster image, then you need to replace username 'rms' with 'pi', e.g. /home/pi instead of /home/rms. How to determine which to use? Simply run:
::ls /home/rms home/pi
: whichever comes existent is your home directory

: Open a terminal and execute the command '''Scripts/RMS_Backup.sh'''. A compressed .zip file containing all important configuration files and keys will be created in user's home directory with the prefix RMS_Backup and .zip extension. Example: ''/home/rms/RMS_Backup_XX0001_2023-01-28.zip''.

: Copy the .zip file to a safe place outside RPi, it will be useful later to restore the system in case of failure. Note it contains the RSA public and private keys used to contact GMN servers, keep it secret.

: To restore the configuration, unzip the backup file in some folder on the RPi and copy the files '''.config''', '''platepar_cmn2010.cal''' and '''mask.bmp''' to the folder '''/home/rms/source/RMS/''', and the files '''id_rsa''' and '''id_rsa.pub'' to the folder ''/home/rms/.ssh/''' as in the following example:

:: cp .config platepar_cmn2010.cal mask.bmp /home/rms/source/RMS/
:: cp id_rsa id_rsa.pub /home/rms/.ssh/

: Make sure that RSA key files permission bits are correct by using the command:

:: chmod 400 ~/.ssh/id_rsa*

=== Viewing the data ===

: To view the data, you can use CMN_binViewer software[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer] which is already installed in the RMS SD image.
: There is also a Windows version[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer/releases] you can install.

: '''Important note''' : You can also open the images in astronomical FITS viewers such as FITS Liberator or Pixinsight, though the results may be surprising. For example in FITS Liberator, the image will be '''upside down'''. This is an artefact of how the software reads the image. In space, there's no 'up' or 'down' and so the FITS specification does not dictate whether the pixel (0,0) is at the bottom left or top left, or indeed one of the other corners. Some software, notably FITS Liberator, treats the top left as the origin and so terrestrial images will be displayed mirrored vertically.

=== Tools and Utilities ===

* [https://www.realvnc.com/en/connect/download/viewer/ RealVNC] or [https://anydesk.com/en AnyDesk] remote connect tool allows station access from anywhere. Access from outside your network is enabled by use of an OpenVPN connection address available to meteor stations. Alternatively, with VNC and Teamviewer, you can create an account and team on their websites, and then remotely access your station.
* Samba data directory access, allows you to copy data results directly from your RPi to your computer or tablet.
* [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer CMN_binViewer] can be used to view standard fits image files containing meteor detections. It runs on the RPi, and is also available under Windows.
* [https://sonotaco.com/soft/e_index.html UFO Orbit] allows you to process data from multiple stations and generate unified radiants of two or more stations seeing the same meteor. It can plot the shared object ground path, orbital characteristics, and can output a summary file of all objects seen by more than one station, which can be used for further analysis.
* RMS software can be installed under Windows to allow much of the RMS python-based code to be executed on your computer, so it can be run against meteor station data you have transferred to your computer from the RPi.
* You can run RMS Python jobs on the RPi to sample the image files captured all night long and condense them into a mp4 movie. This creates a sometimes mesmerizing summary that can run for over 2 minutes in length for winter time data.

== What can I do with my GMN station? ==

=== Using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration + Manually reducing observations of fireballs and computing their trajectories: ===
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao3J9Jf0iLQ Updated 2023 video tutorial]
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOjb3qxDlX4 Old 2021 video tutorial]

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/fov3d/ Generating a Google Earth KML file to show your station's field of view] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=253 Using UFO Orbit program to estimate meteor trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=221 Urban meteor observing] ===

== Data analysis with SkyFit2 ==

SkyFit2 is a program within the RMS library which supports analyzing optical meteor data in most optical formats that are in use today, including videos in any popular video format (mp4, avi, mkv), a sequence of static images, or a single image with shutter breaks.

This [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao3J9Jf0iLQ video tutorial] explains how to using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration on GMN data and manually reduce observations of fireballs, including computing their trajectories.

A more general and detailed description of SkyFit2 is given at the '''[[SkyFit2|SkyFit2]]''' page.

== FAQ ==

=== What should I back up when re-flashing an SD card or a USB disk? ===

: The .config, platepar and mask files that are in the RMS source directory, plus the whole contents of the hidden directory /home/pi/.ssh.

If your SD card or a USB disk fails or becomes corrupted, the config files can be fetched from the server as they are uploaded every day together with the data. However the contents of .ssh are essential for connection to the server, so you must also save these. Once you set up a new SD card or a USB disk, return the files in their original location.

=== What are the values in FTPdetectinfo_* file designated as hnr mle bin Pix/fm Rho Phi? ===

: Some of these values are not used in RMS (hnr mle bin), but they are in CAMS, so they are here to conform to the standard. Thus they are all zeros. The others are:

: - Pix/fm - Average angular speed of the meteor in pixels per frame.

: - Rho, Phi - Parameters that define the line of the meteor in polar coordinates, see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hough_transform#Theory here] for more details. Rho is the distance of the line from the centre of the image, and phi is the angle of the line as measured from the positive direction of the Y axis (basically a line going from the center of the image to the top of the image), the positive angles are measured clockwise (I think, the CAMS standard might define these parameters a bit differently, the Y axis is flipped).

: The intensity is the sum of all pixel intensities of the meteor on a given frame. Let's say I represent an area around the meteor on a given frame like this, where the numbers are pixel intensities on an 8-bit image (so they can range from 0 to 255):

: [[File:Intensity_sum.png |Intensity_sum.png ]]

: and the pixels values inside the red boundary represent the meteor blob on the frame, the intensity would be the sum of all numbers inside the red boundary.
: This value is later used to compute the magnitude. The magnitude is computed as: mag = -2.5*log10(intensity sum) + photometric_offset. The photometric offset is estimated in SkyFit by fitting the line with slope -2.5 through pairs of known magnitudes of stars and logartihms of their pixel intensity sum. The photometric offset is basically the intercept of that line. The constant slope of -2.5 comes from the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apparent_magnitude#Calculations definition of stellar magnitudes.]

== GMN data policy ==

The Global Meteor Network produces several levles of data products:
* Level 1 - The lowest level data (i.e. as close to "raw" as possible) are the FF image and FR video files saved to the RPi by the capture code and the fireball detector.
* Level 2 - The meteor detector uses these data to extract positional and brightness information of individual meteors (FTPdetectinfo file), and images are also used for astrometric and photometric calibration (platepar file). Meteor and star detections are used to generate a range of plots suchs as the single-station shower association graph, camera drift graph, etc. The calibrated meteors measurements get uploaded to the GMN server together with the raw images of individual meteors.
* Level 3 - The software on the server correlates individual observations and computes multi-station meteor trajectories which are published daily on the GMN [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ data website]. This data is made public under the [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ CC BY 4.0 license].

Operators of individual GMN stations exclusively own the Level 1 and Level 2 data their stations produce. In practice, this means that they are free to share this data with other meteor networks if they wish to do so. The data that gets uploaded to the GMN server will not be shared publicly nor with other parties without the operator's consent, but may be used internally by the GMN coordinators to manually produce other data products (e.g. trajectory of a meteorite dropping fireball, analysis of a meteor shower). All station operators will be credited for their data in all GMN publications.

== IstraStream ==

=== [http://istrastream.com/rms-gmn/ IstraStream GMN status website NOW OBSOLETE] ===

: IstraStream.com is an independent hosting site primarily for cameras sold by IstraStream. In mid-2023 Istrastream stopped listing camera image output and the IstraStream data display has been replaced by the [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/weblog/ GMN weblog].

This document explains what every plot on the IstraStream weblog means:

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/132aHGn0QPzhpVN2s2n6FT6rJn39LAsPkchWJqXQb8Qk/edit?usp=sharing IstraStream Plots Explanation] ===

== For More Information ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=43 Contact the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork Join the Global Meteor Network Forum] ===

=== [https://github.com/markmac99/ukmon-pitools/wiki UK Meteor Network Wiki]===
This wiki has numerous FAQs and tips on maintaining, monitoring and managing your system, and several explainers such as how to calibrate and create a mask, how to copy data and so forth.

=== GMN talks ===

: [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLmQ5Bvz4ACYJLYfswIeAipapoeGeI6QWy GMN talk for Society for Astronomical Sciences workshop 2024 (The first 3 videos)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IfUyCHjMATc 2023 GMN Meeting Session 1 (February 2023)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I78KwF5-1GE 2023 GMN Meeting Session 2 (February 2023)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDdrG_FCyGk 2022 GMN Meeting Session 1 (February 2022)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_75CDPzjI4 2022 GMN Meeting Session 2 (February 2022)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6x9_WCVphY GMN talk at the European Space Agency's Fireball Workshop (June 2021)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXBTLPnPDWs 2021 GMN Meeting] - [https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ia9vagug5lxm8k9/AAB_i_1jcWThUdAHO_2gF_Ksa?dl=0 Link to slides]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Overview of the GMN - IMC2020 (September 2020)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oM7lfQ4nmyw Overview of the GMN, Astro Imaging Channel presentation (May 2020)]

=== GMN-related publications ===

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2206.11365 Vida, D., Blaauw Erskine, R. C., Brown, P. G., Kambulow, J., Campbell-Brown, M., & Mazur, M. J. (2022). Computing optical meteor flux using global meteor network data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 515(2), 2322-2339.]

: [https://academic.oup.com/mnras/advance-article/doi/10.1093/mnras/stab2557/6368869 Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T., & Vida, D. (2021). Meteor shower radiant dispersions in Global Meteor Network data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 508(1), 326-339.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2107.12335 Vida, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P. S., Brown, P. G., McIntyre, M. J., Dijkema, T. J., Pavletić, L., Kukić, P., Mazur, M.J., Eschman, P., Roggemans, P., Merlak, A., & Zubović, D. (2021). The Global Meteor Network–Methodology and first results. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 506(4), 5046-5074.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.05458/ Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T. D., & Vida, D. (2020). Realistic gravitational focusing of meteoroid streams. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 494(2), 2982-2994.]

: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Kukic-et-al-2018-Rolling-shutter.pdf Kukić, P., Gural, P., Vida, D., Šegon, D. & Merlak, A. (2018) Correction for meteor centroids observed using rolling shutter cameras. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46:5, 154-118.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_sun_skirter_final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Kukić, P., & Merlak, A. (2018). Compressive strength of a skirting Daytime Arietid-first science results from low-cost Raspberry Pi-based meteor stations. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 113-118.]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.02979.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - I. Theory. arXiv:1911.02979v4 [astro-ph.EP] 21 Apr 2020]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.11734.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - II. Results. arXiv:1911.11734v1 [astro-ph.EP] 26 Novr 2019]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_first_results-final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Zubović, D., Kukić, P., Parag, F., & Macan, A. (2018). First results of a Raspberry Pi based meteor camera system. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 71-78.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Vida_IMC2016_proceedings_final.pdf Vida, D., Zubović, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P., & Cupec, R. (2016). Open-source meteor detection software for low-cost single-board computers. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference (IMC2016), Egmond, The Netherlands (pp. 2-5).]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Zubovic_IMC2015_priceedings_final.pdf Zubović, D., Vida, D., Gural, P., & Šegon, D. (2015). Advances in the development of a low-cost video meteor station. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference, Mistelbach, Austria (pp. 27-30).]

Shopping list and tools needed

2024-09-28T19:57:07Z

Dvida: /* Raspberry Pi 4 or 5 */

Howdy! This is the most important section (as all the preparation steps are), please have a look at the list of parts you will need, order the correct ones with the correct options and if you are not sure just ask in the forums. Once ordered, you may wish to have a look at the tools that are required and make sure you have them at your disposal.

= Parts and Tools needed =
[[File:01_annotated.jpg|thumb|right|Annotated Parts List]]

Click on the image to the right to see a larger version with the parts labelled

# IMX291 sensor board
# Lens with the lens holder - 4mm, 6mm are M16 mount as pictured, while other lenses might be CS which have a different holder
# 2x M2 screws, 6mm long - for mounting lens holder
# Camera housing
# Small cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Large cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Camera Power over Ethernet (PoE) cable (sometimes called a network cable by the sellers)
# Camera board holder (supplied with the housing)
# Holder metal plate (supplied with the housing)
# 4x M2 screws, 12 mm long - for mounting camera module to bracket
# 1x M3-.50 screw, 6mm long - for mounting camera module L-bracket to base plate
# Metal plate screws (supplied with the housing)
# Transparent weatherproof silicone
# Housing mounting bracket (supplied with the housing)
# Waterproof ethernet cable protector
# PoE injector to supply 48v to the camera (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi 5 (recommended) or Raspberry Pi 4 Model B 2GB (minimum) with official power supply (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi housing (not shown)
# 128 GB or greater microSD card (not shown)
# Self-amalgamating tape (not shown)

= Purchasing Parts =
For consistency across the network and to make collaborative support possible, it is recommended that the camera and lenses listed below are used in preference to random handy bits that are cobbled together. The selected components are proven and known to work well. Other components can be sourced from any convenient seller.

Many components such as the Pi and microSD cards are are readily available in most locations. For other items such as lens, camera and housing, AliExpress - the Chinese equivalent of eBay - is the preferred online source as it serves most of the globe and has been reliably suppling parts to date.

NB: Links are given to current sellers, but stock levels vary and if the link is dead or the seller is out of stock, you should be able to find an equivalent from another seller on AliExpress.

== Sensor ==
The bare IP security camera featuring a Sony IMX291 has been selected for the RMS system. This is available from many sellers on AliExpress. Out of the options offered, choose "With 48V POE cable" and "No lens":
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002315913099.html IVG-HP203Y-AE]
Always buy a lens separately from the list in the following section.

== Lens ==
Most cameras available on Aliexpress come with a choice of lenses. The preferred lens is a 4mm f/0.95 M16 lens providing ~88x45° field of view, which can also be bought separately for example via this link.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32876034491.html 4mm f/0.95 M16]
Alternative lenses (4mm and 6 mm) are available here:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005003145991079.html 4mm OR 6mm f/0.95 M16]

If you live in an area with heavy light pollution, other options are available. We wholeheartedly recommend only using lenses from the following list, as others might not be as sensitive or might have large distortion. See [[Lens Options|this page]] for more lens options.

== Housing ==
A security camera housing is used, providing weather-tight protection without distortion introduced by plastic domes. From the options offered, select "Plate and Bracket" to get a plate for mounting a 38x38mm bare IP camera module, and an L-shaped mounting bracket.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32355130687.html IP66 CCTV Camera Housing with Plate and Bracket] This will also provide a pair of cable glands and some essential screws.

== Power Over Ethernet Injector, PoE Switch (Optional) and PoE replacement camera side cables (Optional, but recommended) ==
This connects by network cables to both the Raspberry Pi and the camera sensor, and injects 48V DC onto the network cable to the camera to supply it with power. Pick a suitable plug style for your location from the options offered. An example unit is:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002704227705.html PoE Injector 48V 0.5A]

Note that over short lengths of up to about 5m you can also use plain PoE connectors. These simply feed 12V from a power supply into the ethernet and extract it at the other end. Over short distances this will supply the camera with adequate power without the need for 48V injectors.

Finally, if you are operating several cameras, you can use a PoE switch instead of a PoE injector and connect all the cameras to your network - '''please source locally'''.
* [https://www.tendacn.com/product/tef1110p-8-63w.html TEF1110P-8-63W 10-Port 10/100M Desktop Switch with 8-Port PoE]

It is a good idea to keep a replacement PoE camera side cable or two:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/4001297174234.html Poe cable - Select RJ45 or RJ45DC]
Alternative cable - please note that in the picture just 2 connectors are visible, but you will receive all the connectors needed for IMX291 board (1 pcs 2pin port (2.0mm), 1 pcs 4pin port (1.25mm), 1 pcs 6pin port (1.25mm), 1 pcs 8pin port (1.25mm)):
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002598310068.html Poe Cable]

== Cooled Housing for Raspberry Pi ==
This is one of the rare cases that fulfills our needs. It has a fan which is relatively quiet, it’s sturdy, and it can fit the RTC with the addition of riser pins. '''Please buy this case''', we have tried many others, but they are not as good. From the options offered, make sure you select one that says "for Pi 4" if you are using a Raspberry Pi 4, or "for Pi 3B Plus" if you are using a Raspbery Pi 3B+. Additionally there is a case variation that is fully enclosed and has no fans; do not select this option.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32959825297.html Raspberry Pi Aluminium Enclosure with fans]

== Real Time Clock for Raspberry Pi ==
[[File:rtc.jpg|thumb|RTC installation|200px]]

Very precise timing is essential to processing the meteor data, so unless you are confident in your internet connection an RTC module ensures the Raspberry Pi always has the precise time, even when power or internet is unreliable. AliExpress sells a pack of 10 but they are inexpensive - maybe share the extras among other camera constructors in your area. The AliExpress store lists two RTC modules, one labelled "DS3231 module" and the other "mini DS3231 module." Select the "mini DS3231 module" option; it is designed for the Raspberry Pi. It has 5 pins and includes a battery.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32770348851.html DS3231 RTC]

Once you plug it into the Pi (see image on the right) and make sure the current time is correct on the Pi, open the terminal and run:

<pre>
sudo hwclock -w
</pre>

This will set the current computer time to the RTC. Every time the Pi boots up, it will read the correct time from the RTC.

== Pin Headers ==
Required to raise the height of the Raspberry GPIO bins to allow the RTC to sit proud of the Raspberry Pi case. You only need 1 but the pack of 20 is available for only a dollar or so.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32549850046.html Tall header pins]

== Network cabling ==
You will need two lengths of network cabling, one (probably quite short) between the Raspberry Pi and the PoE injector and the other between the PoE injector and the camera. You can purchase suitable lengths locally or on AliExpress. Some people have found the following thin flat network cable to be useful for sneaking the wire through a window or door to avoid drilling holes in walls or eaves, although it will require some extra attention to seal the cable at the camera's PoE connector:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002311509668.html Cat6 Flat Ethernet Cable]

== Waterproof Cable Connector ==
One end of the network cable will be outside, connected into the PoE cable from the camera. This is not only carrying data but 48V DC power and needs to be kept sealed. This waterproof connector is fitted over the end of the network cable connector then after the network cable is plugged into the camera's PoE cable, the connector is locked into the end of the PoE cable. For extra weatherproofing, wrap in self-amalgamating tape.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32834472563.html RJ45 Waterproof Connector Cap]

== 128GB Micro SD Card or 256GB USB flash disk ==

You may choose between an SD card and a USB flash disk, no need to have both.

You need at least a 64GB card but a 128GB is recommended as 20+ GB of data is collected every night. Make sure it is a fast card eg Class 10 UHS-1 or better. A card can either be purchased locally or [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32676225311.html from AliExpress]. Be warned that there is an [https://photographylife.com/fake-memory-cards ongoing problem with the production and sale of fraudulent memory cards misreporting the available storage] and even supplies from a reputable outlet can be affected - test the card you purchase. The AliExpress link has been used successfully to obtain suitable micro SD cards. If you live in North America, buy your SD cards at Costco.

If you want to go for a USB flash disk, this one is verified to work well [https://www.kingston.com/en/usb-flash-drives/datatraveler-kyson-high-performance-usb-flash-drive Kingston DataTraveler Kyson 256 GB]. We recommend you source it locally, for the reference the link to get it on [https://www.amazon.com/Kingston-DataTraveler-Kyson-256GB-DTKN/dp/B08KHZY581 amazon.com]

== Raspberry Pi 4 or 5 ==
These are likely to be available to be purchased locally or from a domestic online source. You need at least a 2GB RAM model. The Raspberry Pi Model 4B is now the minimum spec. Previously, a Raspberry Pi Model 3B+ was considered the minimum but these do not have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers. Also, the Pi3 is stuck on Python 2 for which we will drop support on July 1, 2025.

Purchase the official 5.1V 3A 15.3W power supply to go with your Pi - most problems with Raspberry Pi units are due to inadequate power supplies being used instead of purchasing the official power pack. Note: to connect a RPi 4B to a monitor you will also need a micro-HDMI cable, so that might be necessary to add to the shopping cart also.

== Additional items and tools ==
* Source suitable M2 and M3 screws. It might be possible to find these locally but in some places they are just odd enough to be quite hard to find. You could order some hardware from the [https://www.aliexpress.com/store/4714020?spm=a2g0o.detail.1000007.1.5fc666d9tN1f8i ScrewHome Store] on AliExpress. Each [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32981714992.html?spm=a2g0o.store_pc_groupList.8148356.10.be65539dLjPgfh packet of 50 M2x6mm, M2x12mm, and M3x6mm] machine screws will cost only a few dollars.
* A tube of silicone sealant is used to seal the glass window for the housing and the front screws in the housing.
* Self-amalgamating tape can be used to wrap and seal the cable connector(s) to ensure they remain weathertight in all conditions.
* Tools such as small wire cutters or a sharp knife, various sized screwdrivers, a drill and screws to mount the camera bracket will be required.
* RJ45 crimper tool to finish the ethernet cable will be needed.

Some cameras come with a slightly different cable with a separate 12V socket for power input as shown [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/images/d/dc/Alternatecable.jpg here].
If the power input port has a small cap, then you can just cover it and use the PoE on the ethernet port. If it's open, then you will need a pair of PoE adapters (seen in that picture in the background).

To test and focus the camera you will need VLC. This software is preinstalled on the Pi but is also available for Mac, Windows or Linux from [https://www.videolan.org/vlc/ here].

You are now done with this section or you are waiting for the parts. Anyway, you may proceed to have a look at the build of the camera itself or to start actually building it. Have fun! [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Build_%26_Install_%26_Setup_your_camera_-_The_complete_how-to Back to the signpost page.]

Shopping list and tools needed

2024-09-11T19:03:12Z

Dvida: /* Parts and Tools needed */

Howdy! This is the most important section (as all the preparation steps are), please have a look at the list of parts you will need, order the correct ones with the correct options and if you are not sure just ask in the forums. Once ordered, you may wish to have a look at the tools that are required and make sure you have them at your disposal.

= Parts and Tools needed =
[[File:01_annotated.jpg|thumb|right|Annotated Parts List]]

Click on the image to the right to see a larger version with the parts labelled

# IMX291 sensor board
# Lens with the lens holder - 4mm, 6mm are M16 mount as pictured, while other lenses might be CS which have a different holder
# 2x M2 screws, 6mm long - for mounting lens holder
# Camera housing
# Small cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Large cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Camera Power over Ethernet (PoE) cable (sometimes called a network cable by the sellers)
# Camera board holder (supplied with the housing)
# Holder metal plate (supplied with the housing)
# 4x M2 screws, 12 mm long - for mounting camera module to bracket
# 1x M3-.50 screw, 6mm long - for mounting camera module L-bracket to base plate
# Metal plate screws (supplied with the housing)
# Transparent weatherproof silicone
# Housing mounting bracket (supplied with the housing)
# Waterproof ethernet cable protector
# PoE injector to supply 48v to the camera (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi 5 (recommended) or Raspberry Pi 4 Model B 2GB (minimum) with official power supply (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi housing (not shown)
# 128 GB or greater microSD card (not shown)
# Self-amalgamating tape (not shown)

= Purchasing Parts =
For consistency across the network and to make collaborative support possible, it is recommended that the camera and lenses listed below are used in preference to random handy bits that are cobbled together. The selected components are proven and known to work well. Other components can be sourced from any convenient seller.

Many components such as the Pi and microSD cards are are readily available in most locations. For other items such as lens, camera and housing, AliExpress - the Chinese equivalent of eBay - is the preferred online source as it serves most of the globe and has been reliably suppling parts to date.

NB: Links are given to current sellers, but stock levels vary and if the link is dead or the seller is out of stock, you should be able to find an equivalent from another seller on AliExpress.

== Sensor ==
The bare IP security camera featuring a Sony IMX291 has been selected for the RMS system. This is available from many sellers on AliExpress. Out of the options offered, choose "With 48V POE cable" and "No lens":
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002315913099.html IVG-HP203Y-AE]
Always buy a lens separately from the list in the following section.

== Lens ==
Most cameras available on Aliexpress come with a choice of lenses. The preferred lens is a 4mm f/0.95 M16 lens providing ~88x45° field of view, which can also be bought separately for example via this link.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32876034491.html 4mm f/0.95 M16]
Alternative lenses (4mm and 6 mm) are available here:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005003145991079.html 4mm OR 6mm f/0.95 M16]

If you live in an area with heavy light pollution, other options are available. We wholeheartedly recommend only using lenses from the following list, as others might not be as sensitive or might have large distortion. See [[Lens Options|this page]] for more lens options.

== Housing ==
A security camera housing is used, providing weather-tight protection without distortion introduced by plastic domes. From the options offered, select "Plate and Bracket" to get a plate for mounting a 38x38mm bare IP camera module, and an L-shaped mounting bracket.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32355130687.html IP66 CCTV Camera Housing with Plate and Bracket] This will also provide a pair of cable glands and some essential screws.

== Power Over Ethernet Injector, PoE Switch (Optional) and PoE replacement camera side cables (Optional, but recommended) ==
This connects by network cables to both the Raspberry Pi and the camera sensor, and injects 48V DC onto the network cable to the camera to supply it with power. Pick a suitable plug style for your location from the options offered. An example unit is:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002704227705.html PoE Injector 48V 0.5A]

Note that over short lengths of up to about 5m you can also use plain PoE connectors. These simply feed 12V from a power supply into the ethernet and extract it at the other end. Over short distances this will supply the camera with adequate power without the need for 48V injectors.

Finally, if you are operating several cameras, you can use a PoE switch instead of a PoE injector and connect all the cameras to your network - '''please source locally'''.
* [https://www.tendacn.com/product/tef1110p-8-63w.html TEF1110P-8-63W 10-Port 10/100M Desktop Switch with 8-Port PoE]

It is a good idea to keep a replacement PoE camera side cable or two:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/4001297174234.html Poe cable - Select RJ45 or RJ45DC]
Alternative cable - please note that in the picture just 2 connectors are visible, but you will receive all the connectors needed for IMX291 board (1 pcs 2pin port (2.0mm), 1 pcs 4pin port (1.25mm), 1 pcs 6pin port (1.25mm), 1 pcs 8pin port (1.25mm)):
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002598310068.html Poe Cable]

== Cooled Housing for Raspberry Pi ==
This is one of the rare cases that fulfills our needs. It has a fan which is relatively quiet, it’s sturdy, and it can fit the RTC with the addition of riser pins. '''Please buy this case''', we have tried many others, but they are not as good. From the options offered, make sure you select one that says "for Pi 4" if you are using a Raspberry Pi 4, or "for Pi 3B Plus" if you are using a Raspbery Pi 3B+. Additionally there is a case variation that is fully enclosed and has no fans; do not select this option.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32959825297.html Raspberry Pi Aluminium Enclosure with fans]

== Real Time Clock for Raspberry Pi ==
[[File:rtc.jpg|thumb|RTC installation|200px]]

Very precise timing is essential to processing the meteor data, so unless you are confident in your internet connection an RTC module ensures the Raspberry Pi always has the precise time, even when power or internet is unreliable. AliExpress sells a pack of 10 but they are inexpensive - maybe share the extras among other camera constructors in your area. The AliExpress store lists two RTC modules, one labelled "DS3231 module" and the other "mini DS3231 module." Select the "mini DS3231 module" option; it is designed for the Raspberry Pi. It has 5 pins and includes a battery.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32770348851.html DS3231 RTC]

Once you plug it into the Pi (see image on the right) and make sure the current time is correct on the Pi, open the terminal and run:

<pre>
sudo hwclock -w
</pre>

This will set the current computer time to the RTC. Every time the Pi boots up, it will read the correct time from the RTC.

== Pin Headers ==
Required to raise the height of the Raspberry GPIO bins to allow the RTC to sit proud of the Raspberry Pi case. You only need 1 but the pack of 20 is available for only a dollar or so.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32549850046.html Tall header pins]

== Network cabling ==
You will need two lengths of network cabling, one (probably quite short) between the Raspberry Pi and the PoE injector and the other between the PoE injector and the camera. You can purchase suitable lengths locally or on AliExpress. Some people have found the following thin flat network cable to be useful for sneaking the wire through a window or door to avoid drilling holes in walls or eaves, although it will require some extra attention to seal the cable at the camera's PoE connector:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002311509668.html Cat6 Flat Ethernet Cable]

== Waterproof Cable Connector ==
One end of the network cable will be outside, connected into the PoE cable from the camera. This is not only carrying data but 48V DC power and needs to be kept sealed. This waterproof connector is fitted over the end of the network cable connector then after the network cable is plugged into the camera's PoE cable, the connector is locked into the end of the PoE cable. For extra weatherproofing, wrap in self-amalgamating tape.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32834472563.html RJ45 Waterproof Connector Cap]

== 128GB Micro SD Card or 256GB USB flash disk ==

You may choose between an SD card and a USB flash disk, no need to have both.

You need at least a 64GB card but a 128GB is recommended as 20+ GB of data is collected every night. Make sure it is a fast card eg Class 10 UHS-1 or better. A card can either be purchased locally or [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32676225311.html from AliExpress]. Be warned that there is an [https://photographylife.com/fake-memory-cards ongoing problem with the production and sale of fraudulent memory cards misreporting the available storage] and even supplies from a reputable outlet can be affected - test the card you purchase. The AliExpress link has been used successfully to obtain suitable micro SD cards. If you live in North America, buy your SD cards at Costco.

If you want to go for a USB flash disk, this one is verified to work well [https://www.kingston.com/en/usb-flash-drives/datatraveler-kyson-high-performance-usb-flash-drive Kingston DataTraveler Kyson 256 GB]. We recommend you source it locally, for the reference the link to get it on [https://www.amazon.com/Kingston-DataTraveler-Kyson-256GB-DTKN/dp/B08KHZY581 amazon.com]

== Raspberry Pi 4 or 5 ==
These are likely to be available to be purchased locally or from a domestic online source. You need at least a 2GB RAM model. The Raspberry Pi Model 4B is now the minimum spec. Previously, a Raspberry Pi Model 3B+ was considered the minimum but these do not have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers. Purchase the official 5.1V 3A 15.3W power supply to go with it - most problems with Raspberry Pi units are due to inadequate power supplies being used instead of purchasing the official power pack. Note: to connect a RPi 4B to a monitor you will also need a micro-HDMI cable, so that might be necessary to add to the shopping cart also.

== Additional items and tools ==
* Source suitable M2 and M3 screws. It might be possible to find these locally but in some places they are just odd enough to be quite hard to find. You could order some hardware from the [https://www.aliexpress.com/store/4714020?spm=a2g0o.detail.1000007.1.5fc666d9tN1f8i ScrewHome Store] on AliExpress. Each [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32981714992.html?spm=a2g0o.store_pc_groupList.8148356.10.be65539dLjPgfh packet of 50 M2x6mm, M2x12mm, and M3x6mm] machine screws will cost only a few dollars.
* A tube of silicone sealant is used to seal the glass window for the housing and the front screws in the housing.
* Self-amalgamating tape can be used to wrap and seal the cable connector(s) to ensure they remain weathertight in all conditions.
* Tools such as small wire cutters or a sharp knife, various sized screwdrivers, a drill and screws to mount the camera bracket will be required.
* RJ45 crimper tool to finish the ethernet cable will be needed.

Some cameras come with a slightly different cable with a separate 12V socket for power input as shown [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/images/d/dc/Alternatecable.jpg here].
If the power input port has a small cap, then you can just cover it and use the PoE on the ethernet port. If it's open, then you will need a pair of PoE adapters (seen in that picture in the background).

To test and focus the camera you will need VLC. This software is preinstalled on the Pi but is also available for Mac, Windows or Linux from [https://www.videolan.org/vlc/ here].

You are now done with this section or you are waiting for the parts. Anyway, you may proceed to have a look at the build of the camera itself or to start actually building it. Have fun! [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Build_%26_Install_%26_Setup_your_camera_-_The_complete_how-to Back to the signpost page.]

Shopping list and tools needed

2024-09-11T19:02:32Z

Dvida: /* Raspberry Pi 4 */

Howdy! This is the most important section (as all the preparation steps are), please have a look at the list of parts you will need, order the correct ones with the correct options and if you are not sure just ask in the forums. Once ordered, you may wish to have a look at the tools that are required and make sure you have them at your disposal.

= Parts and Tools needed =
[[File:01_annotated.jpg|thumb|right|Annotated Parts List]]

Click on the image to the right to see a larger version with the parts labelled

# IMX291 sensor board
# Lens with the lens holder - 4mm, 6mm are M16 mount as pictured, while other lenses might be CS which have a different holder
# 2x M2 screws, 6mm long - for mounting lens holder
# Camera housing
# Small cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Large cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Camera Power over Ethernet (PoE) cable (sometimes called a network cable by the sellers)
# Camera board holder (supplied with the housing)
# Holder metal plate (supplied with the housing)
# 4x M2 screws, 12 mm long - for mounting camera module to bracket
# 1x M3-.50 screw, 6mm long - for mounting camera module L-bracket to base plate
# Metal plate screws (supplied with the housing)
# Transparent weatherproof silicone
# Housing mounting bracket (supplied with the housing)
# Waterproof ethernet cable protector
# PoE injector to supply 48v to the camera (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi 4 Model B 2GB (or at least a 3B+ with 2GB) with official power supply (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi housing (not shown)
# 128 GB or greater microSD card (not shown)
# Self-amalgamating tape (not shown)

= Purchasing Parts =
For consistency across the network and to make collaborative support possible, it is recommended that the camera and lenses listed below are used in preference to random handy bits that are cobbled together. The selected components are proven and known to work well. Other components can be sourced from any convenient seller.

Many components such as the Pi and microSD cards are are readily available in most locations. For other items such as lens, camera and housing, AliExpress - the Chinese equivalent of eBay - is the preferred online source as it serves most of the globe and has been reliably suppling parts to date.

NB: Links are given to current sellers, but stock levels vary and if the link is dead or the seller is out of stock, you should be able to find an equivalent from another seller on AliExpress.

== Sensor ==
The bare IP security camera featuring a Sony IMX291 has been selected for the RMS system. This is available from many sellers on AliExpress. Out of the options offered, choose "With 48V POE cable" and "No lens":
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002315913099.html IVG-HP203Y-AE]
Always buy a lens separately from the list in the following section.

== Lens ==
Most cameras available on Aliexpress come with a choice of lenses. The preferred lens is a 4mm f/0.95 M16 lens providing ~88x45° field of view, which can also be bought separately for example via this link.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32876034491.html 4mm f/0.95 M16]
Alternative lenses (4mm and 6 mm) are available here:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005003145991079.html 4mm OR 6mm f/0.95 M16]

If you live in an area with heavy light pollution, other options are available. We wholeheartedly recommend only using lenses from the following list, as others might not be as sensitive or might have large distortion. See [[Lens Options|this page]] for more lens options.

== Housing ==
A security camera housing is used, providing weather-tight protection without distortion introduced by plastic domes. From the options offered, select "Plate and Bracket" to get a plate for mounting a 38x38mm bare IP camera module, and an L-shaped mounting bracket.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32355130687.html IP66 CCTV Camera Housing with Plate and Bracket] This will also provide a pair of cable glands and some essential screws.

== Power Over Ethernet Injector, PoE Switch (Optional) and PoE replacement camera side cables (Optional, but recommended) ==
This connects by network cables to both the Raspberry Pi and the camera sensor, and injects 48V DC onto the network cable to the camera to supply it with power. Pick a suitable plug style for your location from the options offered. An example unit is:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002704227705.html PoE Injector 48V 0.5A]

Note that over short lengths of up to about 5m you can also use plain PoE connectors. These simply feed 12V from a power supply into the ethernet and extract it at the other end. Over short distances this will supply the camera with adequate power without the need for 48V injectors.

Finally, if you are operating several cameras, you can use a PoE switch instead of a PoE injector and connect all the cameras to your network - '''please source locally'''.
* [https://www.tendacn.com/product/tef1110p-8-63w.html TEF1110P-8-63W 10-Port 10/100M Desktop Switch with 8-Port PoE]

It is a good idea to keep a replacement PoE camera side cable or two:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/4001297174234.html Poe cable - Select RJ45 or RJ45DC]
Alternative cable - please note that in the picture just 2 connectors are visible, but you will receive all the connectors needed for IMX291 board (1 pcs 2pin port (2.0mm), 1 pcs 4pin port (1.25mm), 1 pcs 6pin port (1.25mm), 1 pcs 8pin port (1.25mm)):
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002598310068.html Poe Cable]

== Cooled Housing for Raspberry Pi ==
This is one of the rare cases that fulfills our needs. It has a fan which is relatively quiet, it’s sturdy, and it can fit the RTC with the addition of riser pins. '''Please buy this case''', we have tried many others, but they are not as good. From the options offered, make sure you select one that says "for Pi 4" if you are using a Raspberry Pi 4, or "for Pi 3B Plus" if you are using a Raspbery Pi 3B+. Additionally there is a case variation that is fully enclosed and has no fans; do not select this option.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32959825297.html Raspberry Pi Aluminium Enclosure with fans]

== Real Time Clock for Raspberry Pi ==
[[File:rtc.jpg|thumb|RTC installation|200px]]

Very precise timing is essential to processing the meteor data, so unless you are confident in your internet connection an RTC module ensures the Raspberry Pi always has the precise time, even when power or internet is unreliable. AliExpress sells a pack of 10 but they are inexpensive - maybe share the extras among other camera constructors in your area. The AliExpress store lists two RTC modules, one labelled "DS3231 module" and the other "mini DS3231 module." Select the "mini DS3231 module" option; it is designed for the Raspberry Pi. It has 5 pins and includes a battery.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32770348851.html DS3231 RTC]

Once you plug it into the Pi (see image on the right) and make sure the current time is correct on the Pi, open the terminal and run:

<pre>
sudo hwclock -w
</pre>

This will set the current computer time to the RTC. Every time the Pi boots up, it will read the correct time from the RTC.

== Pin Headers ==
Required to raise the height of the Raspberry GPIO bins to allow the RTC to sit proud of the Raspberry Pi case. You only need 1 but the pack of 20 is available for only a dollar or so.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32549850046.html Tall header pins]

== Network cabling ==
You will need two lengths of network cabling, one (probably quite short) between the Raspberry Pi and the PoE injector and the other between the PoE injector and the camera. You can purchase suitable lengths locally or on AliExpress. Some people have found the following thin flat network cable to be useful for sneaking the wire through a window or door to avoid drilling holes in walls or eaves, although it will require some extra attention to seal the cable at the camera's PoE connector:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002311509668.html Cat6 Flat Ethernet Cable]

== Waterproof Cable Connector ==
One end of the network cable will be outside, connected into the PoE cable from the camera. This is not only carrying data but 48V DC power and needs to be kept sealed. This waterproof connector is fitted over the end of the network cable connector then after the network cable is plugged into the camera's PoE cable, the connector is locked into the end of the PoE cable. For extra weatherproofing, wrap in self-amalgamating tape.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32834472563.html RJ45 Waterproof Connector Cap]

== 128GB Micro SD Card or 256GB USB flash disk ==

You may choose between an SD card and a USB flash disk, no need to have both.

You need at least a 64GB card but a 128GB is recommended as 20+ GB of data is collected every night. Make sure it is a fast card eg Class 10 UHS-1 or better. A card can either be purchased locally or [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32676225311.html from AliExpress]. Be warned that there is an [https://photographylife.com/fake-memory-cards ongoing problem with the production and sale of fraudulent memory cards misreporting the available storage] and even supplies from a reputable outlet can be affected - test the card you purchase. The AliExpress link has been used successfully to obtain suitable micro SD cards. If you live in North America, buy your SD cards at Costco.

If you want to go for a USB flash disk, this one is verified to work well [https://www.kingston.com/en/usb-flash-drives/datatraveler-kyson-high-performance-usb-flash-drive Kingston DataTraveler Kyson 256 GB]. We recommend you source it locally, for the reference the link to get it on [https://www.amazon.com/Kingston-DataTraveler-Kyson-256GB-DTKN/dp/B08KHZY581 amazon.com]

== Raspberry Pi 4 or 5 ==
These are likely to be available to be purchased locally or from a domestic online source. You need at least a 2GB RAM model. The Raspberry Pi Model 4B is now the minimum spec. Previously, a Raspberry Pi Model 3B+ was considered the minimum but these do not have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers. Purchase the official 5.1V 3A 15.3W power supply to go with it - most problems with Raspberry Pi units are due to inadequate power supplies being used instead of purchasing the official power pack. Note: to connect a RPi 4B to a monitor you will also need a micro-HDMI cable, so that might be necessary to add to the shopping cart also.

== Additional items and tools ==
* Source suitable M2 and M3 screws. It might be possible to find these locally but in some places they are just odd enough to be quite hard to find. You could order some hardware from the [https://www.aliexpress.com/store/4714020?spm=a2g0o.detail.1000007.1.5fc666d9tN1f8i ScrewHome Store] on AliExpress. Each [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32981714992.html?spm=a2g0o.store_pc_groupList.8148356.10.be65539dLjPgfh packet of 50 M2x6mm, M2x12mm, and M3x6mm] machine screws will cost only a few dollars.
* A tube of silicone sealant is used to seal the glass window for the housing and the front screws in the housing.
* Self-amalgamating tape can be used to wrap and seal the cable connector(s) to ensure they remain weathertight in all conditions.
* Tools such as small wire cutters or a sharp knife, various sized screwdrivers, a drill and screws to mount the camera bracket will be required.
* RJ45 crimper tool to finish the ethernet cable will be needed.

Some cameras come with a slightly different cable with a separate 12V socket for power input as shown [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/images/d/dc/Alternatecable.jpg here].
If the power input port has a small cap, then you can just cover it and use the PoE on the ethernet port. If it's open, then you will need a pair of PoE adapters (seen in that picture in the background).

To test and focus the camera you will need VLC. This software is preinstalled on the Pi but is also available for Mac, Windows or Linux from [https://www.videolan.org/vlc/ here].

You are now done with this section or you are waiting for the parts. Anyway, you may proceed to have a look at the build of the camera itself or to start actually building it. Have fun! [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Build_%26_Install_%26_Setup_your_camera_-_The_complete_how-to Back to the signpost page.]

Windows Installation

2024-04-29T21:01:30Z

Dvida: /* Install the required Python packages */

= Basic Instructions =
There are more detailed instructions, with pictures, [[Detailed_Windows_Installation|here]] but the below should work for most users.

'''Note: you will need about 2.5GB of space on your hard disk for the support tools. '''

== Install Required Tools ==
=== install MS Visual Studio Build Tools ===
(updated Nov 2021)

* Download Visual Studio 2022 Community Edition.
https://visualstudio.microsoft.com/downloads/#build-tools-for-visual-studio-2019. (this now takes you to the Visual Studio 2022 installation page)

* Click the "Free Download" button to install Community edition. This will download and run the installer.
* In the left panel, select Desktop Development with C++.
* ''Note that you do not need python development''.
* On the right panel ensure the latest versions of MSVC v143 - VS 2022 C++ x64/x86 build tools and Windows 10 SDK are selected. This should be automatic. You can also select CLI Tools.

* Click install. Its a '''10.5GB''' package so it'll take a while.

=== Install Anaconda for Windows ===
* Download Anaconda from here https://www.anaconda.com/products/individual
* Run the installer.
* Unless you intend to use Anaconda for other python development, you can select the default options at every stage.
* Its a 500MB download and installation may take 20-30 minutes.

=== Install Git for Windows ===
* Download Git from here https://git-scm.com/download/win
* Again, select the default options unless you have some specific requirement.

== Download RMS and Set it Up ==
=== Clone the RMS code to your PC ===
* From the Start Menu, open an Anaconda Powershell prompt and change directory to the place you want to keep the code.
* Run this command:
<pre> git clone https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS.git</pre>
*This will create a new folder "RMS" containing the code.

=== Create an Anaconda virtual environment ===
* Still in the anaconda powershell window, type the following:
<pre>conda create -n RMS python=3.8</pre>
* This will create a python virtual environment named "RMS" containing python 3.8

=== Install the required Python packages ===
* Still in the anaconda powershell window type the following to activate the virtual environment:
<pre>conda activate RMS</pre>
* the prompt should change to "(RMS) c:\source\" or something similar
* change directory into the RMS folder.
* Now install the required Python modules by running these commands:
<pre>
conda install -c conda-forge PyGObject
pip install -r requirements.txt
pip install PyQt5
pip install opencv_python
pip install rawpy
</pre>

== Test RMS worked ==
* To test that RMS worked, type the following in the same Window:
<pre> python -m Utils.SkyFit2 </pre>
* The first time you run RMS it will compile various code modules, but at the end of the process you should see this message:
<pre>
usage: SkyFit2.py [-h] [-c CONFIG_PATH] [-r] [-t TIME] [-f FPS]
[-g CAMERA_GAMMA] [-p GEO_POINTS_PATH]
INPUT_PATH
SkyFit2.py: error: the following arguments are required: INPUT_PATH </pre>
* This indicates that RMS is installed properly.

== Setting RMS up for your Cameras ==
RMS reads its settings from a hidden file '''.config''' which is in the folder /home/pi/source/RMS on each Pi, and is also copied to the ArchivedFiles/ folder containing the night's data. You can copy this file to the RMS folder on your PC if you want.

== Update Regularly!!! ==
The RMS code is FREQUENTLY updated and so its important that you update it too. On the Pi, this is automatic but on your PC you need to do it yourself.

To update the code, open an Anaconda Powershell window, activate the RMS environment and then type:
<pre>
git stash
git pull
git stash apply
</pre>
This will 'stash' your local changes such as the config file, pull the latest code, and then reapply your local changes.

== Thats It ==
That's it! Any time you want to run RMS you just
* open an Anaconda Powershell prompt
* change directory to the RMS folder
* activate the virtual environment
<pre> conda activate RMS</pre>
* and then run the module you want to use.

Installing OS onto a Raspberry Pi

2023-08-15T19:15:01Z

Dvida: /* Flash image onto a microSD card/USB flash disk */

'''WARNING: THIS IS A PAGE IN PROGRESS! DO NOT FOLLOW IT IF YOU ARE LOOKING FOR THE BUILDING OF A CAMERA FROM SCRATCH'''
Ahoj! In this section, you will flash (or install if you wish) an OS Linux onto your SD card or USB flash key and boot your Raspberry Pi for the first time.

= Install OS by flashing the image =
== Flash image onto a microSD card/USB flash disk ==

''' The process is the same for an microSD card or a USB flash key, just the target will differ. '''

# Download the image for Raspberry Pi 4B [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/projects/sd_card_images/RMS_RPi4_image_20230804.img.xz here] and save it on the PC somewhere.
# Download the [https://www.balena.io/etcher/ BalenaEtcher], if you haven’t done it yet.
# Insert a microSD card or a USB flash disk into your PC, and note the letter it was assigned.
# Run BalenaEtcher, and flash the image file onto your microSD card/USB flash disk: Select Flash from file, find the image file and select it. As Target select your USB flash disk. Normally the system disks are hidden but verify the name, letter and size of your USB flash disk to be sure you have the correct target. Click Flash, once again verify the target and confirm it. Wait for the process to finish. (In case you will receive an error you may need to run BalenaEtcher as administrator)
# Eject the USB flash disk in Windows if necessary and then remove your microSD card/USB flash disk from your PC and insert it into your Raspberry Pi, which should be connected to a TV or Monitor, and have a keyboard and mouse connected. Power on a Raspberry Pi. Make sure that a microSD card is not inserted.
# Wait for the boot. If the boot takes too long to occur, please have a look at the next section. If it booted successfully, follow the on-screen instructions.

This is what the selection should look like:
[[File:BalenaEtcher_selection.png|center]]

This is what the process should look like:
[[File:BalenaEtcher_process.png|center]]

== Pre-2021 Raspberry Pi 4 Bootloader update - an USB flash disk ONLY ==

If you encountered a problem booting Raspberry Pi 4 from a USB device (common for all USB devices, not only flash disks), the most probable reason is that your Raspberry Pi 4 is from an older batch and its bootloader has to be updated. The procedure is simple and you will need a blank small MicroSD card to continue, the data are around 1MB in size, so any small microSD card will do the job. The process is nicely described in [https://www.raspberrypi.com/documentation/computers/raspberry-pi.html#updating-the-bootloader the raspberry pi official documentation].

* In case you are looking for more extensive USB booting guide click [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Booting_from_a_USB_device here]

* the pre-installed RMS software images incorporate an auto-updating feature, so that the RMS software is updated to the current release whenever your Raspberry Pi RMS is booted. This way, your station is always running the most recent set of updates.

== The first boot ==

This is how the first boot of RMS linux looks like:
[[File:The_first_boot_raspi.png|1500px|center]]

Now it is good time to send an email to denis.vida@gmail.com with short introduction, stating that you are building the camera, stating from which country you are and asking for the station code. You will need it later when setting up the RMS software once your camera is fully installed and positioned.

= [OPTIONAL] Install the software from scratch =
''' This is for users who wish to perform more advanced tasks, if you have gone for the previous section, do not continue with the sections below '''
'''Note: if you're setting up a Raspberry Pi you should use the prebuilt image as this comes with all necessary software installed and is ready to use.'''. If you really really '''really''' do want to install on the RPi from scratch, you can follow the instructions below:

== Install for Raspberry Pi 4 ==

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/19ImeNqBTD1ml2iisp5y7CjDrRV33wBeF9rtx3mIVjh4/edit?usp=sharing here]

== Install for Linux ==

Detailed instructions [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Installation_for_Linux here]

== Linux GUI and multi-Camera support ==

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vTh_CtwxKu3_vxB6YpEoctLpsn5-v677qJgWsYi6gEr_QKacrfrfIz4lFM1l-CZO86t1HwFfk3P5Nb6/pub here]

== Installation for Windows ==
Data capture does not work under windows. However you can use the other tools on your PC, where its much quicker to run SkyFit2 to calibrate your camera to the sky, or you want to use BatchFFToImage to convert data to jpeg format to share on Social Media.

Click '''[[Windows_Installation|here]]''' for detailed instructions. The instructions were tested on Windows 10 64-bit, but should work on any Windows version where git and Anaconda are available.

Aside: If you are a Windows whizz, please feel free to investigate why data capture doesn't work!

== Installation for MacOS ==
As with Windows, installation for MacOS is useful if you want to analyse the data offline. If you do want to install it, please follow the instructions '''[[MacOS_Install | here]]'''.

You are now done with this section and now you are going to focus your camera and put all bits and pieces together for the first test. Exciting, isn't it? [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Build_%26_Install_%26_Setup_your_camera_-_The_complete_how-to Back to the signpost page.]

Lens Options

2023-07-24T13:21:12Z

Dvida:

In city skies or if you have lots of obstructions (trees, buildings, etc.), we recommend the following 6mm lens with a ~55x30° field of view:
* Seller 1 - [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005003145991079.html 6mm f/0.95 M16]
* Seller 2 - [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32959421060.html 6mm f/0.95 M16]

In very light-polluted city skies, an alternative is the 8mm f/0.9 M16 lens which provides ~40x20° field of view:
* [https://aliexpress.com/item/1005004841215050.html 8mm f/0.9 M16]

For observing fainter meteors, the following 16mm f/1.0 lens can be used that provides only a limited 20x10° field of view. This stations with this lens should only be paired with other stations using the same lens:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32857028953.html 16mm f/1.0 CS]
Note that this lens also requires a special CS lens mount, not supplied with the lens:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32833667462.html CS lens mount]

Main Page

2023-05-16T19:05:10Z

Dvida: /* GMN related publications */

Welcome to the Global Meteor Network's wiki page!

The Global Meteor Network (GMN) is a world wide organization of amateur and professional astronomers alike, whose goal is to observe the night sky using low-light video cameras and produce meteor trajectories in a coordinated manner. Here you will find information on the purpose and structure of the GMN, assembling and operating your own meteor camera, contributing to the development of RMS the GMN software, as well as information on how your observations as a citizen scientist can contribute to the further understanding of our solar system's formation and evolution.

'''<span style="color:red">If you have come here to find out how to build and setup a camera from scratch, jump ahead to [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#How_do_I_obtain_a_camera.3F this] section !</span>'''

== Global Meteor Network Overview ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=141 Our mission] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=363 A brief history of the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Video introduction - Overview of the Global Meteor Network (IMC2020)] ===

=== [https://youtu.be/oM7lfQ4nmyw Video overview - Meteor tracking and the GMN from Astro Imaging Channel presentation] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ Some 'live' GMN data products] ===

== Meteor Detection Station ==

=== What is an RMS GMN station? ===
: A RMS-based GMN station that is the subject of this Wiki consists of a Raspberry Pi (RPi) single board computer, a low light level security video camera, and the RMS software package. The camera is securely mounted in a weatherproof housing, pointed at the sky, and connected to the RPi with a POE (Power Over Ethernet) cable. The RPi is connected to the Internet via WiFi, and to be a part of GMN network, you’ll need a fairly powerful Raspberry Pi (RPi 3B+, RPi 4 or better) and a reasonably fast Internet connection. The internet connection is primarily required to enable data upload to a central server each morning as well as provide automatic updates for the RMS software.

: Nightly, the RPi starts recording video from the camera shortly after local sunset continuously compressing and storing the video data locally. Each morning before sunrise, after capture is complete, the RPi analyzes the video and extracts your nightly station’s meteor observations. These extracted video “clips” of detected meteors are then archived and uploaded to a server. The clips can total hundreds of megabytes on a “busy” night (e.g., in a heavy meteor shower, or a night with a lot of false detections--progress is being made on the detection software). The server finds meteors which were observed with more than one station and this enables the server to triangulate the meteor trails in 3D and calculate the orbits of the meteors.

===[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS/blob/master/README.md What do I need?] ===

You'll need a Raspberry Pi with the software on, and a camera kit. We strongly recommend the Pi4 model. The software will run on a Pi3 but it is much slower.

It is also possible to run multiple cameras on a Linux PC. More details [https://docs.google.com/document/d/16PSFi8RAqbenPdluhulCRaIenOkEzgs5piUhkX3yaOc/edit here].

=== How do I obtain a camera? ===
There are two options:

==== Buy a Camera ====
You can buy a camera and Pi prebuilt and ready to install. These are available from a couple of suppliers. The Croatian Meteor Network sell prebuilt cameras as explained on [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=136 this page]. Alternatively, if you're in the UK, you can obtain cameras from the [https://ukmeteornetwork.co.uk/ UK Meteor Network]

==== Build your own from scratch ====
This requires some basic DIY skills and some familiarity with the Raspberry PI, but don't be put off. The instructions are comprehensive and if you get stuck, you can ask for advice in the [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork groups.io] forum.

Click on this link if you want to '''[[Build_A_Camera|build a camera from scratch]]'''.

Once you've built the camera, You can '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#Flash_a_pre-built_image flash a Prebuilt image]''' onto an SD card to set up the Pi with the software required to capture meteors and upload data to the network. Although the primary choice for Raspberry Pi 4 is still a microSD card, you may wish to consider '''using a USB flash disk, USB-attached SSD or USB-attached HDD''' as a boot device. Click [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Booting_from_a_USB_device Booting from a USB device] to know more.

=== Can I use a commercial all-sky camera? ===

: Generally no due to the lack of sensitivity. [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=163 But see this recent experiment]

== Operating and maintaining your GMN station ==

=== Overview ===

: Please note that GMS is a nascent operation and you may share some growing pains if you choose to be involved -- we're still working out some bugs and making improvements here, which may be an opportunity to help if you have programming skills! ;-) So note that the workload of day-to-day operation can be non-zero, and might take a little bit of your time.

: Ideally, you'll want to monitor your RMS RPi system(s) daily to look for freezes or glitches or other problems... like birds nesting or soiling the camera window, people accidentally unplugging the power cord, mice (or cats or dogs!) chewing on the camera Ethernet cable, etc.

: Although we are getting close, this is not a "power up and forget about it" system yet.
: However, by its very nature, the GMS network is inhabited by a lot of people who are willing to help newcomers getting started. So, here are some clues for daily operation of your RMS camera.

=== So what does the meteor camera do over the course of 24 hours? ===

: The RMS Python based system calculates the sundown to sunrise interval and schedules video camera capture all night long. Depending on the video camera and capabilities of the RPi, the camera captures 25 or more frames per second between evening and morning twilight. During the continuous image capture, the station begins processing captured image data, doing a pre-screening to target frames with a suitable number of stars (usually around 20) that makes it worth looking for meteor detections. Once data capture has finished, the station switches into processing all the promising frames for detections, then refining the astrometric accuracy of every positive detection. Using the station platepar (plate parameters) calibration file, processing iterates to find the best astrometry and photometry solution for each detected meteor. Once this process has analyzed each detection, summary files are created.
: These summary files include text file data presentation in several widely accepted formats (CAMS and UFOorbit), as well as graphic plots of detection frequencies throughout the night, a set of thumbnail images of detections, a set of thumbnail images of data captured throughout the night, a single image with all detections stacked together, plots of photometry, astrometry, and camera pointing drift in arc minutes throughout the course of the night as the mount or building flexes, a flat file for correcting images, and a plot of all detections showing any identified radiants. Finally all results are combined into a single compressed archive, which is automatically uploaded each morning to the central server. Optionally, you can create a mp4 movie showing a time lapse of the night’s captured images.
: Each morning you can review the result files on the RPi, and copy anything you want to your computer or tablet.

===Archiving data ===

: Your primary scientific data is automatically uploaded to the central server every morning when data processing is done. However once it has done this, RMS will purge out the oldest data to free up space for the next night's run.

: So, you may want to copy some of the data to a PC, NAS or cloud for further analysis of your own. The data you should consider backing up are the contents of '''~/RMS_data/ArchivedFiles''', which holds the individual files and data that RMS determined were probably meteors. Full detail on how to nbare beyond the scope of the GMN Wiki, but tools such as robocopy (for Windows) and rsync(for Linux/MacOS) are ideal. These tools can 'mirror' data across a network. If you want help configuring these, ask in the Globalmeteornetwork group on groups.io.

: We've also built some automated tools that can help to back up any additional data to a thumb drive inserted into the RPi. Please ask in the group about these.

===Backup and restore configuration and RSA keys===

: Open a terminal and execute the command '''Scripts/RMS_Backup.sh'''. A compressed .zip file containing all important configuration files and keys will be created in user's home directory with the prefix RMS_Backup and .zip extension. Example: ''/home/pi/RMS_Backup_XX0001_2023-01-28.zip''.

: Copy the .zip file to a safe place outside RPi, it will be useful later to restore the system in case of failure. Note it contains the RSA public and private keys used to contact GMN servers, keep it secret.

: To restore the configuration, unzip the backup file in some folder on the RPi and copy the files '''.config''', '''platepar_cmn2010.cal''' and '''mask.bmp''' to the folder '''/home/pi/source/RMS/''', and the files '''id_rsa''' and '''id_rsa.pub'' to the folder ''/home/pi/.ssh/''' as in the following example:

:: cp .config platepar_cmn2010.cal mask.bmp /home/pi/source/RMS/
:: cp id_rsa id_rsa.pub /home/pi/.ssh/

: Make sure that RSA key files permission bits are correct by using the command:

:: chmod 400 ~/.ssh/id_rsa*

=== Viewing the data ===

: To view the data, you can use CMN_binViewer software[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer] which is already installed in the RMS SD image.
: There is also a Windows version[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer/releases] you can install.

: '''Important note''' : You can also open the images in astronomical FITS viewers such as FITS Liberator or Pixinsight, though the results may be surprising. For example in FITS Liberator, the image will be '''upside down'''. This is an artefact of how the software reads the image. In space, there's no 'up' or 'down' and so the FITS specification does not dictate whether the pixel (0,0) is at the bottom left or top left, or indeed one of the other corners. Some software, notably FITS Liberator, treats the top left as the origin and so terrestrial images will be displayed mirrored vertically.

=== Tools and Utilities ===

* [https://www.realvnc.com/en/connect/download/viewer/ RealVNC] or [https://anydesk.com/en AnyDesk] remote connect tool allows station access from anywhere. Access from outside your network is enabled by use of an OpenVPN connection address available to meteor stations. Alternatively, with VNC and Teamviewer, you can create an account and team on their websites, and then remotely access your station.
* Samba data directory access, allows you to copy data results directly from your RPi to your computer or tablet.
* [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer CMN_binViewer] can be used to view standard fits image files containing meteor detections. It runs on the RPi, and is also available under Windows.
* [https://sonotaco.com/soft/e_index.html UFO Orbit] allows you to process data from multiple stations and generate unified radiants of two or more stations seeing the same meteor. It can plot the shared object ground path, orbital characteristics, and can output a summary file of all objects seen by more than one station, which can be used for further analysis.
* RMS software can be installed under Windows to allow much of the RMS python-based code to be executed on your computer, so it can be run against meteor station data you have transferred to your computer from the RPi.
* You can run RMS Python jobs on the RPi to sample the image files captured all night long and condense them into a mp4 movie. This creates a sometimes mesmerizing summary that can run for over 2 minutes in length for winter time data.

== Configuring and installing your camera ==

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick start guide] ===

=== [[Focusing_your_camera | Focusing your IP camera]] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2sq1hBwcAA Video tutorial - Configuring your IMX291 IP camera] ===

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1TPotXcRstHz-XWIQYIW71xkRYy7Ca1UCoEiZsqdk9zw/edit?usp=sharing Different ways of connecting the camera] ===

== What can I do with my GMN station? ==

=== Using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration + Manually reducing observations of fireballs and computing their trajectories: ===
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao3J9Jf0iLQ Updated 2023 video tutorial]
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOjb3qxDlX4 Old 2021 video tutorial]

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=310 Generating a Google Earth KML file to show your station's field of view] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=253 Using UFO Orbit program to estimate meteor trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=221 Urban meteor observing] ===

== RMS Software Installation ==

=== Flash a pre-built image ===

Pre-built Images are available with the RMS software pre-installed on Raspbian. Raspbian is the operating system typically used on the Raspberry Pi.

A 128 GB microSD card is preferred, although smaller 64 GB cards will also work. The image is flashed to the microSD card using the Etcher utility for Windows (32 or 64-bit), MacOS or Linux (64-bit), which can be found [https://www.balena.io/etcher/ here]

If you are considering using a USB flash disk, USB-attached SSD or USB-attached HDD as a boot device, click [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Booting_from_a_USB_device Booting from a USB device] to know more.

When you first boot up the Pi make sure you have a keyboard, monitor and mouse attached as you will be taken through a setup process by the RMS software.

The current publicly released images of RMS are:
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/sa9csd4m3jr1vqo/RMS_image_20191203.zip?dl=1 RPi3B+ ]
and
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/3pwwenty43dazq4/RMS_RPi4_image_20210626.zip?dl=1 RPi4 ].

Please see the [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick Start Guide] about how to flash them to an SD card.

Notes:
* The earlier versions of the Raspberry Pi, the 1 and 2, are not powerful enough to run RMS software.

* the pre-installed RMS software images incorporate an auto-updating feature, so that the RMS software is updated to the current release whenever your Raspberry Pi RMS is booted. This way, your station is always running the most recent set of updates.

* For installations into other Linux or windows environments, executing the command ''git pull'' will update to the most recent RMS release.

* The code was designed to run on a RPi, but it will also run an some Linux distributions. We have tested it on Linux Mint 18 and Ubuntu 16. For information on installing into other Linux releases, check portions of the section listed below for installing on RPi, and also check installation instructions found on [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS GitHub]

== [OPTIONAL] Install the software from scratch ==

'''Note: if you're setting up a Raspberry Pi you should use the prebuilt image as this comes with all necessary software installed and is ready to use.'''. If you really really '''really''' do want to install on the RPi from scratch, you can follow the instructions below:

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 4 ===

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/19ImeNqBTD1ml2iisp5y7CjDrRV33wBeF9rtx3mIVjh4/edit?usp=sharing here]

Install on a [[Pi4 with Raspbian Bullseye]]

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 3 ===

'''We no longer recommend the Pi3, as it doesn't have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers. '''

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ChaXx6WkuGfcQ_f5yRbwUOOMxEgIJrjq932UZE6cRjE/edit here].

=== Install for Linux ===

Detailed instructions [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Installation_for_Linux here]

=== Linux GUI and multi-Camera support ===

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/16PSFi8RAqbenPdluhulCRaIenOkEzgs5piUhkX3yaOc/edit?usp=sharing here]

=== Installation for Windows ===
Data capture does not work under windows. However you can use the other tools on your PC, where its much quicker to run SkyFit2 to calibrate your camera to the sky, or you want to use BatchFFToImage to convert data to jpeg format to share on Social Media.

Click '''[[Windows_Installation|here]]''' for detailed instructions. The instructions were tested on Windows 10 64-bit, but should work on any Windows version where git and Anaconda are available.

Aside: If you are a Windows whizz, please feel free to investigate why data capture doesn't work!

=== Installation for MacOS ===
As with Windows, installation for MacOS is useful if you want to analyse the data offline. If you do want to install it, please follow the instructions '''[[MacOS_Install | here]]'''.

== Data analysis with SkyFit2 ==

SkyFit2 is a program within the RMS library which supports analyzing optical meteor data in most optical formats that are in use today, including videos in any popular video format (mp4, avi, mkv), a sequence of static images, or a single image with shutter breaks.

This [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao3J9Jf0iLQ video tutorial] explains how to using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration on GMN data and manually reduce observations of fireballs, including computing their trajectories.

A more general and detailed description of SkyFit2 is given at the '''[[SkyFit2|SkyFit2]]''' page.

== FAQ ==

=== What should I back up when re-flashing an SD card or a USB disk? ===

: The .config, platepar and mask files that are in the RMS source directory, plus the whole contents of the hidden directory /home/pi/.ssh.

If your SD card or a USB disk fails or becomes corrupted, the config files can be fetched from the server as they are uploaded every day together with the data. However the contents of .ssh are essential for connection to the server, so you must also save these. Once you set up a new SD card or a USB disk, return the files in their original location.

=== What are the values in FTPdetectinfo_* file designated as hnr mle bin Pix/fm Rho Phi? ===

: Some of these values are not used in RMS (hnr mle bin), but they are in CAMS, so they are here to conform to the standard. Thus they are all zeros. The others are:

: - Pix/fm - Average angular speed of the meteor in pixels per frame.

: - Rho, Phi - Parameters that define the line of the meteor in polar coordinates, see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hough_transform#Theory here] for more details. Rho is the distance of the line from the centre of the image, and phi is the angle of the line as measured from the positive direction of the Y axis (basically a line going from the center of the image to the top of the image), the positive angles are measured clockwise (I think, the CAMS standard might define these parameters a bit differently, the Y axis is flipped).

: The intensity is the sum of all pixel intensities of the meteor on a given frame. Let's say I represent an area around the meteor on a given frame like this, where the numbers are pixel intensities on an 8-bit image (so they can range from 0 to 255):

: [[File:Intensity_sum.png |Intensity_sum.png ]]

: and the pixels values inside the red boundary represent the meteor blob on the frame, the intensity would be the sum of all numbers inside the red boundary.
: This value is later used to compute the magnitude. The magnitude is computed as: mag = -2.5*log10(intensity sum) + photometric_offset. The photometric offset is estimated in SkyFit by fitting the line with slope -2.5 through pairs of known magnitudes of stars and logartihms of their pixel intensity sum. The photometric offset is basically the intercept of that line. The constant slope of -2.5 comes from the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apparent_magnitude#Calculations definition of stellar magnitudes.]

== GMN data policy ==

The Global Meteor Network produces several levles of data products:
* Level 1 - The lowest level data (i.e. as close to "raw" as possible) are the FF image and FR video files saved to the RPi by the capture code and the fireball detector.
* Level 2 - The meteor detector uses these data to extract positional and brightness information of individual meteors (FTPdetectinfo file), and images are also used for astrometric and photometric calibration (platepar file). Meteor and star detections are used to generate a range of plots suchs as the single-station shower association graph, camera drift graph, etc. The calibrated meteors measurements get uploaded to the GMN server together with the raw images of individual meteors.
* Level 3 - The software on the server correlates individual observations and computes multi-station meteor trajectories which are published daily on the GMN [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ data website]. This data is made public under the [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ CC BY 4.0 license].

Operators of individual GMN stations exclusivery own the Level 1 and Level 2 data their stations produce. In practice, this means that they are free to share this data with other meteor networks if they wish to do so. The data that gets uploaded to the GMN server will not be shared publicly nor with other parties without the operator's consent, but may be used internally by the GMN coordinators to manually produce other data products (e.g. trajectory of a meteorite dropping fireball, analysis of a meteor shower). All station operators will be credited for their data in all GMN publications.

== IstraStream ==

=== [http://istrastream.com/rms-gmn/ IstraStream GMN status website] ===

: The IstraStream.com is an independent hosting site which primarily hosts data by cameras sold by IstraStream, but they also host several other stations. As for mid-2023 Istrastream stopped taking new cameras and is aimed to be completely replaced by the [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/weblog/ GMN weblog].

This document explains what every plot on the IstraStream weblog means:

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/132aHGn0QPzhpVN2s2n6FT6rJn39LAsPkchWJqXQb8Qk/edit?usp=sharing IstraStream Plots Explanation] ===

== For More Information ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=43 Contact the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork Join the Global Meteor Network Forum] ===

=== [https://github.com/markmac99/ukmon-pitools/wiki UK Meteor Network Wiki]===
This wiki has numerous FAQs and tips on maintaining, monitoring and managing your system, and several explainers such as how to calibrate and create a mask, how to copy data and so forth.

=== GMN talks ===

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IfUyCHjMATc 2023 GMN Meeting Session 1 (February 2023)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I78KwF5-1GE 2023 GMN Meeting Session 2 (February 2023)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDdrG_FCyGk 2022 GMN Meeting Session 1 (February 2022)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_75CDPzjI4 2022 GMN Meeting Session 2 (February 2022)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6x9_WCVphY GMN talk at the European Space Agency's Fireball Workshop (June 2021)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXBTLPnPDWs 2021 GMN Meeting] - [https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ia9vagug5lxm8k9/AAB_i_1jcWThUdAHO_2gF_Ksa?dl=0 Link to slides]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Overview of the GMN - IMC2020 (September 2020)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oM7lfQ4nmyw Overview of the GMN, Astro Imaging Channel presentation (May 2020)]

=== GMN-related publications ===

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2206.11365 Vida, D., Blaauw Erskine, R. C., Brown, P. G., Kambulow, J., Campbell-Brown, M., & Mazur, M. J. (2022). Computing optical meteor flux using global meteor network data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 515(2), 2322-2339.]

: [https://academic.oup.com/mnras/advance-article/doi/10.1093/mnras/stab2557/6368869 Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T., & Vida, D. (2021). Meteor shower radiant dispersions in Global Meteor Network data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 508(1), 326-339.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2107.12335 Vida, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P. S., Brown, P. G., McIntyre, M. J., Dijkema, T. J., Pavletić, L., Kukić, P., Mazur, M.J., Eschman, P., Roggemans, P., Merlak, A., & Zubović, D. (2021). The Global Meteor Network–Methodology and first results. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 506(4), 5046-5074.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.05458/ Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T. D., & Vida, D. (2020). Realistic gravitational focusing of meteoroid streams. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 494(2), 2982-2994.]

: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Kukic-et-al-2018-Rolling-shutter.pdf Kukić, P., Gural, P., Vida, D., Šegon, D. & Merlak, A. (2018) Correction for meteor centroids observed using rolling shutter cameras. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46:5, 154-118.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_sun_skirter_final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Kukić, P., & Merlak, A. (2018). Compressive strength of a skirting Daytime Arietid-first science results from low-cost Raspberry Pi-based meteor stations. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 113-118.]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.02979.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - I. Theory. arXiv:1911.02979v4 [astro-ph.EP] 21 Apr 2020]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.11734.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - II. Results. arXiv:1911.11734v1 [astro-ph.EP] 26 Novr 2019]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_first_results-final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Zubović, D., Kukić, P., Parag, F., & Macan, A. (2018). First results of a Raspberry Pi based meteor camera system. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 71-78.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Vida_IMC2016_proceedings_final.pdf Vida, D., Zubović, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P., & Cupec, R. (2016). Open-source meteor detection software for low-cost single-board computers. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference (IMC2016), Egmond, The Netherlands (pp. 2-5).]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Zubovic_IMC2015_priceedings_final.pdf Zubović, D., Vida, D., Gural, P., & Šegon, D. (2015). Advances in the development of a low-cost video meteor station. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference, Mistelbach, Austria (pp. 27-30).]

Main Page

2023-05-16T19:02:47Z

Dvida: /* GMN talks */

Welcome to the Global Meteor Network's wiki page!

The Global Meteor Network (GMN) is a world wide organization of amateur and professional astronomers alike, whose goal is to observe the night sky using low-light video cameras and produce meteor trajectories in a coordinated manner. Here you will find information on the purpose and structure of the GMN, assembling and operating your own meteor camera, contributing to the development of RMS the GMN software, as well as information on how your observations as a citizen scientist can contribute to the further understanding of our solar system's formation and evolution.

'''<span style="color:red">If you have come here to find out how to build and setup a camera from scratch, jump ahead to [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#How_do_I_obtain_a_camera.3F this] section !</span>'''

== Global Meteor Network Overview ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=141 Our mission] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=363 A brief history of the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Video introduction - Overview of the Global Meteor Network (IMC2020)] ===

=== [https://youtu.be/oM7lfQ4nmyw Video overview - Meteor tracking and the GMN from Astro Imaging Channel presentation] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ Some 'live' GMN data products] ===

== Meteor Detection Station ==

=== What is an RMS GMN station? ===
: A RMS-based GMN station that is the subject of this Wiki consists of a Raspberry Pi (RPi) single board computer, a low light level security video camera, and the RMS software package. The camera is securely mounted in a weatherproof housing, pointed at the sky, and connected to the RPi with a POE (Power Over Ethernet) cable. The RPi is connected to the Internet via WiFi, and to be a part of GMN network, you’ll need a fairly powerful Raspberry Pi (RPi 3B+, RPi 4 or better) and a reasonably fast Internet connection. The internet connection is primarily required to enable data upload to a central server each morning as well as provide automatic updates for the RMS software.

: Nightly, the RPi starts recording video from the camera shortly after local sunset continuously compressing and storing the video data locally. Each morning before sunrise, after capture is complete, the RPi analyzes the video and extracts your nightly station’s meteor observations. These extracted video “clips” of detected meteors are then archived and uploaded to a server. The clips can total hundreds of megabytes on a “busy” night (e.g., in a heavy meteor shower, or a night with a lot of false detections--progress is being made on the detection software). The server finds meteors which were observed with more than one station and this enables the server to triangulate the meteor trails in 3D and calculate the orbits of the meteors.

===[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS/blob/master/README.md What do I need?] ===

You'll need a Raspberry Pi with the software on, and a camera kit. We strongly recommend the Pi4 model. The software will run on a Pi3 but it is much slower.

It is also possible to run multiple cameras on a Linux PC. More details [https://docs.google.com/document/d/16PSFi8RAqbenPdluhulCRaIenOkEzgs5piUhkX3yaOc/edit here].

=== How do I obtain a camera? ===
There are two options:

==== Buy a Camera ====
You can buy a camera and Pi prebuilt and ready to install. These are available from a couple of suppliers. The Croatian Meteor Network sell prebuilt cameras as explained on [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=136 this page]. Alternatively, if you're in the UK, you can obtain cameras from the [https://ukmeteornetwork.co.uk/ UK Meteor Network]

==== Build your own from scratch ====
This requires some basic DIY skills and some familiarity with the Raspberry PI, but don't be put off. The instructions are comprehensive and if you get stuck, you can ask for advice in the [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork groups.io] forum.

Click on this link if you want to '''[[Build_A_Camera|build a camera from scratch]]'''.

Once you've built the camera, You can '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#Flash_a_pre-built_image flash a Prebuilt image]''' onto an SD card to set up the Pi with the software required to capture meteors and upload data to the network. Although the primary choice for Raspberry Pi 4 is still a microSD card, you may wish to consider '''using a USB flash disk, USB-attached SSD or USB-attached HDD''' as a boot device. Click [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Booting_from_a_USB_device Booting from a USB device] to know more.

=== Can I use a commercial all-sky camera? ===

: Generally no due to the lack of sensitivity. [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=163 But see this recent experiment]

== Operating and maintaining your GMN station ==

=== Overview ===

: Please note that GMS is a nascent operation and you may share some growing pains if you choose to be involved -- we're still working out some bugs and making improvements here, which may be an opportunity to help if you have programming skills! ;-) So note that the workload of day-to-day operation can be non-zero, and might take a little bit of your time.

: Ideally, you'll want to monitor your RMS RPi system(s) daily to look for freezes or glitches or other problems... like birds nesting or soiling the camera window, people accidentally unplugging the power cord, mice (or cats or dogs!) chewing on the camera Ethernet cable, etc.

: Although we are getting close, this is not a "power up and forget about it" system yet.
: However, by its very nature, the GMS network is inhabited by a lot of people who are willing to help newcomers getting started. So, here are some clues for daily operation of your RMS camera.

=== So what does the meteor camera do over the course of 24 hours? ===

: The RMS Python based system calculates the sundown to sunrise interval and schedules video camera capture all night long. Depending on the video camera and capabilities of the RPi, the camera captures 25 or more frames per second between evening and morning twilight. During the continuous image capture, the station begins processing captured image data, doing a pre-screening to target frames with a suitable number of stars (usually around 20) that makes it worth looking for meteor detections. Once data capture has finished, the station switches into processing all the promising frames for detections, then refining the astrometric accuracy of every positive detection. Using the station platepar (plate parameters) calibration file, processing iterates to find the best astrometry and photometry solution for each detected meteor. Once this process has analyzed each detection, summary files are created.
: These summary files include text file data presentation in several widely accepted formats (CAMS and UFOorbit), as well as graphic plots of detection frequencies throughout the night, a set of thumbnail images of detections, a set of thumbnail images of data captured throughout the night, a single image with all detections stacked together, plots of photometry, astrometry, and camera pointing drift in arc minutes throughout the course of the night as the mount or building flexes, a flat file for correcting images, and a plot of all detections showing any identified radiants. Finally all results are combined into a single compressed archive, which is automatically uploaded each morning to the central server. Optionally, you can create a mp4 movie showing a time lapse of the night’s captured images.
: Each morning you can review the result files on the RPi, and copy anything you want to your computer or tablet.

===Archiving data ===

: Your primary scientific data is automatically uploaded to the central server every morning when data processing is done. However once it has done this, RMS will purge out the oldest data to free up space for the next night's run.

: So, you may want to copy some of the data to a PC, NAS or cloud for further analysis of your own. The data you should consider backing up are the contents of '''~/RMS_data/ArchivedFiles''', which holds the individual files and data that RMS determined were probably meteors. Full detail on how to nbare beyond the scope of the GMN Wiki, but tools such as robocopy (for Windows) and rsync(for Linux/MacOS) are ideal. These tools can 'mirror' data across a network. If you want help configuring these, ask in the Globalmeteornetwork group on groups.io.

: We've also built some automated tools that can help to back up any additional data to a thumb drive inserted into the RPi. Please ask in the group about these.

===Backup and restore configuration and RSA keys===

: Open a terminal and execute the command '''Scripts/RMS_Backup.sh'''. A compressed .zip file containing all important configuration files and keys will be created in user's home directory with the prefix RMS_Backup and .zip extension. Example: ''/home/pi/RMS_Backup_XX0001_2023-01-28.zip''.

: Copy the .zip file to a safe place outside RPi, it will be useful later to restore the system in case of failure. Note it contains the RSA public and private keys used to contact GMN servers, keep it secret.

: To restore the configuration, unzip the backup file in some folder on the RPi and copy the files '''.config''', '''platepar_cmn2010.cal''' and '''mask.bmp''' to the folder '''/home/pi/source/RMS/''', and the files '''id_rsa''' and '''id_rsa.pub'' to the folder ''/home/pi/.ssh/''' as in the following example:

:: cp .config platepar_cmn2010.cal mask.bmp /home/pi/source/RMS/
:: cp id_rsa id_rsa.pub /home/pi/.ssh/

: Make sure that RSA key files permission bits are correct by using the command:

:: chmod 400 ~/.ssh/id_rsa*

=== Viewing the data ===

: To view the data, you can use CMN_binViewer software[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer] which is already installed in the RMS SD image.
: There is also a Windows version[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer/releases] you can install.

: '''Important note''' : You can also open the images in astronomical FITS viewers such as FITS Liberator or Pixinsight, though the results may be surprising. For example in FITS Liberator, the image will be '''upside down'''. This is an artefact of how the software reads the image. In space, there's no 'up' or 'down' and so the FITS specification does not dictate whether the pixel (0,0) is at the bottom left or top left, or indeed one of the other corners. Some software, notably FITS Liberator, treats the top left as the origin and so terrestrial images will be displayed mirrored vertically.

=== Tools and Utilities ===

* [https://www.realvnc.com/en/connect/download/viewer/ RealVNC] or [https://anydesk.com/en AnyDesk] remote connect tool allows station access from anywhere. Access from outside your network is enabled by use of an OpenVPN connection address available to meteor stations. Alternatively, with VNC and Teamviewer, you can create an account and team on their websites, and then remotely access your station.
* Samba data directory access, allows you to copy data results directly from your RPi to your computer or tablet.
* [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer CMN_binViewer] can be used to view standard fits image files containing meteor detections. It runs on the RPi, and is also available under Windows.
* [https://sonotaco.com/soft/e_index.html UFO Orbit] allows you to process data from multiple stations and generate unified radiants of two or more stations seeing the same meteor. It can plot the shared object ground path, orbital characteristics, and can output a summary file of all objects seen by more than one station, which can be used for further analysis.
* RMS software can be installed under Windows to allow much of the RMS python-based code to be executed on your computer, so it can be run against meteor station data you have transferred to your computer from the RPi.
* You can run RMS Python jobs on the RPi to sample the image files captured all night long and condense them into a mp4 movie. This creates a sometimes mesmerizing summary that can run for over 2 minutes in length for winter time data.

== Configuring and installing your camera ==

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick start guide] ===

=== [[Focusing_your_camera | Focusing your IP camera]] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2sq1hBwcAA Video tutorial - Configuring your IMX291 IP camera] ===

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1TPotXcRstHz-XWIQYIW71xkRYy7Ca1UCoEiZsqdk9zw/edit?usp=sharing Different ways of connecting the camera] ===

== What can I do with my GMN station? ==

=== Using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration + Manually reducing observations of fireballs and computing their trajectories: ===
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao3J9Jf0iLQ Updated 2023 video tutorial]
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOjb3qxDlX4 Old 2021 video tutorial]

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=310 Generating a Google Earth KML file to show your station's field of view] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=253 Using UFO Orbit program to estimate meteor trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=221 Urban meteor observing] ===

== RMS Software Installation ==

=== Flash a pre-built image ===

Pre-built Images are available with the RMS software pre-installed on Raspbian. Raspbian is the operating system typically used on the Raspberry Pi.

A 128 GB microSD card is preferred, although smaller 64 GB cards will also work. The image is flashed to the microSD card using the Etcher utility for Windows (32 or 64-bit), MacOS or Linux (64-bit), which can be found [https://www.balena.io/etcher/ here]

If you are considering using a USB flash disk, USB-attached SSD or USB-attached HDD as a boot device, click [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Booting_from_a_USB_device Booting from a USB device] to know more.

When you first boot up the Pi make sure you have a keyboard, monitor and mouse attached as you will be taken through a setup process by the RMS software.

The current publicly released images of RMS are:
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/sa9csd4m3jr1vqo/RMS_image_20191203.zip?dl=1 RPi3B+ ]
and
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/3pwwenty43dazq4/RMS_RPi4_image_20210626.zip?dl=1 RPi4 ].

Please see the [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick Start Guide] about how to flash them to an SD card.

Notes:
* The earlier versions of the Raspberry Pi, the 1 and 2, are not powerful enough to run RMS software.

* the pre-installed RMS software images incorporate an auto-updating feature, so that the RMS software is updated to the current release whenever your Raspberry Pi RMS is booted. This way, your station is always running the most recent set of updates.

* For installations into other Linux or windows environments, executing the command ''git pull'' will update to the most recent RMS release.

* The code was designed to run on a RPi, but it will also run an some Linux distributions. We have tested it on Linux Mint 18 and Ubuntu 16. For information on installing into other Linux releases, check portions of the section listed below for installing on RPi, and also check installation instructions found on [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS GitHub]

== [OPTIONAL] Install the software from scratch ==

'''Note: if you're setting up a Raspberry Pi you should use the prebuilt image as this comes with all necessary software installed and is ready to use.'''. If you really really '''really''' do want to install on the RPi from scratch, you can follow the instructions below:

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 4 ===

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/19ImeNqBTD1ml2iisp5y7CjDrRV33wBeF9rtx3mIVjh4/edit?usp=sharing here]

Install on a [[Pi4 with Raspbian Bullseye]]

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 3 ===

'''We no longer recommend the Pi3, as it doesn't have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers. '''

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ChaXx6WkuGfcQ_f5yRbwUOOMxEgIJrjq932UZE6cRjE/edit here].

=== Install for Linux ===

Detailed instructions [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Installation_for_Linux here]

=== Linux GUI and multi-Camera support ===

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/16PSFi8RAqbenPdluhulCRaIenOkEzgs5piUhkX3yaOc/edit?usp=sharing here]

=== Installation for Windows ===
Data capture does not work under windows. However you can use the other tools on your PC, where its much quicker to run SkyFit2 to calibrate your camera to the sky, or you want to use BatchFFToImage to convert data to jpeg format to share on Social Media.

Click '''[[Windows_Installation|here]]''' for detailed instructions. The instructions were tested on Windows 10 64-bit, but should work on any Windows version where git and Anaconda are available.

Aside: If you are a Windows whizz, please feel free to investigate why data capture doesn't work!

=== Installation for MacOS ===
As with Windows, installation for MacOS is useful if you want to analyse the data offline. If you do want to install it, please follow the instructions '''[[MacOS_Install | here]]'''.

== Data analysis with SkyFit2 ==

SkyFit2 is a program within the RMS library which supports analyzing optical meteor data in most optical formats that are in use today, including videos in any popular video format (mp4, avi, mkv), a sequence of static images, or a single image with shutter breaks.

This [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao3J9Jf0iLQ video tutorial] explains how to using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration on GMN data and manually reduce observations of fireballs, including computing their trajectories.

A more general and detailed description of SkyFit2 is given at the '''[[SkyFit2|SkyFit2]]''' page.

== FAQ ==

=== What should I back up when re-flashing an SD card or a USB disk? ===

: The .config, platepar and mask files that are in the RMS source directory, plus the whole contents of the hidden directory /home/pi/.ssh.

If your SD card or a USB disk fails or becomes corrupted, the config files can be fetched from the server as they are uploaded every day together with the data. However the contents of .ssh are essential for connection to the server, so you must also save these. Once you set up a new SD card or a USB disk, return the files in their original location.

=== What are the values in FTPdetectinfo_* file designated as hnr mle bin Pix/fm Rho Phi? ===

: Some of these values are not used in RMS (hnr mle bin), but they are in CAMS, so they are here to conform to the standard. Thus they are all zeros. The others are:

: - Pix/fm - Average angular speed of the meteor in pixels per frame.

: - Rho, Phi - Parameters that define the line of the meteor in polar coordinates, see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hough_transform#Theory here] for more details. Rho is the distance of the line from the centre of the image, and phi is the angle of the line as measured from the positive direction of the Y axis (basically a line going from the center of the image to the top of the image), the positive angles are measured clockwise (I think, the CAMS standard might define these parameters a bit differently, the Y axis is flipped).

: The intensity is the sum of all pixel intensities of the meteor on a given frame. Let's say I represent an area around the meteor on a given frame like this, where the numbers are pixel intensities on an 8-bit image (so they can range from 0 to 255):

: [[File:Intensity_sum.png |Intensity_sum.png ]]

: and the pixels values inside the red boundary represent the meteor blob on the frame, the intensity would be the sum of all numbers inside the red boundary.
: This value is later used to compute the magnitude. The magnitude is computed as: mag = -2.5*log10(intensity sum) + photometric_offset. The photometric offset is estimated in SkyFit by fitting the line with slope -2.5 through pairs of known magnitudes of stars and logartihms of their pixel intensity sum. The photometric offset is basically the intercept of that line. The constant slope of -2.5 comes from the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apparent_magnitude#Calculations definition of stellar magnitudes.]

== GMN data policy ==

The Global Meteor Network produces several levles of data products:
* Level 1 - The lowest level data (i.e. as close to "raw" as possible) are the FF image and FR video files saved to the RPi by the capture code and the fireball detector.
* Level 2 - The meteor detector uses these data to extract positional and brightness information of individual meteors (FTPdetectinfo file), and images are also used for astrometric and photometric calibration (platepar file). Meteor and star detections are used to generate a range of plots suchs as the single-station shower association graph, camera drift graph, etc. The calibrated meteors measurements get uploaded to the GMN server together with the raw images of individual meteors.
* Level 3 - The software on the server correlates individual observations and computes multi-station meteor trajectories which are published daily on the GMN [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ data website]. This data is made public under the [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ CC BY 4.0 license].

Operators of individual GMN stations exclusivery own the Level 1 and Level 2 data their stations produce. In practice, this means that they are free to share this data with other meteor networks if they wish to do so. The data that gets uploaded to the GMN server will not be shared publicly nor with other parties without the operator's consent, but may be used internally by the GMN coordinators to manually produce other data products (e.g. trajectory of a meteorite dropping fireball, analysis of a meteor shower). All station operators will be credited for their data in all GMN publications.

== IstraStream ==

=== [http://istrastream.com/rms-gmn/ IstraStream GMN status website] ===

: The IstraStream.com is an independent hosting site which primarily hosts data by cameras sold by IstraStream, but they also host several other stations. As for mid-2023 Istrastream stopped taking new cameras and is aimed to be completely replaced by the [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/weblog/ GMN weblog].

This document explains what every plot on the IstraStream weblog means:

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/132aHGn0QPzhpVN2s2n6FT6rJn39LAsPkchWJqXQb8Qk/edit?usp=sharing IstraStream Plots Explanation] ===

== For More Information ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=43 Contact the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork Join the Global Meteor Network Forum] ===

=== [https://github.com/markmac99/ukmon-pitools/wiki UK Meteor Network Wiki]===
This wiki has numerous FAQs and tips on maintaining, monitoring and managing your system, and several explainers such as how to calibrate and create a mask, how to copy data and so forth.

=== GMN talks ===

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IfUyCHjMATc 2023 GMN Meeting Session 1 (February 2023)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I78KwF5-1GE 2023 GMN Meeting Session 2 (February 2023)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDdrG_FCyGk 2022 GMN Meeting Session 1 (February 2022)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_75CDPzjI4 2022 GMN Meeting Session 2 (February 2022)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6x9_WCVphY GMN talk at the European Space Agency's Fireball Workshop (June 2021)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXBTLPnPDWs 2021 GMN Meeting] - [https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ia9vagug5lxm8k9/AAB_i_1jcWThUdAHO_2gF_Ksa?dl=0 Link to slides]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Overview of the GMN - IMC2020 (September 2020)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oM7lfQ4nmyw Overview of the GMN, Astro Imaging Channel presentation (May 2020)]

=== GMN related publications ===

: [https://academic.oup.com/mnras/advance-article/doi/10.1093/mnras/stab2557/6368869 Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T., & Vida, D. (2021). Meteor shower radiant dispersions in Global Meteor Network data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2107.12335 Vida, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P. S., Brown, P. G., McIntyre, M. J., Dijkema, T. J., Pavletić, L., Kukić, P., Mazur, M.J., Eschman, P., Roggemans, P., Merlak, A., & Zubović, D. (2021). The Global Meteor Network–Methodology and first results. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 506(4), 5046-5074.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.05458/ Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T. D., & Vida, D. (2020). Realistic gravitational focusing of meteoroid streams. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 494(2), 2982-2994.]

: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Kukic-et-al-2018-Rolling-shutter.pdf Kukić, P., Gural, P., Vida, D., Šegon, D. & Merlak, A. (2018) Correction for meteor centroids observed using rolling shutter cameras. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46:5, 154-118.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_sun_skirter_final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Kukić, P., & Merlak, A. (2018). Compressive strength of a skirting Daytime Arietid-first science results from low-cost Raspberry Pi-based meteor stations. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 113-118.]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.02979.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - I. Theory. arXiv:1911.02979v4 [astro-ph.EP] 21 Apr 2020]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.11734.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - II. Results. arXiv:1911.11734v1 [astro-ph.EP] 26 Novr 2019]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_first_results-final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Zubović, D., Kukić, P., Parag, F., & Macan, A. (2018). First results of a Raspberry Pi based meteor camera system. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 71-78.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Vida_IMC2016_proceedings_final.pdf Vida, D., Zubović, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P., & Cupec, R. (2016). Open-source meteor detection software for low-cost single-board computers. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference (IMC2016), Egmond, The Netherlands (pp. 2-5).]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Zubovic_IMC2015_priceedings_final.pdf Zubović, D., Vida, D., Gural, P., & Šegon, D. (2015). Advances in the development of a low-cost video meteor station. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference, Mistelbach, Austria (pp. 27-30).]

Main Page

2023-04-26T16:23:53Z

Dvida: /* IstraStream */

Welcome to the Global Meteor Network's wiki page!

The Global Meteor Network (GMN) is a world wide organization of amateur and professional astronomers alike, whose goal is to observe the night sky using low-light video cameras and produce meteor trajectories in a coordinated manner. Here you will find information on the purpose and structure of the GMN, assembling and operating your own meteor camera, contributing to the development of RMS the GMN software, as well as information on how your observations as a citizen scientist can contribute to the further understanding of our solar system's formation and evolution.

'''<span style="color:red">If you have come here to find out how to build and setup a camera from scratch, jump ahead to [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#How_do_I_obtain_a_camera.3F this] section !</span>'''

== Global Meteor Network Overview ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=141 Our mission] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=363 A brief history of the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Video introduction - Overview of the Global Meteor Network (IMC2020)] ===

=== [https://youtu.be/oM7lfQ4nmyw Video overview - Meteor tracking and the GMN from Astro Imaging Channel presentation] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ Some 'live' GMN data products] ===

== Meteor Detection Station ==

=== What is an RMS GMN station? ===
: A RMS-based GMN station that is the subject of this Wiki consists of a Raspberry Pi (RPi) single board computer, a low light level security video camera, and the RMS software package. The camera is securely mounted in a weatherproof housing, pointed at the sky, and connected to the RPi with a POE (Power Over Ethernet) cable. The RPi is connected to the Internet via WiFi, and to be a part of GMN network, you’ll need a fairly powerful Raspberry Pi (RPi 3B+, RPi 4 or better) and a reasonably fast Internet connection. The internet connection is primarily required to enable data upload to a central server each morning as well as provide automatic updates for the RMS software.

: Nightly, the RPi starts recording video from the camera shortly after local sunset continuously compressing and storing the video data locally. Each morning before sunrise, after capture is complete, the RPi analyzes the video and extracts your nightly station’s meteor observations. These extracted video “clips” of detected meteors are then archived and uploaded to a server. The clips can total hundreds of megabytes on a “busy” night (e.g., in a heavy meteor shower, or a night with a lot of false detections--progress is being made on the detection software). The server finds meteors which were observed with more than one station and this enables the server to triangulate the meteor trails in 3D and calculate the orbits of the meteors.

===[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS/blob/master/README.md What do I need?] ===

You'll need a Raspberry Pi with the software on, and a camera kit. We strongly recommend the Pi4 model. The software will run on a Pi3 but it is much slower.

It is also possible to run multiple cameras on a Linux PC. More details [https://docs.google.com/document/d/16PSFi8RAqbenPdluhulCRaIenOkEzgs5piUhkX3yaOc/edit here].

=== How do I obtain a camera? ===
There are two options:

==== Buy a Camera ====
You can buy a camera and Pi prebuilt and ready to install. These are available from a couple of suppliers. The Croatian Meteor Network sell prebuilt cameras as explained on [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=136 this page]. Alternatively, if you're in the UK, you can obtain cameras from the [https://ukmeteornetwork.co.uk/ UK Meteor Network]

==== Build your own from scratch ====
This requires some basic DIY skills and some familiarity with the Raspberry PI, but don't be put off. The instructions are comprehensive and if you get stuck, you can ask for advice in the [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork groups.io] forum.

Click on this link if you want to '''[[Build_A_Camera|build a camera from scratch]]'''.

Once you've built the camera, You can '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#Flash_a_pre-built_image flash a Prebuilt image]''' onto an SD card to set up the Pi with the software required to capture meteors and upload data to the network. Although the primary choice for Raspberry Pi 4 is still a microSD card, you may wish to consider '''using a USB flash disk, USB-attached SSD or USB-attached HDD''' as a boot device. Click [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Booting_from_a_USB_device Booting from a USB device] to know more.

=== Can I use a commercial all-sky camera? ===

: Generally no due to the lack of sensitivity. [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=163 But see this recent experiment]

== Operating and maintaining your GMN station ==

=== Overview ===

: Please note that GMS is a nascent operation and you may share some growing pains if you choose to be involved -- we're still working out some bugs and making improvements here, which may be an opportunity to help if you have programming skills! ;-) So note that the workload of day-to-day operation can be non-zero, and might take a little bit of your time.

: Ideally, you'll want to monitor your RMS RPi system(s) daily to look for freezes or glitches or other problems... like birds nesting or soiling the camera window, people accidentally unplugging the power cord, mice (or cats or dogs!) chewing on the camera Ethernet cable, etc.

: Although we are getting close, this is not a "power up and forget about it" system yet.
: However, by its very nature, the GMS network is inhabited by a lot of people who are willing to help newcomers getting started. So, here are some clues for daily operation of your RMS camera.

=== So what does the meteor camera do over the course of 24 hours? ===

: The RMS Python based system calculates the sundown to sunrise interval and schedules video camera capture all night long. Depending on the video camera and capabilities of the RPi, the camera captures 25 or more frames per second between evening and morning twilight. During the continuous image capture, the station begins processing captured image data, doing a pre-screening to target frames with a suitable number of stars (usually around 20) that makes it worth looking for meteor detections. Once data capture has finished, the station switches into processing all the promising frames for detections, then refining the astrometric accuracy of every positive detection. Using the station platepar (plate parameters) calibration file, processing iterates to find the best astrometry and photometry solution for each detected meteor. Once this process has analyzed each detection, summary files are created.
: These summary files include text file data presentation in several widely accepted formats (CAMS and UFOorbit), as well as graphic plots of detection frequencies throughout the night, a set of thumbnail images of detections, a set of thumbnail images of data captured throughout the night, a single image with all detections stacked together, plots of photometry, astrometry, and camera pointing drift in arc minutes throughout the course of the night as the mount or building flexes, a flat file for correcting images, and a plot of all detections showing any identified radiants. Finally all results are combined into a single compressed archive, which is automatically uploaded each morning to the central server. Optionally, you can create a mp4 movie showing a time lapse of the night’s captured images.
: Each morning you can review the result files on the RPi, and copy anything you want to your computer or tablet.

===Archiving data ===

: Your primary scientific data is automatically uploaded to the central server every morning when data processing is done. However once it has done this, RMS will purge out the oldest data to free up space for the next night's run.

: So, you may want to copy some of the data to a PC, NAS or cloud for further analysis of your own. The data you should consider backing up are the contents of '''~/RMS_data/ArchivedFiles''', which holds the individual files and data that RMS determined were probably meteors. Full detail on how to nbare beyond the scope of the GMN Wiki, but tools such as robocopy (for Windows) and rsync(for Linux/MacOS) are ideal. These tools can 'mirror' data across a network. If you want help configuring these, ask in the Globalmeteornetwork group on groups.io.

: We've also built some automated tools that can help to back up any additional data to a thumb drive inserted into the RPi. Please ask in the group about these.

===Backup and restore configuration and RSA keys===

: Open a terminal and execute the command '''Scripts/RMS_Backup.sh'''. A compressed .zip file containing all important configuration files and keys will be created in user's home directory with the prefix RMS_Backup and .zip extension. Example: ''/home/pi/RMS_Backup_XX0001_2023-01-28.zip''.

: Copy the .zip file to a safe place outside RPi, it will be useful later to restore the system in case of failure. Note it contains the RSA public and private keys used to contact GMN servers, keep it secret.

: To restore the configuration, unzip the backup file in some folder on the RPi and copy the files '''.config''', '''platepar_cmn2010.cal''' and '''mask.bmp''' to the folder '''/home/pi/source/RMS/''', and the files '''id_rsa''' and '''id_rsa.pub'' to the folder ''/home/pi/.ssh/''' as in the following example:

:: cp .config platepar_cmn2010.cal mask.bmp /home/pi/source/RMS/
:: cp id_rsa id_rsa.pub /home/pi/.ssh/

: Make sure that RSA key files permission bits are correct by using the command:

:: chmod 400 ~/.ssh/id_rsa*

=== Viewing the data ===

: To view the data, you can use CMN_binViewer software[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer] which is already installed in the RMS SD image.
: There is also a Windows version[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer/releases] you can install.

: '''Important note''' : You can also open the images in astronomical FITS viewers such as FITS Liberator or Pixinsight, though the results may be surprising. For example in FITS Liberator, the image will be '''upside down'''. This is an artefact of how the software reads the image. In space, there's no 'up' or 'down' and so the FITS specification does not dictate whether the pixel (0,0) is at the bottom left or top left, or indeed one of the other corners. Some software, notably FITS Liberator, treats the top left as the origin and so terrestrial images will be displayed mirrored vertically.

=== Tools and Utilities ===

* [https://www.realvnc.com/en/connect/download/viewer/ RealVNC] or [https://anydesk.com/en AnyDesk] remote connect tool allows station access from anywhere. Access from outside your network is enabled by use of an OpenVPN connection address available to meteor stations. Alternatively, with VNC and Teamviewer, you can create an account and team on their websites, and then remotely access your station.
* Samba data directory access, allows you to copy data results directly from your RPi to your computer or tablet.
* [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer CMN_binViewer] can be used to view standard fits image files containing meteor detections. It runs on the RPi, and is also available under Windows.
* [https://sonotaco.com/soft/e_index.html UFO Orbit] allows you to process data from multiple stations and generate unified radiants of two or more stations seeing the same meteor. It can plot the shared object ground path, orbital characteristics, and can output a summary file of all objects seen by more than one station, which can be used for further analysis.
* RMS software can be installed under Windows to allow much of the RMS python-based code to be executed on your computer, so it can be run against meteor station data you have transferred to your computer from the RPi.
* You can run RMS Python jobs on the RPi to sample the image files captured all night long and condense them into a mp4 movie. This creates a sometimes mesmerizing summary that can run for over 2 minutes in length for winter time data.

== Configuring and installing your camera ==

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick start guide] ===

=== [[Focusing_your_camera | Focusing your IP camera]] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2sq1hBwcAA Video tutorial - Configuring your IMX291 IP camera] ===

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1TPotXcRstHz-XWIQYIW71xkRYy7Ca1UCoEiZsqdk9zw/edit?usp=sharing Different ways of connecting the camera] ===

== What can I do with my GMN station? ==

=== Using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration + Manually reducing observations of fireballs and computing their trajectories: ===
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao3J9Jf0iLQ Updated 2023 video tutorial]
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOjb3qxDlX4 Old 2021 video tutorial]

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=310 Generating a Google Earth KML file to show your station's field of view] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=253 Using UFO Orbit program to estimate meteor trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=221 Urban meteor observing] ===

== RMS Software Installation ==

=== Flash a pre-built image ===

Pre-built Images are available with the RMS software pre-installed on Raspbian. Raspbian is the operating system typically used on the Raspberry Pi.

A 128 GB microSD card is preferred, although smaller 64 GB cards will also work. The image is flashed to the microSD card using the Etcher utility for Windows (32 or 64-bit), MacOS or Linux (64-bit), which can be found [https://www.balena.io/etcher/ here]

If you are considering using a USB flash disk, USB-attached SSD or USB-attached HDD as a boot device, click [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Booting_from_a_USB_device Booting from a USB device] to know more.

When you first boot up the Pi make sure you have a keyboard, monitor and mouse attached as you will be taken through a setup process by the RMS software.

The current publicly released images of RMS are:
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/sa9csd4m3jr1vqo/RMS_image_20191203.zip?dl=1 RPi3B+ ]
and
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/3pwwenty43dazq4/RMS_RPi4_image_20210626.zip?dl=1 RPi4 ].

Please see the [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick Start Guide] about how to flash them to an SD card.

Notes:
* The earlier versions of the Raspberry Pi, the 1 and 2, are not powerful enough to run RMS software.

* the pre-installed RMS software images incorporate an auto-updating feature, so that the RMS software is updated to the current release whenever your Raspberry Pi RMS is booted. This way, your station is always running the most recent set of updates.

* For installations into other Linux or windows environments, executing the command ''git pull'' will update to the most recent RMS release.

* The code was designed to run on a RPi, but it will also run an some Linux distributions. We have tested it on Linux Mint 18 and Ubuntu 16. For information on installing into other Linux releases, check portions of the section listed below for installing on RPi, and also check installation instructions found on [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS GitHub]

== [OPTIONAL] Install the software from scratch ==

'''Note: if you're setting up a Raspberry Pi you should use the prebuilt image as this comes with all necessary software installed and is ready to use.'''. If you really really '''really''' do want to install on the RPi from scratch, you can follow the instructions below:

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 4 ===

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/19ImeNqBTD1ml2iisp5y7CjDrRV33wBeF9rtx3mIVjh4/edit?usp=sharing here]

Install on a [[Pi4 with Raspbian Bullseye]]

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 3 ===

'''We no longer recommend the Pi3, as it doesn't have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers. '''

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ChaXx6WkuGfcQ_f5yRbwUOOMxEgIJrjq932UZE6cRjE/edit here].

=== Install for Linux ===

Detailed instructions [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Installation_for_Linux here]

=== Linux GUI and multi-Camera support ===

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/16PSFi8RAqbenPdluhulCRaIenOkEzgs5piUhkX3yaOc/edit?usp=sharing here]

=== Installation for Windows ===
Data capture does not work under windows. However you can use the other tools on your PC, where its much quicker to run SkyFit2 to calibrate your camera to the sky, or you want to use BatchFFToImage to convert data to jpeg format to share on Social Media.

Click '''[[Windows_Installation|here]]''' for detailed instructions. The instructions were tested on Windows 10 64-bit, but should work on any Windows version where git and Anaconda are available.

Aside: If you are a Windows whizz, please feel free to investigate why data capture doesn't work!

=== Installation for MacOS ===
As with Windows, installation for MacOS is useful if you want to analyse the data offline. If you do want to install it, please follow the instructions '''[[MacOS_Install | here]]'''.

== Data analysis with SkyFit2 ==

SkyFit2 is a program within the RMS library which supports analyzing optical meteor data in most optical formats that are in use today, including videos in any popular video format (mp4, avi, mkv), a sequence of static images, or a single image with shutter breaks.

This [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao3J9Jf0iLQ video tutorial] explains how to using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration on GMN data and manually reduce observations of fireballs, including computing their trajectories.

A more general and detailed description of SkyFit2 is given at the '''[[SkyFit2|SkyFit2]]''' page.

== FAQ ==

=== What should I back up when re-flashing an SD card or a USB disk? ===

: The .config, platepar and mask files that are in the RMS source directory, plus the whole contents of the hidden directory /home/pi/.ssh.

If your SD card or a USB disk fails or becomes corrupted, the config files can be fetched from the server as they are uploaded every day together with the data. However the contents of .ssh are essential for connection to the server, so you must also save these. Once you set up a new SD card or a USB disk, return the files in their original location.

=== What are the values in FTPdetectinfo_* file designated as hnr mle bin Pix/fm Rho Phi? ===

: Some of these values are not used in RMS (hnr mle bin), but they are in CAMS, so they are here to conform to the standard. Thus they are all zeros. The others are:

: - Pix/fm - Average angular speed of the meteor in pixels per frame.

: - Rho, Phi - Parameters that define the line of the meteor in polar coordinates, see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hough_transform#Theory here] for more details. Rho is the distance of the line from the centre of the image, and phi is the angle of the line as measured from the positive direction of the Y axis (basically a line going from the center of the image to the top of the image), the positive angles are measured clockwise (I think, the CAMS standard might define these parameters a bit differently, the Y axis is flipped).

: The intensity is the sum of all pixel intensities of the meteor on a given frame. Let's say I represent an area around the meteor on a given frame like this, where the numbers are pixel intensities on an 8-bit image (so they can range from 0 to 255):

: [[File:Intensity_sum.png |Intensity_sum.png ]]

: and the pixels values inside the red boundary represent the meteor blob on the frame, the intensity would be the sum of all numbers inside the red boundary.
: This value is later used to compute the magnitude. The magnitude is computed as: mag = -2.5*log10(intensity sum) + photometric_offset. The photometric offset is estimated in SkyFit by fitting the line with slope -2.5 through pairs of known magnitudes of stars and logartihms of their pixel intensity sum. The photometric offset is basically the intercept of that line. The constant slope of -2.5 comes from the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apparent_magnitude#Calculations definition of stellar magnitudes.]

== GMN data policy ==

The Global Meteor Network produces several levles of data products:
* Level 1 - The lowest level data (i.e. as close to "raw" as possible) are the FF image and FR video files saved to the RPi by the capture code and the fireball detector.
* Level 2 - The meteor detector uses these data to extract positional and brightness information of individual meteors (FTPdetectinfo file), and images are also used for astrometric and photometric calibration (platepar file). Meteor and star detections are used to generate a range of plots suchs as the single-station shower association graph, camera drift graph, etc. The calibrated meteors measurements get uploaded to the GMN server together with the raw images of individual meteors.
* Level 3 - The software on the server correlates individual observations and computes multi-station meteor trajectories which are published daily on the GMN [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ data website]. This data is made public under the [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ CC BY 4.0 license].

Operators of individual GMN stations exclusivery own the Level 1 and Level 2 data their stations produce. In practice, this means that they are free to share this data with other meteor networks if they wish to do so. The data that gets uploaded to the GMN server will not be shared publicly nor with other parties without the operator's consent, but may be used internally by the GMN coordinators to manually produce other data products (e.g. trajectory of a meteorite dropping fireball, analysis of a meteor shower). All station operators will be credited for their data in all GMN publications.

== IstraStream ==

=== [http://istrastream.com/rms-gmn/ IstraStream GMN status website] ===

: The IstraStream.com is an independent hosting site which primarily hosts data by cameras sold by IstraStream, but they also host several other stations. As for mid-2023 Istrastream stopped taking new cameras and is aimed to be completely replaced by the [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/weblog/ GMN weblog].

This document explains what every plot on the IstraStream weblog means:

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/132aHGn0QPzhpVN2s2n6FT6rJn39LAsPkchWJqXQb8Qk/edit?usp=sharing IstraStream Plots Explanation] ===

== For More Information ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=43 Contact the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork Join the Global Meteor Network Forum] ===

=== [https://github.com/markmac99/ukmon-pitools/wiki UK Meteor Network Wiki]===
This wiki has numerous FAQs and tips on maintaining, monitoring and managing your system, and several explainers such as how to calibrate and create a mask, how to copy data and so forth.

=== GMN talks ===

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDdrG_FCyGk 2022 Global Meteor Network Meeting Session 1 (February, 2022)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_75CDPzjI4 2022 Global Meteor Network Meeting Session 2 (February, 2022)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6x9_WCVphY GMN talk at the European Space Agency's Fireball Workshop (June, 2021)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXBTLPnPDWs GMN Workshop (February, 2021)] - [https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ia9vagug5lxm8k9/AAB_i_1jcWThUdAHO_2gF_Ksa?dl=0 Link to slides]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Overview of the GMN - IMC2020 (September, 2020)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oM7lfQ4nmyw Overview of the GMN, Astro Imaging Channel presentation (May, 2020)]

=== GMN related publications ===

: [https://academic.oup.com/mnras/advance-article/doi/10.1093/mnras/stab2557/6368869 Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T., & Vida, D. (2021). Meteor shower radiant dispersions in Global Meteor Network data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2107.12335 Vida, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P. S., Brown, P. G., McIntyre, M. J., Dijkema, T. J., Pavletić, L., Kukić, P., Mazur, M.J., Eschman, P., Roggemans, P., Merlak, A., & Zubović, D. (2021). The Global Meteor Network–Methodology and first results. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 506(4), 5046-5074.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.05458/ Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T. D., & Vida, D. (2020). Realistic gravitational focusing of meteoroid streams. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 494(2), 2982-2994.]

: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Kukic-et-al-2018-Rolling-shutter.pdf Kukić, P., Gural, P., Vida, D., Šegon, D. & Merlak, A. (2018) Correction for meteor centroids observed using rolling shutter cameras. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46:5, 154-118.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_sun_skirter_final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Kukić, P., & Merlak, A. (2018). Compressive strength of a skirting Daytime Arietid-first science results from low-cost Raspberry Pi-based meteor stations. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 113-118.]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.02979.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - I. Theory. arXiv:1911.02979v4 [astro-ph.EP] 21 Apr 2020]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.11734.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - II. Results. arXiv:1911.11734v1 [astro-ph.EP] 26 Novr 2019]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_first_results-final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Zubović, D., Kukić, P., Parag, F., & Macan, A. (2018). First results of a Raspberry Pi based meteor camera system. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 71-78.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Vida_IMC2016_proceedings_final.pdf Vida, D., Zubović, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P., & Cupec, R. (2016). Open-source meteor detection software for low-cost single-board computers. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference (IMC2016), Egmond, The Netherlands (pp. 2-5).]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Zubovic_IMC2015_priceedings_final.pdf Zubović, D., Vida, D., Gural, P., & Šegon, D. (2015). Advances in the development of a low-cost video meteor station. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference, Mistelbach, Austria (pp. 27-30).]

SkyFit2

2023-03-10T15:39:13Z

Dvida: /* Create or Upgrade a Plate with SkyFit2 */

SkyFit2 is a tool used to make astrometric plates and photometric calibrations. An astrometric plate is used to convert measurements on the image to coordinates in the sky (e.g. right ascension and declination). Photometric calibration converts the image pixel intensity to magnitude.

We aim to make SkyFit as user-friendly and universal as possible. It aims to support all optical meteor data formats in existence (videos and still images), as well as calibrating dashcams.

A full video tutorial is available on [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao3J9Jf0iLQ YouTube].

=== Example data ===

Here is some data if you don't have any of your own yet: [https://www.dropbox.com/s/gy023qg7bsobrjp/RU_fireball_20190910.zip?dl=0 data link]
This is data from one fireball observed over the Caucasus Mountains in 2019. You should have everything here for a trajectory solution, and one is already provided in the software. Note that the .config files might be hidden - files beginning with a dot are hidden by default in Linux.

= SkyFit2 Anatomy =

This section describes the various physical features of the SkyFit2 GUI.

== SkyFit Mode ==

=== Image Display & Levels ===

[[File:WikiImgDisplay.png]]

=== Fit Parameters Tab ===

[[File:WikiFitParams.png]]

=== Settings Tab ===

[[File:WikiSettingsTab.png]]

== ManualReduction Mode ==

=== Image Display & Levels ===

[[File:WikiImgDisplay2.png]]

=== Settings Tab ===

[[File:WikiSettingsTab2.png]]

= Create or Upgrade a Plate with SkyFit2 =

This page seeks to walkthrough how to create a new plate or upgrade an old plate using RMS SkyFit2 GUI.

== Getting Started ==

To run SkyFit2, first install the RMS git repository and environment. Then run the command

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 INPUT_PATH [-c/--config CONFIG_PATH][-t/--timebeg TIME][-f/--fps FPS][-g/--gamma GAMMA]

This opens the Sky``Fit2 GUI with whatever data is in the directory specified by "INPUT_PATH". Alternatively, can also be a path to a video file or a state file. Make sure to customize the config file to the proper specifications before running this program. The most common options are detailed below:

* Config: Path to the directory containing the appropriate .config file. Default to the DETECTION_PATH.
* Timebeg: Beginning time of the detection in YYYYMMDD_hhmmss.uuuuuu format.
* Fps: Frames per second when images are used. This option overrides the framerate given in from the config file.
* Gamma: Camera gamma value (typically 0.45 or 1.0). This option overrides the framerate read in from the config file

Upon opening, a request for a plate (platepar .cal file) will occur. If you wish to update a plate, select this here. If you wish to make a new plate, simply close this window.

=== Using RMS data ===

Collect the desired data in a directory (e.g. /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY). The directory should contain an FF and an FR file if you're reducing a fireball. Make sure to also copy the required .config file and the platepar_cmn2010.cal if present.

Then run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY --config . --fr

This will load the given data files.

=== Using FRIPON data ===

FRIPON data are usually given as a bunch of individual frames in a FITS format. It is very important that all files have a .fit extension (not .fits). SkyFit2 will automatically read the header and download the station coordinates, so you don't have to specify a config file. If the data are in /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY, simply run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY

=== Using GFO/DFN data ===

DFN data are given as .NEF files in the raw Nikon format. To load a GFO image in SkyFit, you will need a dfnstation.cfg file which is usually present on the system. Copy both a .NEF image and the dfnstation.cfg in a standalone directory called e.g. /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY.

Then run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY --config .

SkyFit will ask you to choose the .NEF file.

Properly calibrating and reducing GFO data can be a bit tricky. The recommended procedure is the following:

* Take a calibration image (the one with the nominally longer exposure) and put it in a separate "calib" directory. Make sure that lots of stars are visible and that there are at least a few very close to the horizon.
* Fit a radial plate (starting with radial3-odd, then fit a radial5-odd, finishing with a radial7-odd), with the asymmetry correction and equal aspect turned on. Set the extinction scale to 0.6 and turn off a fixed vignetting coefficient option. When happy with the fit, hit CTRL + S to save and close SkyFit.
* Prepare the fireball data in another directory and copy the platepar file from the calib directory. The data images have a shorter exposure, so fewer stars are visible. In the previous step, you fit the pointing and the distortion coefficients - because the lens is the same the distortion coefficients remain the same, but the pointing can drift over time. You need to re-calibrate on 10-20 stars but select the "Only fit pointing option".
* Switch to the ManualReduction mode and start picking. Because the timing is encoded using a de Brujin sequence, the fireball consists of dots and gaps (1s and 0s). Start with an obvious dot, clicking it with your mouse. A red cross will appear. Advance to the next point ("frame") by pressing a right arrow key on your keyboard (note that the frame counter will increase). If the next point is a gap, select it with ALT + CLICK (or NUM0 + CLICK) - this will show up as a yellow cross. Keep going until you select all, and you can go back with a left arrow key in case you missed any. It is very important that the order of selected points is correct. Once you've selected about 10-20 points, switch to the Debrujin tab and click "Check sequence". This will try to find a unique solution for the time, but you might be offered with several options. You can choose one if you know the time, or close it and pick a few more points and try again.
* If you want to do photometry, the background needs to be subtracted before pixel colouring is possible. Use a .NEF image that was taken just before or after the fireball as a dark frame by hitting CTRL + D and selecting the file.

=== Using arbitrary video or image data ===

This section applies if:
a) You are using a video from e.g. a security camera in either a .avi, .mp4, or in a .mov format.
b) Or you are using a sequence of images (make sure their names are sorted alphabetically, e.g. frame001.png, frame002.png, etc.). Using just one image works too, then SkyFit2 will run in a special "single-image mode".

You will need to make a custom configuration file and know the absolute time of the first frame.

First, copy the .config file from the RMS source directory to the directory with the video and rename it with the name of the station (we'll use "London" as the station name), e.g. london.config. Then open this file and change the following entries:

stationID: London
latitude: 51.500761 ; WGS84 +N (degrees) - Use at least 5 decimal places and measure in Google Earth as accurately as possible
longitude: -0.124585 ; WGS84 +E (degrees)
elevation: 20 ; mean sea level EGM96 geoidal datum, not WGS84 ellipsoidal (meters)

...

width: 1280 ; Set the video resolution
height: 720
fps: 25.0 ; frames per second

...

; Approx. horizontal Field-of-view in degrees
fov_w: 87
; Approx. vertical Field-of-view in degrees
fov_h: 45

; Deinterlacing -2 = global shutter, -1 = rolling shutter, 0 = even first, 1 = odd first
deinterlace_order: -1

...

star_catalog_file: BSC5 ; This sets a star catalog with bright stars

...

catalog_mag_limit: 4.0 ; Security cameras usually can't see stars fainter than this, but you can always adjust this later

Then given the absolute UTC time of the first frame in the YYYYMMDD_hhmmss.uuuuuu format (e.g. 20230214_021629.0) and the path to the video file (e.g. /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY/video.mp4), run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY/video.mp4 --config . --timebeg 20230214_021629.0

If you are using a sequence of images, then give it the path to the directory which contains the images:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY/ --config . --timebeg 20230214_021629.0

If you are using just one image, use the command above and SkyFit will ask which image to open (you should have only one in the directory, together with the config file).

== Creating a Plate ==

*NOTE: When entering hotkey commands in SkyFit2, you must be in the main frame/viewer.

Adjust the levels on the right as required or automatically set them by pressing ctrl+A. Once you are happy, begin to rotate the catalog stars into an approximately correct position using your keyboard. A/D control the azimuth, S/W control the altitude, Q/E control the position angle, and Up/Down controls the scale. Don't worry about getting them exactly, just get them close enough to the image for the program to associate the observed stars with the catalog stars when manually picking.

To enter star picking mode, press ctrl+R. This should bring up an annulus around your reticle, whose size you can control by holding ctrl and scrolling with the mouse wheel. To pick a star, click on the star and the program should automatically snap the point to the centroid. If you are unhappy with its choice, you can force the centroid position by holding ctrl and clicking. The position will appear as an orange cross. Your pick of star will automatically associate with the nearest catalog star (which will be filled with a blue X). If you wish to choose a different catalog star, simply click this again and notice as the blue X switches. To accept a pair, press Enter or Space.

Once you have a centroided a number of stars (minimum 5 to adjust pointing, 12 to adjust distortion), you can fit the plate by clicking "Fit Parameters">"Fit" on the sidebar or ctrl+Z. The green numbers that appear are the star magnitudes and the white numbers are the magnitude errors. The bars represent the fitting errors (magnitude and direction). This will print a residual table to the console, as well as the average error and FOV.

Under the "Fit Parameters" tab, there are several options to adjust to improve your astrometry. The refraction correction should be checked for all camera. If the camera is older and does not have square pixels, uncheck equal aspect. If you suspect that the lens is not completely flat with the sensor (nearly always), check the asymmetry correction. The older distortion models are the poly3+radial models. It is preferable to use the radial-odd models as they do not require stars in all parts of the field to accurately model the distortion. To see which you should use, begin with the lowest order model and check the astrometry residuals by clicking "Fit Parameters">"Astrometry" or by pressing the L key. If there is structure to the residuals, then increase the order until the structure disappears.

Fixed vignetting should only be enabled for cameras with well-measured vignetting. This is preferable to the modeled vignetting parameter, but unless it has been measured in the lab or under controlled conditions it will worsen the photometry fit. Extinction values also typically vary between 0.6 and 1.0 and should be measured on a per-camera basis. Both of these effects increase with distance from the center of the lens, as can be seen by clicking "Fit Parameters">"Photometry" or by pressing the P key. Adjust the extinction until it follows the downward curved line.

After creating a plate, it can be useful to remove high residual error stars. You can filter stars by adjusting "Settings">"Filter Mag Err". Manual add and remove stars until you obtain a fit you are satisfied with. You can check the RMSD to get an idea of how good the fit is.

SkyFit2

2023-03-10T15:38:50Z

Dvida: /* Using arbitrary video data */

SkyFit2 is a tool used to make astrometric plates and photometric calibrations. An astrometric plate is used to convert measurements on the image to coordinates in the sky (e.g. right ascension and declination). Photometric calibration converts the image pixel intensity to magnitude.

We aim to make SkyFit as user-friendly and universal as possible. It aims to support all optical meteor data formats in existence (videos and still images), as well as calibrating dashcams.

A full video tutorial is available on [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao3J9Jf0iLQ YouTube].

=== Example data ===

Here is some data if you don't have any of your own yet: [https://www.dropbox.com/s/gy023qg7bsobrjp/RU_fireball_20190910.zip?dl=0 data link]
This is data from one fireball observed over the Caucasus Mountains in 2019. You should have everything here for a trajectory solution, and one is already provided in the software. Note that the .config files might be hidden - files beginning with a dot are hidden by default in Linux.

= SkyFit2 Anatomy =

This section describes the various physical features of the SkyFit2 GUI.

== SkyFit Mode ==

=== Image Display & Levels ===

[[File:WikiImgDisplay.png]]

=== Fit Parameters Tab ===

[[File:WikiFitParams.png]]

=== Settings Tab ===

[[File:WikiSettingsTab.png]]

== ManualReduction Mode ==

=== Image Display & Levels ===

[[File:WikiImgDisplay2.png]]

=== Settings Tab ===

[[File:WikiSettingsTab2.png]]

= Create or Upgrade a Plate with SkyFit2 =

This page seeks to walkthrough how to create a new plate or upgrade an old plate using RMS SkyFit2 GUI.

== Getting Started ==

To run SkyFit2, first install the RMS git repository and environment. Then run the command

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 INPUT_PATH [-c/--config CONFIG_PATH][-t/--timebeg TIME][-f/--fps FPS][-g/--gamma GAMMA]

This opens the Sky``Fit2 GUI with whatever data is in the directory specified by "INPUT_PATH". Alternatively, can also be a path to a video file or a state file. Make sure to customize the config file to the proper specifications before running this program. The most common options are detailed below:

* Config: Path to the directory containing the appropriate .config file. Default to the DETECTION_PATH.
* Timebeg: Beginning time of the detection in YYYYMMDD_hhmmss.uuuuuu format.
* Fps: Frames per second when images are used. This option overrides the framerate given in from the config file.
* Gamma: Camera gamma value (typically 0.45 or 1.0). This option overrides the framerate read in from the config file

Upon opening, a request for a plate (platepar .cal file) will occur. If you wish to update a plate, select this here. If you wish to make a new plate, simply close this window.

=== Using RMS data ===

Collect the desired data in a directory (e.g. /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY). The directory should contain an FF and an FR file if you're reducing a fireball. Make sure to also copy the required .config file and the platepar_cmn2010.cal if present.

Then run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY --config . --fr

This will load the given data files.

=== Using FRIPON data ===

FRIPON data are usually given as a bunch of individual frames in a FITS format. It is very important that all files have a .fit extension (not .fits). SkyFit2 will automatically read the header and download the station coordinates, so you don't have to specify a config file. If the data are in /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY, simply run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY

=== Using GFO/DFN data ===

DFN data are given as .NEF files in the raw Nikon format. To load a GFO image in SkyFit, you will need a dfnstation.cfg file which is usually present on the system. Copy both a .NEF image and the dfnstation.cfg in a standalone directory called e.g. /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY.

Then run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY --config .

SkyFit will ask you to choose the .NEF file.

Properly calibrating and reducing GFO data can be a bit tricky. The recommended procedure is the following:

* Take a calibration image (the one with the nominally longer exposure) and put it in a separate "calib" directory. Make sure that lots of stars are visible and that there are at least a few very close to the horizon.
* Fit a radial plate (starting with radial3-odd, then fit a radial5-odd, finishing with a radial7-odd), with the asymmetry correction and equal aspect turned on. Set the extinction scale to 0.6 and turn off a fixed vignetting coefficient option. When happy with the fit, hit CTRL + S to save and close SkyFit.
* Prepare the fireball data in another directory and copy the platepar file from the calib directory. The data images have a shorter exposure, so fewer stars are visible. In the previous step, you fit the pointing and the distortion coefficients - because the lens is the same the distortion coefficients remain the same, but the pointing can drift over time. You need to re-calibrate on 10-20 stars but select the "Only fit pointing option".
* Switch to the ManualReduction mode and start picking. Because the timing is encoded using a de Brujin sequence, the fireball consists of dots and gaps (1s and 0s). Start with an obvious dot, clicking it with your mouse. A red cross will appear. Advance to the next point ("frame") by pressing a right arrow key on your keyboard (note that the frame counter will increase). If the next point is a gap, select it with ALT + CLICK (or NUM0 + CLICK) - this will show up as a yellow cross. Keep going until you select all, and you can go back with a left arrow key in case you missed any. It is very important that the order of selected points is correct. Once you've selected about 10-20 points, switch to the Debrujin tab and click "Check sequence". This will try to find a unique solution for the time, but you might be offered with several options. You can choose one if you know the time, or close it and pick a few more points and try again.
* If you want to do photometry, the background needs to be subtracted before pixel colouring is possible. Use a .NEF image that was taken just before or after the fireball as a dark frame by hitting CTRL + D and selecting the file.

=== Using arbitrary video or image data ===

This section applies if:
a) You are using a video from e.g. a security camera in either a .avi, .mp4, or in a .mov format.
b) Or you are using a sequence of images (make sure their names are sorted alphabetically, e.g. frame001.png, frame002.png, etc.). Using just one image works too, then SkyFit2 will run in a special "single-image mode".

You will need to make a custom configuration file and know the absolute time of the first frame.

First, copy the .config file from the RMS source directory to the directory with the video and rename it with the name of the station (we'll use "London" as the station name), e.g. london.config. Then open this file and change the following entries:

stationID: London
latitude: 51.500761 ; WGS84 +N (degrees) - Use at least 5 decimal places and measure in Google Earth as accurately as possible
longitude: -0.124585 ; WGS84 +E (degrees)
elevation: 20 ; mean sea level EGM96 geoidal datum, not WGS84 ellipsoidal (meters)

...

width: 1280 ; Set the video resolution
height: 720
fps: 25.0 ; frames per second

...

; Approx. horizontal Field-of-view in degrees
fov_w: 87
; Approx. vertical Field-of-view in degrees
fov_h: 45

; Deinterlacing -2 = global shutter, -1 = rolling shutter, 0 = even first, 1 = odd first
deinterlace_order: -1

...

star_catalog_file: BSC5 ; This sets a star catalog with bright stars

...

catalog_mag_limit: 4.0 ; Security cameras usually can't see stars fainter than this, but you can always adjust this later

Then given the absolute UTC time of the first frame in the YYYYMMDD_hhmmss.uuuuuu format (e.g. 20230214_021629.0) and the path to the video file (e.g. /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY/video.mp4), run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY/video.mp4 --config . --timebeg 20230214_021629.0

If you are using a sequence of images, then give it the path to the directory which contains the images:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY/ --config . --timebeg 20230214_021629.0

If you are using just one image, SkyFit will ask which image to open (you should have only one in the directory, together with the config file).

== Creating a Plate ==

*NOTE: When entering hotkey commands in SkyFit2, you must be in the main frame/viewer.

Adjust the levels on the right as required or automatically set them by pressing ctrl+A. Once you are happy, begin to rotate the catalog stars into an approximately correct position using your keyboard. A/D control the azimuth, S/W control the altitude, Q/E control the position angle, and Up/Down controls the scale. Don't worry about getting them exactly, just get them close enough to the image for the program to associate the observed stars with the catalog stars when manually picking.

To enter star picking mode, press ctrl+R. This should bring up an annulus around your reticle, whose size you can control by holding ctrl and scrolling with the mouse wheel. To pick a star, click on the star and the program should automatically snap the point to the centroid. If you are unhappy with its choice, you can force the centroid position by holding ctrl and clicking. The position will appear as an orange cross. Your pick of star will automatically associate with the nearest catalog star (which will be filled with a blue X). If you wish to choose a different catalog star, simply click this again and notice as the blue X switches. To accept a pair, press Enter or Space.

Once you have a centroided a number of stars (minimum 5 to adjust pointing, 12 to adjust distortion), you can fit the plate by clicking "Fit Parameters">"Fit" on the sidebar or ctrl+Z. The green numbers that appear are the star magnitudes and the white numbers are the magnitude errors. The bars represent the fitting errors (magnitude and direction). This will print a residual table to the console, as well as the average error and FOV.

Under the "Fit Parameters" tab, there are several options to adjust to improve your astrometry. The refraction correction should be checked for all camera. If the camera is older and does not have square pixels, uncheck equal aspect. If you suspect that the lens is not completely flat with the sensor (nearly always), check the asymmetry correction. The older distortion models are the poly3+radial models. It is preferable to use the radial-odd models as they do not require stars in all parts of the field to accurately model the distortion. To see which you should use, begin with the lowest order model and check the astrometry residuals by clicking "Fit Parameters">"Astrometry" or by pressing the L key. If there is structure to the residuals, then increase the order until the structure disappears.

Fixed vignetting should only be enabled for cameras with well-measured vignetting. This is preferable to the modeled vignetting parameter, but unless it has been measured in the lab or under controlled conditions it will worsen the photometry fit. Extinction values also typically vary between 0.6 and 1.0 and should be measured on a per-camera basis. Both of these effects increase with distance from the center of the lens, as can be seen by clicking "Fit Parameters">"Photometry" or by pressing the P key. Adjust the extinction until it follows the downward curved line.

After creating a plate, it can be useful to remove high residual error stars. You can filter stars by adjusting "Settings">"Filter Mag Err". Manual add and remove stars until you obtain a fit you are satisfied with. You can check the RMSD to get an idea of how good the fit is.

SkyFit2

2023-03-09T21:24:27Z

Dvida:

SkyFit2 is a tool used to make astrometric plates and photometric calibrations. An astrometric plate is used to convert measurements on the image to coordinates in the sky (e.g. right ascension and declination). Photometric calibration converts the image pixel intensity to magnitude.

We aim to make SkyFit as user-friendly and universal as possible. It aims to support all optical meteor data formats in existence (videos and still images), as well as calibrating dashcams.

A full video tutorial is available on [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao3J9Jf0iLQ YouTube].

=== Example data ===

Here is some data if you don't have any of your own yet: [https://www.dropbox.com/s/gy023qg7bsobrjp/RU_fireball_20190910.zip?dl=0 data link]
This is data from one fireball observed over the Caucasus Mountains in 2019. You should have everything here for a trajectory solution, and one is already provided in the software. Note that the .config files might be hidden - files beginning with a dot are hidden by default in Linux.

= SkyFit2 Anatomy =

This section describes the various physical features of the SkyFit2 GUI.

== SkyFit Mode ==

=== Image Display & Levels ===

[[File:WikiImgDisplay.png]]

=== Fit Parameters Tab ===

[[File:WikiFitParams.png]]

=== Settings Tab ===

[[File:WikiSettingsTab.png]]

== ManualReduction Mode ==

=== Image Display & Levels ===

[[File:WikiImgDisplay2.png]]

=== Settings Tab ===

[[File:WikiSettingsTab2.png]]

= Create or Upgrade a Plate with SkyFit2 =

This page seeks to walkthrough how to create a new plate or upgrade an old plate using RMS SkyFit2 GUI.

== Getting Started ==

To run SkyFit2, first install the RMS git repository and environment. Then run the command

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 INPUT_PATH [-c/--config CONFIG_PATH][-t/--timebeg TIME][-f/--fps FPS][-g/--gamma GAMMA]

This opens the Sky``Fit2 GUI with whatever data is in the directory specified by "INPUT_PATH". Alternatively, can also be a path to a video file or a state file. Make sure to customize the config file to the proper specifications before running this program. The most common options are detailed below:

* Config: Path to the directory containing the appropriate .config file. Default to the DETECTION_PATH.
* Timebeg: Beginning time of the detection in YYYYMMDD_hhmmss.uuuuuu format.
* Fps: Frames per second when images are used. This option overrides the framerate given in from the config file.
* Gamma: Camera gamma value (typically 0.45 or 1.0). This option overrides the framerate read in from the config file

Upon opening, a request for a plate (platepar .cal file) will occur. If you wish to update a plate, select this here. If you wish to make a new plate, simply close this window.

=== Using RMS data ===

Collect the desired data in a directory (e.g. /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY). The directory should contain an FF and an FR file if you're reducing a fireball. Make sure to also copy the required .config file and the platepar_cmn2010.cal if present.

Then run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY --config . --fr

This will load the given data files.

=== Using FRIPON data ===

FRIPON data are usually given as a bunch of individual frames in a FITS format. It is very important that all files have a .fit extension (not .fits). SkyFit2 will automatically read the header and download the station coordinates, so you don't have to specify a config file. If the data are in /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY, simply run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY

=== Using GFO/DFN data ===

DFN data are given as .NEF files in the raw Nikon format. To load a GFO image in SkyFit, you will need a dfnstation.cfg file which is usually present on the system. Copy both a .NEF image and the dfnstation.cfg in a standalone directory called e.g. /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY.

Then run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY --config .

SkyFit will ask you to choose the .NEF file.

Properly calibrating and reducing GFO data can be a bit tricky. The recommended procedure is the following:

* Take a calibration image (the one with the nominally longer exposure) and put it in a separate "calib" directory. Make sure that lots of stars are visible and that there are at least a few very close to the horizon.
* Fit a radial plate (starting with radial3-odd, then fit a radial5-odd, finishing with a radial7-odd), with the asymmetry correction and equal aspect turned on. Set the extinction scale to 0.6 and turn off a fixed vignetting coefficient option. When happy with the fit, hit CTRL + S to save and close SkyFit.
* Prepare the fireball data in another directory and copy the platepar file from the calib directory. The data images have a shorter exposure, so fewer stars are visible. In the previous step, you fit the pointing and the distortion coefficients - because the lens is the same the distortion coefficients remain the same, but the pointing can drift over time. You need to re-calibrate on 10-20 stars but select the "Only fit pointing option".
* Switch to the ManualReduction mode and start picking. Because the timing is encoded using a de Brujin sequence, the fireball consists of dots and gaps (1s and 0s). Start with an obvious dot, clicking it with your mouse. A red cross will appear. Advance to the next point ("frame") by pressing a right arrow key on your keyboard (note that the frame counter will increase). If the next point is a gap, select it with ALT + CLICK (or NUM0 + CLICK) - this will show up as a yellow cross. Keep going until you select all, and you can go back with a left arrow key in case you missed any. It is very important that the order of selected points is correct. Once you've selected about 10-20 points, switch to the Debrujin tab and click "Check sequence". This will try to find a unique solution for the time, but you might be offered with several options. You can choose one if you know the time, or close it and pick a few more points and try again.
* If you want to do photometry, the background needs to be subtracted before pixel colouring is possible. Use a .NEF image that was taken just before or after the fireball as a dark frame by hitting CTRL + D and selecting the file.

=== Using arbitrary video data ===

If you are using a video from e.g. a security camera in either a .avi, .mp4, or in a .mov format, you will need to make a custom configuration file and know the absolute time of the first frame.

First, copy the .config file from the RMS source directory to the directory with the video and rename it with the name of the station (we'll use "London" as the station name), e.g. london.config. Then open this file and change the following entries:

stationID: London
latitude: 51.500761 ; WGS84 +N (degrees) - Use at least 5 decimal places and measure in Google Earth as accurately as possible
longitude: -0.124585 ; WGS84 +E (degrees)
elevation: 20 ; mean sea level EGM96 geoidal datum, not WGS84 ellipsoidal (meters)

...

width: 1280 ; Set the video resolution
height: 720
fps: 25.0 ; frames per second

...

; Approx. horizontal Field-of-view in degrees
fov_w: 87
; Approx. vertical Field-of-view in degrees
fov_h: 45

; Deinterlacing -2 = global shutter, -1 = rolling shutter, 0 = even first, 1 = odd first
deinterlace_order: -1

...

star_catalog_file: BSC5 ; This sets a star catalog with bright stars

...

catalog_mag_limit: 4.0 ; Security cameras usually can't see stars fainter than this, but you can always adjust this later

Then given the absolute UTC time of the first frame in the YYYYMMDD_hhmmss.uuuuuu format (e.g. 20230214_021629.0) and the path to the video file (e.g. /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY/video.mp4), run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY/video.mp4 --config . --timebeg 20230214_021629.0

== Creating a Plate ==

*NOTE: When entering hotkey commands in SkyFit2, you must be in the main frame/viewer.

Adjust the levels on the right as required or automatically set them by pressing ctrl+A. Once you are happy, begin to rotate the catalog stars into an approximately correct position using your keyboard. A/D control the azimuth, S/W control the altitude, Q/E control the position angle, and Up/Down controls the scale. Don't worry about getting them exactly, just get them close enough to the image for the program to associate the observed stars with the catalog stars when manually picking.

To enter star picking mode, press ctrl+R. This should bring up an annulus around your reticle, whose size you can control by holding ctrl and scrolling with the mouse wheel. To pick a star, click on the star and the program should automatically snap the point to the centroid. If you are unhappy with its choice, you can force the centroid position by holding ctrl and clicking. The position will appear as an orange cross. Your pick of star will automatically associate with the nearest catalog star (which will be filled with a blue X). If you wish to choose a different catalog star, simply click this again and notice as the blue X switches. To accept a pair, press Enter or Space.

Once you have a centroided a number of stars (minimum 5 to adjust pointing, 12 to adjust distortion), you can fit the plate by clicking "Fit Parameters">"Fit" on the sidebar or ctrl+Z. The green numbers that appear are the star magnitudes and the white numbers are the magnitude errors. The bars represent the fitting errors (magnitude and direction). This will print a residual table to the console, as well as the average error and FOV.

Under the "Fit Parameters" tab, there are several options to adjust to improve your astrometry. The refraction correction should be checked for all camera. If the camera is older and does not have square pixels, uncheck equal aspect. If you suspect that the lens is not completely flat with the sensor (nearly always), check the asymmetry correction. The older distortion models are the poly3+radial models. It is preferable to use the radial-odd models as they do not require stars in all parts of the field to accurately model the distortion. To see which you should use, begin with the lowest order model and check the astrometry residuals by clicking "Fit Parameters">"Astrometry" or by pressing the L key. If there is structure to the residuals, then increase the order until the structure disappears.

Fixed vignetting should only be enabled for cameras with well-measured vignetting. This is preferable to the modeled vignetting parameter, but unless it has been measured in the lab or under controlled conditions it will worsen the photometry fit. Extinction values also typically vary between 0.6 and 1.0 and should be measured on a per-camera basis. Both of these effects increase with distance from the center of the lens, as can be seen by clicking "Fit Parameters">"Photometry" or by pressing the P key. Adjust the extinction until it follows the downward curved line.

After creating a plate, it can be useful to remove high residual error stars. You can filter stars by adjusting "Settings">"Filter Mag Err". Manual add and remove stars until you obtain a fit you are satisfied with. You can check the RMSD to get an idea of how good the fit is.

SkyFit2

2023-03-06T18:41:05Z

Dvida:

SkyFit2 is a tool used to make astrometric plates and photometric calibrations. An astrometric plate is used to convert measurements on the image to coordinates in the sky (e.g. right ascension and declination). Photometric calibration converts the image pixel intensity to magnitude.

We aim to make SkyFit as user-friendly and universal as possible. It aims to support all optical meteor data formats in existence (videos and still images), as well as calibrating dashcams.

=== Example data ===

Here is some data if you don't have any of your own yet: [https://www.dropbox.com/s/gy023qg7bsobrjp/RU_fireball_20190910.zip?dl=0 data link]
This is data from one fireball observed over the Caucasus Mountains in 2019. You should have everything here for a trajectory solution, and one is already provided in the software. Note that the .config files might be hidden - files beginning with a dot are hidden by default in Linux.

= SkyFit2 Anatomy =

This section describes the various physical features of the SkyFit2 GUI.

== SkyFit Mode ==

=== Image Display & Levels ===

[[File:WikiImgDisplay.png]]

=== Fit Parameters Tab ===

[[File:WikiFitParams.png]]

=== Settings Tab ===

[[File:WikiSettingsTab.png]]

== ManualReduction Mode ==

=== Image Display & Levels ===

[[File:WikiImgDisplay2.png]]

=== Settings Tab ===

[[File:WikiSettingsTab2.png]]

= Create or Upgrade a Plate with SkyFit2 =

This page seeks to walkthrough how to create a new plate or upgrade an old plate using RMS SkyFit2 GUI.

== Getting Started ==

To run SkyFit2, first install the RMS git repository and environment. Then run the command

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 INPUT_PATH [-c/--config CONFIG_PATH][-t/--timebeg TIME][-f/--fps FPS][-g/--gamma GAMMA]

This opens the Sky``Fit2 GUI with whatever data is in the directory specified by "INPUT_PATH". Alternatively, can also be a path to a video file or a state file. Make sure to customize the config file to the proper specifications before running this program. The most common options are detailed below:

* Config: Path to the directory containing the appropriate .config file. Default to the DETECTION_PATH.
* Timebeg: Beginning time of the detection in YYYYMMDD_hhmmss.uuuuuu format.
* Fps: Frames per second when images are used. This option overrides the framerate given in from the config file.
* Gamma: Camera gamma value (typically 0.45 or 1.0). This option overrides the framerate read in from the config file

Upon opening, a request for a plate (platepar .cal file) will occur. If you wish to update a plate, select this here. If you wish to make a new plate, simply close this window.

=== Using RMS data ===

Collect the desired data in a directory (e.g. /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY). The directory should contain an FF and an FR file if you're reducing a fireball. Make sure to also copy the required .config file and the platepar_cmn2010.cal if present.

Then run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY --config . --fr

This will load the given data files.

=== Using FRIPON data ===

FRIPON data are usually given as a bunch of individual frames in a FITS format. It is very important that all files have a .fit extension (not .fits). SkyFit2 will automatically read the header and download the station coordinates, so you don't have to specify a config file. If the data are in /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY, simply run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY

=== Using GFO/DFN data ===

DFN data are given as .NEF files in the raw Nikon format. To load a GFO image in SkyFit, you will need a dfnstation.cfg file which is usually present on the system. Copy both a .NEF image and the dfnstation.cfg in a standalone directory called e.g. /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY.

Then run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY --config .

SkyFit will ask you to choose the .NEF file.

Properly calibrating and reducing GFO data can be a bit tricky. The recommended procedure is the following:

* Take a calibration image (the one with the nominally longer exposure) and put it in a separate "calib" directory. Make sure that lots of stars are visible and that there are at least a few very close to the horizon.
* Fit a radial plate (starting with radial3-odd, then fit a radial5-odd, finishing with a radial7-odd), with the asymmetry correction and equal aspect turned on. Set the extinction scale to 0.6 and turn off a fixed vignetting coefficient option. When happy with the fit, hit CTRL + S to save and close SkyFit.
* Prepare the fireball data in another directory and copy the platepar file from the calib directory. The data images have a shorter exposure, so fewer stars are visible. In the previous step, you fit the pointing and the distortion coefficients - because the lens is the same the distortion coefficients remain the same, but the pointing can drift over time. You need to re-calibrate on 10-20 stars but select the "Only fit pointing option".
* Switch to the ManualReduction mode and start picking. Because the timing is encoded using a de Brujin sequence, the fireball consists of dots and gaps (1s and 0s). Start with an obvious dot, clicking it with your mouse. A red cross will appear. Advance to the next point ("frame") by pressing a right arrow key on your keyboard (note that the frame counter will increase). If the next point is a gap, select it with ALT + CLICK (or NUM0 + CLICK) - this will show up as a yellow cross. Keep going until you select all, and you can go back with a left arrow key in case you missed any. It is very important that the order of selected points is correct. Once you've selected about 10-20 points, switch to the Debrujin tab and click "Check sequence". This will try to find a unique solution for the time, but you might be offered with several options. You can choose one if you know the time, or close it and pick a few more points and try again.
* If you want to do photometry, the background needs to be subtracted before pixel colouring is possible. Use a .NEF image that was taken just before or after the fireball as a dark frame by hitting CTRL + D and selecting the file.

=== Using arbitrary video data ===

If you are using a video from e.g. a security camera in either a .avi, .mp4, or in a .mov format, you will need to make a custom configuration file and know the absolute time of the first frame.

First, copy the .config file from the RMS source directory to the directory with the video and rename it with the name of the station (we'll use "London" as the station name), e.g. london.config. Then open this file and change the following entries:

stationID: London
latitude: 51.500761 ; WGS84 +N (degrees) - Use at least 5 decimal places and measure in Google Earth as accurately as possible
longitude: -0.124585 ; WGS84 +E (degrees)
elevation: 20 ; mean sea level EGM96 geoidal datum, not WGS84 ellipsoidal (meters)

...

width: 1280 ; Set the video resolution
height: 720
fps: 25.0 ; frames per second

...

; Approx. horizontal Field-of-view in degrees
fov_w: 87
; Approx. vertical Field-of-view in degrees
fov_h: 45

; Deinterlacing -2 = global shutter, -1 = rolling shutter, 0 = even first, 1 = odd first
deinterlace_order: -1

...

star_catalog_file: BSC5 ; This sets a star catalog with bright stars

...

catalog_mag_limit: 4.0 ; Security cameras usually can't see stars fainter than this, but you can always adjust this later

Then given the absolute UTC time of the first frame in the YYYYMMDD_hhmmss.uuuuuu format (e.g. 20230214_021629.0) and the path to the video file (e.g. /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY/video.mp4), run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY/video.mp4 --config . --timebeg 20230214_021629.0

== Creating a Plate ==

*NOTE: When entering hotkey commands in SkyFit2, you must be in the main frame/viewer.

Adjust the levels on the right as required or automatically set them by pressing ctrl+A. Once you are happy, begin to rotate the catalog stars into an approximately correct position using your keyboard. A/D control the azimuth, S/W control the altitude, Q/E control the position angle, and Up/Down controls the scale. Don't worry about getting them exactly, just get them close enough to the image for the program to associate the observed stars with the catalog stars when manually picking.

To enter star picking mode, press ctrl+R. This should bring up an annulus around your reticle, whose size you can control by holding ctrl and scrolling with the mouse wheel. To pick a star, click on the star and the program should automatically snap the point to the centroid. If you are unhappy with its choice, you can force the centroid position by holding ctrl and clicking. The position will appear as an orange cross. Your pick of star will automatically associate with the nearest catalog star (which will be filled with a blue X). If you wish to choose a different catalog star, simply click this again and notice as the blue X switches. To accept a pair, press Enter or Space.

Once you have a centroided a number of stars (minimum 5 to adjust pointing, 12 to adjust distortion), you can fit the plate by clicking "Fit Parameters">"Fit" on the sidebar or ctrl+Z. The green numbers that appear are the star magnitudes and the white numbers are the magnitude errors. The bars represent the fitting errors (magnitude and direction). This will print a residual table to the console, as well as the average error and FOV.

Under the "Fit Parameters" tab, there are several options to adjust to improve your astrometry. The refraction correction should be checked for all camera. If the camera is older and does not have square pixels, uncheck equal aspect. If you suspect that the lens is not completely flat with the sensor (nearly always), check the asymmetry correction. The older distortion models are the poly3+radial models. It is preferable to use the radial-odd models as they do not require stars in all parts of the field to accurately model the distortion. To see which you should use, begin with the lowest order model and check the astrometry residuals by clicking "Fit Parameters">"Astrometry" or by pressing the L key. If there is structure to the residuals, then increase the order until the structure disappears.

Fixed vignetting should only be enabled for cameras with well-measured vignetting. This is preferable to the modeled vignetting parameter, but unless it has been measured in the lab or under controlled conditions it will worsen the photometry fit. Extinction values also typically vary between 0.6 and 1.0 and should be measured on a per-camera basis. Both of these effects increase with distance from the center of the lens, as can be seen by clicking "Fit Parameters">"Photometry" or by pressing the P key. Adjust the extinction until it follows the downward curved line.

After creating a plate, it can be useful to remove high residual error stars. You can filter stars by adjusting "Settings">"Filter Mag Err". Manual add and remove stars until you obtain a fit you are satisfied with. You can check the RMSD to get an idea of how good the fit is.

SkyFit2

2023-03-02T14:46:02Z

Dvida:

SkyFit2 is a tool used to make astrometric plates and photometric calibrations. An astrometric plate is used to convert measurements on the image to coordinates in the sky (e.g. right ascension and declination). Photometric calibration converts the image pixel intensity to magnitude.

We aim to make SkyFit as user-friendly and universal as possible. It aims to support all optical meteor data formats in existence (videos and still images), as well as calibrating dashcams.

= SkyFit2 Anatomy =

This section describes the various physical features of the SkyFit2 GUI.

== SkyFit Mode ==

=== Image Display & Levels ===

[[File:WikiImgDisplay.png]]

=== Fit Parameters Tab ===

[[File:WikiFitParams.png]]

=== Settings Tab ===

[[File:WikiSettingsTab.png]]

== ManualReduction Mode ==

=== Image Display & Levels ===

[[File:WikiImgDisplay2.png]]

=== Settings Tab ===

[[File:WikiSettingsTab2.png]]

= Create or Upgrade a Plate with SkyFit2 =

This page seeks to walkthrough how to create a new plate or upgrade an old plate using RMS SkyFit2 GUI.

== Getting Started ==

To run SkyFit2, first install the RMS git repository and environment. Then run the command

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 INPUT_PATH [-c/--config CONFIG_PATH][-t/--timebeg TIME][-f/--fps FPS][-g/--gamma GAMMA]

This opens the Sky``Fit2 GUI with whatever data is in the directory specified by "INPUT_PATH". Alternatively, can also be a path to a video file or a state file. Make sure to customize the config file to the proper specifications before running this program. The most common options are detailed below:

* Config: Path to the directory containing the appropriate .config file. Default to the DETECTION_PATH.
* Timebeg: Beginning time of the detection in YYYYMMDD_hhmmss.uuuuuu format.
* Fps: Frames per second when images are used. This option overrides the framerate given in from the config file.
* Gamma: Camera gamma value (typically 0.45 or 1.0). This option overrides the framerate read in from the config file

Upon opening, a request for a plate (platepar .cal file) will occur. If you wish to update a plate, select this here. If you wish to make a new plate, simply close this window.

=== Using RMS data ===

Collect the desired data in a directory (e.g. /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY). The directory should contain an FF and an FR file if you're reducing a fireball. Make sure to also copy the required .config file and the platepar_cmn2010.cal if present.

Then run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY --config . --fr

This will load the given data files.

=== Using FRIPON data ===

FRIPON data are usually given as a bunch of individual frames in a FITS format. It is very important that all files have a .fit extension (not .fits). SkyFit2 will automatically read the header and download the station coordinates, so you don't have to specify a config file. If the data are in /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY, simply run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY

=== Using GFO/DFN data ===

DFN data are given as .NEF files in the raw Nikon format. To load a GFO image in SkyFit, you will need a dfnstation.cfg file which is usually present on the system. Copy both a .NEF image and the dfnstation.cfg in a standalone directory called e.g. /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY.

Then run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY --config .

SkyFit will ask you to choose the .NEF file.

Properly calibrating and reducing GFO data can be a bit tricky. The recommended procedure is the following:

* Take a calibration image (the one with the nominally longer exposure) and put it in a separate "calib" directory. Make sure that lots of stars are visible and that there are at least a few very close to the horizon.
* Fit a radial plate (starting with radial3-odd, then fit a radial5-odd, finishing with a radial7-odd), with the asymmetry correction and equal aspect turned on. Set the extinction scale to 0.6 and turn off a fixed vignetting coefficient option. When happy with the fit, hit CTRL + S to save and close SkyFit.
* Prepare the fireball data in another directory and copy the platepar file from the calib directory. The data images have a shorter exposure, so fewer stars are visible. In the previous step, you fit the pointing and the distortion coefficients - because the lens is the same the distortion coefficients remain the same, but the pointing can drift over time. You need to re-calibrate on 10-20 stars but select the "Only fit pointing option".
* Switch to the ManualReduction mode and start picking. Because the timing is encoded using a de Brujin sequence, the fireball consists of dots and gaps (1s and 0s). Start with an obvious dot, clicking it with your mouse. A red cross will appear. Advance to the next point ("frame") by pressing a right arrow key on your keyboard (note that the frame counter will increase). If the next point is a gap, select it with ALT + CLICK (or NUM0 + CLICK) - this will show up as a yellow cross. Keep going until you select all, and you can go back with a left arrow key in case you missed any. It is very important that the order of selected points is correct. Once you've selected about 10-20 points, switch to the Debrujin tab and click "Check sequence". This will try to find a unique solution for the time, but you might be offered with several options. You can choose one if you know the time, or close it and pick a few more points and try again.
* If you want to do photometry, the background needs to be subtracted before pixel colouring is possible. Use a .NEF image that was taken just before or after the fireball as a dark frame by hitting CTRL + D and selecting the file.

=== Using arbitrary video data ===

If you are using a video from e.g. a security camera in either a .avi, .mp4, or in a .mov format, you will need to make a custom configuration file and know the absolute time of the first frame.

First, copy the .config file from the RMS source directory to the directory with the video and rename it with the name of the station (we'll use "London" as the station name), e.g. london.config. Then open this file and change the following entries:

stationID: London
latitude: 51.500761 ; WGS84 +N (degrees) - Use at least 5 decimal places and measure in Google Earth as accurately as possible
longitude: -0.124585 ; WGS84 +E (degrees)
elevation: 20 ; mean sea level EGM96 geoidal datum, not WGS84 ellipsoidal (meters)

...

width: 1280 ; Set the video resolution
height: 720
fps: 25.0 ; frames per second

...

; Approx. horizontal Field-of-view in degrees
fov_w: 87
; Approx. vertical Field-of-view in degrees
fov_h: 45

; Deinterlacing -2 = global shutter, -1 = rolling shutter, 0 = even first, 1 = odd first
deinterlace_order: -1

...

star_catalog_file: BSC5 ; This sets a star catalog with bright stars

...

catalog_mag_limit: 4.0 ; Security cameras usually can't see stars fainter than this, but you can always adjust this later

Then given the absolute UTC time of the first frame in the YYYYMMDD_hhmmss.uuuuuu format (e.g. 20230214_021629.0) and the path to the video file (e.g. /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY/video.mp4), run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY/video.mp4 --config . --timebeg 20230214_021629.0

== Creating a Plate ==

*NOTE: When entering hotkey commands in SkyFit2, you must be in the main frame/viewer.

Adjust the levels on the right as required or automatically set them by pressing ctrl+A. Once you are happy, begin to rotate the catalog stars into an approximately correct position using your keyboard. A/D control the azimuth, S/W control the altitude, Q/E control the position angle, and Up/Down controls the scale. Don't worry about getting them exactly, just get them close enough to the image for the program to associate the observed stars with the catalog stars when manually picking.

To enter star picking mode, press ctrl+R. This should bring up an annulus around your reticle, whose size you can control by holding ctrl and scrolling with the mouse wheel. To pick a star, click on the star and the program should automatically snap the point to the centroid. If you are unhappy with its choice, you can force the centroid position by holding ctrl and clicking. The position will appear as an orange cross. Your pick of star will automatically associate with the nearest catalog star (which will be filled with a blue X). If you wish to choose a different catalog star, simply click this again and notice as the blue X switches. To accept a pair, press Enter or Space.

Once you have a centroided a number of stars (minimum 5 to adjust pointing, 12 to adjust distortion), you can fit the plate by clicking "Fit Parameters">"Fit" on the sidebar or ctrl+Z. The green numbers that appear are the star magnitudes and the white numbers are the magnitude errors. The bars represent the fitting errors (magnitude and direction). This will print a residual table to the console, as well as the average error and FOV.

Under the "Fit Parameters" tab, there are several options to adjust to improve your astrometry. The refraction correction should be checked for all camera. If the camera is older and does not have square pixels, uncheck equal aspect. If you suspect that the lens is not completely flat with the sensor (nearly always), check the asymmetry correction. The older distortion models are the poly3+radial models. It is preferable to use the radial-odd models as they do not require stars in all parts of the field to accurately model the distortion. To see which you should use, begin with the lowest order model and check the astrometry residuals by clicking "Fit Parameters">"Astrometry" or by pressing the L key. If there is structure to the residuals, then increase the order until the structure disappears.

Fixed vignetting should only be enabled for cameras with well-measured vignetting. This is preferable to the modeled vignetting parameter, but unless it has been measured in the lab or under controlled conditions it will worsen the photometry fit. Extinction values also typically vary between 0.6 and 1.0 and should be measured on a per-camera basis. Both of these effects increase with distance from the center of the lens, as can be seen by clicking "Fit Parameters">"Photometry" or by pressing the P key. Adjust the extinction until it follows the downward curved line.

After creating a plate, it can be useful to remove high residual error stars. You can filter stars by adjusting "Settings">"Filter Mag Err". Manual add and remove stars until you obtain a fit you are satisfied with. You can check the RMSD to get an idea of how good the fit is.

SkyFit2

2023-03-02T14:41:42Z

Dvida: /* Create or Upgrade a Plate with SkyFit2 */

= SkyFit2 Anatomy =

This section describes the various physical features of the SkyFit2 GUI.

== SkyFit Mode ==

=== Image Display & Levels ===

[[File:WikiImgDisplay.png]]

=== Fit Parameters Tab ===

[[File:WikiFitParams.png]]

=== Settings Tab ===

[[File:WikiSettingsTab.png]]

== ManualReduction Mode ==

=== Image Display & Levels ===

[[File:WikiImgDisplay2.png]]

=== Settings Tab ===

[[File:WikiSettingsTab2.png]]

= Create or Upgrade a Plate with SkyFit2 =

This page seeks to walkthrough how to create a new plate or upgrade an old plate using RMS SkyFit2 GUI.

== Getting Started ==

To run SkyFit2, first install the RMS git repository and environment. Then run the command

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 INPUT_PATH [-c/--config CONFIG_PATH][-t/--timebeg TIME][-f/--fps FPS][-g/--gamma GAMMA]

This opens the Sky``Fit2 GUI with whatever data is in the directory specified by "INPUT_PATH". Alternatively, can also be a path to a video file or a state file. Make sure to customize the config file to the proper specifications before running this program. The most common options are detailed below:

* Config: Path to the directory containing the appropriate .config file. Default to the DETECTION_PATH.
* Timebeg: Beginning time of the detection in YYYYMMDD_hhmmss.uuuuuu format.
* Fps: Frames per second when images are used. This option overrides the framerate given in from the config file.
* Gamma: Camera gamma value (typically 0.45 or 1.0). This option overrides the framerate read in from the config file

Upon opening, a request for a plate (platepar .cal file) will occur. If you wish to update a plate, select this here. If you wish to make a new plate, simply close this window.

=== Using RMS data ===

Collect the desired data in a directory (e.g. /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY). The directory should contain an FF and an FR file if you're reducing a fireball. Make sure to also copy the required .config file and the platepar_cmn2010.cal if present.

Then run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY --config . --fr

This will load the given data files.

=== Using FRIPON data ===

FRIPON data are usually given as a bunch of individual frames in a FITS format. It is very important that all files have a .fit extension (not .fits). SkyFit2 will automatically read the header and download the station coordinates, so you don't have to specify a config file. If the data are in /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY, simply run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY

=== Using GFO/DFN data ===

DFN data are given as .NEF files in the raw Nikon format. To load a GFO image in SkyFit, you will need a dfnstation.cfg file which is usually present on the system. Copy both a .NEF image and the dfnstation.cfg in a standalone directory called e.g. /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY.

Then run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY --config .

SkyFit will ask you to choose the .NEF file.

Properly calibrating and reducing GFO data can be a bit tricky. The recommended procedure is the following:

* Take a calibration image (the one with the nominally longer exposure) and put it in a separate "calib" directory. Make sure that lots of stars are visible and that there are at least a few very close to the horizon.
* Fit a radial plate (starting with radial3-odd, then fit a radial5-odd, finishing with a radial7-odd), with the asymmetry correction and equal aspect turned on. Set the extinction scale to 0.6 and turn off a fixed vignetting coefficient option. When happy with the fit, hit CTRL + S to save and close SkyFit.
* Prepare the fireball data in another directory and copy the platepar file from the calib directory. The data images have a shorter exposure, so fewer stars are visible. In the previous step, you fit the pointing and the distortion coefficients - because the lens is the same the distortion coefficients remain the same, but the pointing can drift over time. You need to re-calibrate on 10-20 stars but select the "Only fit pointing option".
* Switch to the ManualReduction mode and start picking. Because the timing is encoded using a de Brujin sequence, the fireball consists of dots and gaps (1s and 0s). Start with an obvious dot, clicking it with your mouse. A red cross will appear. Advance to the next point ("frame") by pressing a right arrow key on your keyboard (note that the frame counter will increase). If the next point is a gap, select it with ALT + CLICK (or NUM0 + CLICK) - this will show up as a yellow cross. Keep going until you select all, and you can go back with a left arrow key in case you missed any. It is very important that the order of selected points is correct. Once you've selected about 10-20 points, switch to the Debrujin tab and click "Check sequence". This will try to find a unique solution for the time, but you might be offered with several options. You can choose one if you know the time, or close it and pick a few more points and try again.
* If you want to do photometry, the background needs to be subtracted before pixel colouring is possible. Use a .NEF image that was taken just before or after the fireball as a dark frame by hitting CTRL + D and selecting the file.

=== Using arbitrary video data ===

If you are using a video from e.g. a security camera in either a .avi, .mp4, or in a .mov format, you will need to make a custom configuration file and know the absolute time of the first frame.

First, copy the .config file from the RMS source directory to the directory with the video and rename it with the name of the station (we'll use "London" as the station name), e.g. london.config. Then open this file and change the following entries:

stationID: London
latitude: 51.500761 ; WGS84 +N (degrees) - Use at least 5 decimal places and measure in Google Earth as accurately as possible
longitude: -0.124585 ; WGS84 +E (degrees)
elevation: 20 ; mean sea level EGM96 geoidal datum, not WGS84 ellipsoidal (meters)

...

width: 1280 ; Set the video resolution
height: 720
fps: 25.0 ; frames per second

...

; Approx. horizontal Field-of-view in degrees
fov_w: 87
; Approx. vertical Field-of-view in degrees
fov_h: 45

; Deinterlacing -2 = global shutter, -1 = rolling shutter, 0 = even first, 1 = odd first
deinterlace_order: -1

...

star_catalog_file: BSC5 ; This sets a star catalog with bright stars

...

catalog_mag_limit: 4.0 ; Security cameras usually can't see stars fainter than this, but you can always adjust this later

Then given the absolute UTC time of the first frame in the YYYYMMDD_hhmmss.uuuuuu format (e.g. 20230214_021629.0) and the path to the video file (e.g. /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY/video.mp4), run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY/video.mp4 --config . --timebeg 20230214_021629.0

== Creating a Plate ==

*NOTE: When entering hotkey commands in SkyFit2, you must be in the main frame/viewer.

Adjust the levels on the right as required or automatically set them by pressing ctrl+A. Once you are happy, begin to rotate the catalog stars into an approximately correct position using your keyboard. A/D control the azimuth, S/W control the altitude, Q/E control the position angle, and Up/Down controls the scale. Don't worry about getting them exactly, just get them close enough to the image for the program to associate the observed stars with the catalog stars when manually picking.

To enter star picking mode, press ctrl+R. This should bring up an annulus around your reticle, whose size you can control by holding ctrl and scrolling with the mouse wheel. To pick a star, click on the star and the program should automatically snap the point to the centroid. If you are unhappy with its choice, you can force the centroid position by holding ctrl and clicking. The position will appear as an orange cross. Your pick of star will automatically associate with the nearest catalog star (which will be filled with a blue X). If you wish to choose a different catalog star, simply click this again and notice as the blue X switches. To accept a pair, press Enter or Space.

Once you have a centroided a number of stars (minimum 5 to adjust pointing, 12 to adjust distortion), you can fit the plate by clicking "Fit Parameters">"Fit" on the sidebar or ctrl+Z. The green numbers that appear are the star magnitudes and the white numbers are the magnitude errors. The bars represent the fitting errors (magnitude and direction). This will print a residual table to the console, as well as the average error and FOV.

Under the "Fit Parameters" tab, there are several options to adjust to improve your astrometry. The refraction correction should be checked for all camera. If the camera is older and does not have square pixels, uncheck equal aspect. If you suspect that the lens is not completely flat with the sensor (nearly always), check the asymmetry correction. The older distortion models are the poly3+radial models. It is preferable to use the radial-odd models as they do not require stars in all parts of the field to accurately model the distortion. To see which you should use, begin with the lowest order model and check the astrometry residuals by clicking "Fit Parameters">"Astrometry" or by pressing the L key. If there is structure to the residuals, then increase the order until the structure disappears.

Fixed vignetting should only be enabled for cameras with well-measured vignetting. This is preferable to the modeled vignetting parameter, but unless it has been measured in the lab or under controlled conditions it will worsen the photometry fit. Extinction values also typically vary between 0.6 and 1.0 and should be measured on a per-camera basis. Both of these effects increase with distance from the center of the lens, as can be seen by clicking "Fit Parameters">"Photometry" or by pressing the P key. Adjust the extinction until it follows the downward curved line.

After creating a plate, it can be useful to remove high residual error stars. You can filter stars by adjusting "Settings">"Filter Mag Err". Manual add and remove stars until you obtain a fit you are satisfied with. You can check the RMSD to get an idea of how good the fit is.

Main Page

2023-03-02T14:41:19Z

Dvida: /* Data analysis with SkyFit2 */

Welcome to the Global Meteor Network's wiki page!

The Global Meteor Network (GMN) is a world wide organization of amateur and professional astronomers alike, whose goal is to observe the night sky using low-light video cameras and produce meteor trajectories in a coordinated manner. Here you will find information on the purpose and structure of the GMN, assembling and operating your own meteor camera, contributing to the development of RMS the GMN software, as well as information on how your observations as a citizen scientist can contribute to the further understanding of our solar system's formation and evolution.

'''<span style="color:red">If you have come here to find out how to build and setup a camera from scratch, jump ahead to [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#How_do_I_obtain_a_camera.3F this] section !</span>'''

== Global Meteor Network Overview ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=141 Our mission] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=363 A brief history of the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Video introduction - Overview of the Global Meteor Network (IMC2020)] ===

=== [https://youtu.be/oM7lfQ4nmyw Video overview - Meteor tracking and the GMN from Astro Imaging Channel presentation] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ Some 'live' GMN data products] ===

== Meteor Detection Station ==

=== What is an RMS GMN station? ===
: A RMS-based GMN station that is the subject of this Wiki consists of a Raspberry Pi (RPi) single board computer, a low light level security video camera, and the RMS software package. The camera is securely mounted in a weatherproof housing, pointed at the sky, and connected to the RPi with a POE (Power Over Ethernet) cable. The RPi is connected to the Internet via WiFi, and to be a part of GMN network, you’ll need a fairly powerful Raspberry Pi (RPi 3B+, RPi 4 or better) and a reasonably fast Internet connection. The internet connection is primarily required to enable data upload to a central server each morning as well as provide automatic updates for the RMS software.

: Nightly, the RPi starts recording video from the camera shortly after local sunset continuously compressing and storing the video data locally. Each morning before sunrise, after capture is complete, the RPi analyzes the video and extracts your nightly station’s meteor observations. These extracted video “clips” of detected meteors are then archived and uploaded to a server. The clips can total hundreds of megabytes on a “busy” night (e.g., in a heavy meteor shower, or a night with a lot of false detections--progress is being made on the detection software). The server finds meteors which were observed with more than one station and this enables the server to triangulate the meteor trails in 3D and calculate the orbits of the meteors.

===[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS/blob/master/README.md What do I need?] ===

You'll need a Raspberry Pi with the software on, and a camera kit. We strongly recommend the Pi4 model. The software will run on a Pi3 but it is much slower.

It is also possible to run multiple cameras on a Linux PC. More details [https://docs.google.com/document/d/16PSFi8RAqbenPdluhulCRaIenOkEzgs5piUhkX3yaOc/edit here].

=== How do I obtain a camera? ===
There are two options:

==== Buy a Camera ====
You can buy a camera and Pi prebuilt and ready to install. These are available from a couple of suppliers. The Croatian Meteor Network sell prebuilt cameras as explained on [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=136 this page]. Alternatively, if you're in the UK, you can obtain cameras from the [https://ukmeteornetwork.co.uk/ UK Meteor Network]

==== Build your own from scratch ====
This requires some basic DIY skills and some familiarity with the Raspberry PI, but don't be put off. The instructions are comprehensive and if you get stuck, you can ask for advice in the [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork groups.io] forum.

Click on this link if you want to '''[[Build_A_Camera|build a camera from scratch]]'''.

Once you've built the camera, You can '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#Flash_a_pre-built_image flash a Prebuilt image]''' onto an SD card to set up the Pi with the software required to capture meteors and upload data to the network. Although the primary choice for Raspberry Pi 4 is still a microSD card, you may wish to consider '''using a USB flash disk, USB-attached SSD or USB-attached HDD''' as a boot device. Click [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Booting_from_a_USB_device Booting from a USB device] to know more.

=== Can I use a commercial all-sky camera? ===

: Generally no due to the lack of sensitivity. [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=163 But see this recent experiment]

== Operating and maintaining your GMN station ==

=== Overview ===

: Please note that GMS is a nascent operation and you may share some growing pains if you choose to be involved -- we're still working out some bugs and making improvements here, which may be an opportunity to help if you have programming skills! ;-) So note that the workload of day-to-day operation can be non-zero, and might take a little bit of your time.

: Ideally, you'll want to monitor your RMS RPi system(s) daily to look for freezes or glitches or other problems... like birds nesting or soiling the camera window, people accidentally unplugging the power cord, mice (or cats or dogs!) chewing on the camera Ethernet cable, etc.

: Although we are getting close, this is not a "power up and forget about it" system yet.
: However, by its very nature, the GMS network is inhabited by a lot of people who are willing to help newcomers getting started. So, here are some clues for daily operation of your RMS camera.

=== So what does the meteor camera do over the course of 24 hours? ===

: The RMS Python based system calculates the sundown to sunrise interval and schedules video camera capture all night long. Depending on the video camera and capabilities of the RPi, the camera captures 25 or more frames per second between evening and morning twilight. During the continuous image capture, the station begins processing captured image data, doing a pre-screening to target frames with a suitable number of stars (usually around 20) that makes it worth looking for meteor detections. Once data capture has finished, the station switches into processing all the promising frames for detections, then refining the astrometric accuracy of every positive detection. Using the station platepar (plate parameters) calibration file, processing iterates to find the best astrometry and photometry solution for each detected meteor. Once this process has analyzed each detection, summary files are created.
: These summary files include text file data presentation in several widely accepted formats (CAMS and UFOorbit), as well as graphic plots of detection frequencies throughout the night, a set of thumbnail images of detections, a set of thumbnail images of data captured throughout the night, a single image with all detections stacked together, plots of photometry, astrometry, and camera pointing drift in arc minutes throughout the course of the night as the mount or building flexes, a flat file for correcting images, and a plot of all detections showing any identified radiants. Finally all results are combined into a single compressed archive, which is automatically uploaded each morning to the central server. Optionally, you can create a mp4 movie showing a time lapse of the night’s captured images.
: Each morning you can review the result files on the RPi, and copy anything you want to your computer or tablet.

===Archiving data ===

: Your primary scientific data is automatically uploaded to the central server every morning when data processing is done. However once it has done this, RMS will purge out the oldest data to free up space for the next night's run.

: So, you may want to copy some of the data to a PC, NAS or cloud for further analysis of your own. The data you should consider backing up are the contents of '''~/RMS_data/ArchivedFiles''', which holds the individual files and data that RMS determined were probably meteors. Full detail on how to nbare beyond the scope of the GMN Wiki, but tools such as robocopy (for Windows) and rsync(for Linux/MacOS) are ideal. These tools can 'mirror' data across a network. If you want help configuring these, ask in the Globalmeteornetwork group on groups.io.

: We've also built some automated tools that can help to back up any additional data to a thumb drive inserted into the RPi. Please ask in the group about these.

===Backup and restore configuration and RSA keys===

: Open a terminal and execute the command '''Scripts/RMS_Backup.sh'''. A compressed .zip file containing all important configuration files and keys will be created in user's home directory with the prefix RMS_Backup and .zip extension. Example: ''/home/pi/RMS_Backup_XX0001_2023-01-28.zip''.

: Copy the .zip file to a safe place outside RPi, it will be useful later to restore the system in case of failure. Note it contains the RSA public and private keys used to contact GMN servers, keep it secret.

: To restore the configuration, unzip the backup file in some folder on the RPi and copy the files '''.config''', '''platepar_cmn2010.cal''' and '''mask.bmp''' to the folder '''/home/pi/source/RMS/''', and the files '''id_rsa''' and '''id_rsa.pub'' to the folder ''/home/pi/.ssh/''' as in the following example:

:: cp .config platepar_cmn2010.cal mask.bmp /home/pi/source/RMS/
:: cp id_rsa id_rsa.pub /home/pi/.ssh/

: Make sure that RSA key files permission bits are correct by using the command:

:: chmod 400 ~/.ssh/id_rsa*

=== Viewing the data ===

: To view the data, you can use CMN_binViewer software[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer] which is already installed in the RMS SD image.
: There is also a Windows version[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer/releases] you can install.

: '''Important note''' : You can also open the images in astronomical FITS viewers such as FITS Liberator or Pixinsight, though the results may be surprising. For example in FITS Liberator, the image will be '''upside down'''. This is an artefact of how the software reads the image. In space, there's no 'up' or 'down' and so the FITS specification does not dictate whether the pixel (0,0) is at the bottom left or top left, or indeed one of the other corners. Some software, notably FITS Liberator, treats the top left as the origin and so terrestrial images will be displayed mirrored vertically.

=== Tools and Utilities ===

* [https://www.realvnc.com/en/connect/download/viewer/ RealVNC] or [https://anydesk.com/en AnyDesk] remote connect tool allows station access from anywhere. Access from outside your network is enabled by use of an OpenVPN connection address available to meteor stations. Alternatively, with VNC and Teamviewer, you can create an account and team on their websites, and then remotely access your station.
* Samba data directory access, allows you to copy data results directly from your RPi to your computer or tablet.
* [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer CMN_binViewer] can be used to view standard fits image files containing meteor detections. It runs on the RPi, and is also available under Windows.
* [https://sonotaco.com/soft/e_index.html UFO Orbit] allows you to process data from multiple stations and generate unified radiants of two or more stations seeing the same meteor. It can plot the shared object ground path, orbital characteristics, and can output a summary file of all objects seen by more than one station, which can be used for further analysis.
* RMS software can be installed under Windows to allow much of the RMS python-based code to be executed on your computer, so it can be run against meteor station data you have transferred to your computer from the RPi.
* You can run RMS Python jobs on the RPi to sample the image files captured all night long and condense them into a mp4 movie. This creates a sometimes mesmerizing summary that can run for over 2 minutes in length for winter time data.

== Configuring and installing your camera ==

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick start guide] ===

=== [[Focusing_your_camera | Focusing your IP camera]] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2sq1hBwcAA Video tutorial - Configuring your IMX291 IP camera] ===

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1TPotXcRstHz-XWIQYIW71xkRYy7Ca1UCoEiZsqdk9zw/edit?usp=sharing Different ways of connecting the camera] ===

== What can I do with my GMN station? ==

=== Using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration + Manually reducing observations of fireballs and computing their trajectories: ===
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao3J9Jf0iLQ Updated 2023 video tutorial]
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOjb3qxDlX4 Old 2021 video tutorial]

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=310 Generating a Google Earth KML file to show your station's field of view] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=253 Using UFO Orbit program to estimate meteor trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=221 Urban meteor observing] ===

== RMS Software Installation ==

=== Flash a pre-built image ===

Pre-built Images are available with the RMS software pre-installed on Raspbian. Raspbian is the operating system typically used on the Raspberry Pi.

A 128 GB microSD card is preferred, although smaller 64 GB cards will also work. The image is flashed to the microSD card using the Etcher utility for Windows (32 or 64-bit), MacOS or Linux (64-bit), which can be found [https://www.balena.io/etcher/ here]

If you are considering using a USB flash disk, USB-attached SSD or USB-attached HDD as a boot device, click [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Booting_from_a_USB_device Booting from a USB device] to know more.

When you first boot up the Pi make sure you have a keyboard, monitor and mouse attached as you will be taken through a setup process by the RMS software.

The current publicly released images of RMS are:
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/sa9csd4m3jr1vqo/RMS_image_20191203.zip?dl=1 RPi3B+ ]
and
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/3pwwenty43dazq4/RMS_RPi4_image_20210626.zip?dl=1 RPi4 ].

Please see the [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick Start Guide] about how to flash them to an SD card.

Notes:
* The earlier versions of the Raspberry Pi, the 1 and 2, are not powerful enough to run RMS software.

* the pre-installed RMS software images incorporate an auto-updating feature, so that the RMS software is updated to the current release whenever your Raspberry Pi RMS is booted. This way, your station is always running the most recent set of updates.

* For installations into other Linux or windows environments, executing the command ''git pull'' will update to the most recent RMS release.

* The code was designed to run on a RPi, but it will also run an some Linux distributions. We have tested it on Linux Mint 18 and Ubuntu 16. For information on installing into other Linux releases, check portions of the section listed below for installing on RPi, and also check installation instructions found on [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS GitHub]

== [OPTIONAL] Install the software from scratch ==

'''Note: if you're setting up a Raspberry Pi you should use the prebuilt image as this comes with all necessary software installed and is ready to use.'''. If you really really '''really''' do want to install on the RPi from scratch, you can follow the instructions below:

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 4 ===

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/19ImeNqBTD1ml2iisp5y7CjDrRV33wBeF9rtx3mIVjh4/edit?usp=sharing here]

Install on a [[Pi4 with Raspbian Bullseye]]

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 3 ===

'''We no longer recommend the Pi3, as it doesn't have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers. '''

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ChaXx6WkuGfcQ_f5yRbwUOOMxEgIJrjq932UZE6cRjE/edit here].

=== Install for Linux ===

Detailed instructions [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Installation_for_Linux here]

=== Linux GUI and multi-Camera support ===

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/16PSFi8RAqbenPdluhulCRaIenOkEzgs5piUhkX3yaOc/edit?usp=sharing here]

=== Installation for Windows ===
Data capture does not work under windows. However you can use the other tools on your PC, where its much quicker to run SkyFit2 to calibrate your camera to the sky, or you want to use BatchFFToImage to convert data to jpeg format to share on Social Media.

Click '''[[Windows_Installation|here]]''' for detailed instructions. The instructions were tested on Windows 10 64-bit, but should work on any Windows version where git and Anaconda are available.

Aside: If you are a Windows whizz, please feel free to investigate why data capture doesn't work!

=== Installation for MacOS ===
As with Windows, installation for MacOS is useful if you want to analyse the data offline. If you do want to install it, please follow the instructions '''[[MacOS_Install | here]]'''.

== Data analysis with SkyFit2 ==

SkyFit2 is a program within the RMS library which supports analyzing optical meteor data in most optical formats that are in use today, including videos in any popular video format (mp4, avi, mkv), a sequence of static images, or a single image with shutter breaks.

This [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao3J9Jf0iLQ video tutorial] explains how to using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration on GMN data and manually reduce observations of fireballs, including computing their trajectories.

A more general and detailed description of SkyFit2 is given at the '''[[SkyFit2|SkyFit2]]''' page.

== FAQ ==

=== What should I back up when re-flashing an SD card or a USB disk? ===

: The .config, platepar and mask files that are in the RMS source directory, plus the whole contents of the hidden directory /home/pi/.ssh.

If your SD card or a USB disk fails or becomes corrupted, the config files can be fetched from the server as they are uploaded every day together with the data. However the contents of .ssh are essential for connection to the server, so you must also save these. Once you set up a new SD card or a USB disk, return the files in their original location.

=== What are the values in FTPdetectinfo_* file designated as hnr mle bin Pix/fm Rho Phi? ===

: Some of these values are not used in RMS (hnr mle bin), but they are in CAMS, so they are here to conform to the standard. Thus they are all zeros. The others are:

: - Pix/fm - Average angular speed of the meteor in pixels per frame.

: - Rho, Phi - Parameters that define the line of the meteor in polar coordinates, see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hough_transform#Theory here] for more details. Rho is the distance of the line from the centre of the image, and phi is the angle of the line as measured from the positive direction of the Y axis (basically a line going from the center of the image to the top of the image), the positive angles are measured clockwise (I think, the CAMS standard might define these parameters a bit differently, the Y axis is flipped).

: The intensity is the sum of all pixel intensities of the meteor on a given frame. Let's say I represent an area around the meteor on a given frame like this, where the numbers are pixel intensities on an 8-bit image (so they can range from 0 to 255):

: [[File:Intensity_sum.png |Intensity_sum.png ]]

: and the pixels values inside the red boundary represent the meteor blob on the frame, the intensity would be the sum of all numbers inside the red boundary.
: This value is later used to compute the magnitude. The magnitude is computed as: mag = -2.5*log10(intensity sum) + photometric_offset. The photometric offset is estimated in SkyFit by fitting the line with slope -2.5 through pairs of known magnitudes of stars and logartihms of their pixel intensity sum. The photometric offset is basically the intercept of that line. The constant slope of -2.5 comes from the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apparent_magnitude#Calculations definition of stellar magnitudes.]

== GMN data policy ==

The Global Meteor Network produces several levles of data products:
* Level 1 - The lowest level data (i.e. as close to "raw" as possible) are the FF image and FR video files saved to the RPi by the capture code and the fireball detector.
* Level 2 - The meteor detector uses these data to extract positional and brightness information of individual meteors (FTPdetectinfo file), and images are also used for astrometric and photometric calibration (platepar file). Meteor and star detections are used to generate a range of plots suchs as the single-station shower association graph, camera drift graph, etc. The calibrated meteors measurements get uploaded to the GMN server together with the raw images of individual meteors.
* Level 3 - The software on the server correlates individual observations and computes multi-station meteor trajectories which are published daily on the GMN [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ data website]. This data is made public under the [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ CC BY 4.0 license].

Operators of individual GMN stations exclusivery own the Level 1 and Level 2 data their stations produce. In practice, this means that they are free to share this data with other meteor networks if they wish to do so. The data that gets uploaded to the GMN server will not be shared publicly nor with other parties without the operator's consent, but may be used internally by the GMN coordinators to manually produce other data products (e.g. trajectory of a meteorite dropping fireball, analysis of a meteor shower). All station operators will be credited for their data in all GMN publications.

== IstraStream ==

=== [http://istrastream.com/rms-gmn/ IstraStream GMN status website] ===

: The IstraStream.com is an independent hosting site which is part of our world wide GMN. It is primarily a host for data from cameras sold by IstraStream, but other station operators can request that their data be included.
To enable the IstraStream upload, the <b>external_script_run</b>, <b>external_script_path</b>, and <b>reboot_after_processing</b> parameters have to be changed. This is how the config file should look:

<pre>
; External script
; An external script will be run after RMS finishes the processing for the night, it will be passed three arguments:
; captured_night_dir, archived_night_dir, config - captured_night dir is the full path to the captured folder of the night
; the second one is the archived, and config is an object holding the values in this config file.
; ---------------
; Enable running an external script at the end of every night of processing
external_script_run: true
; Run the external script after auto reprocess. "auto_reprocess" needs to be turned on for this to work.
auto_reprocess_external_script_run: false
; Full path to the external script
external_script_path: /home/pi/source/RMS/iStream/iStream.py
; Name of the function in the external script which will be called
external_function_name: rmsExternal

; Daily reboot
; ---------------
; Reboot the computer daily after the processing and upload is done
reboot_after_processing: false
</pre>

Then, send an e-mail to [mailto:info@istrastream.com info@istrastream.com] with your:
* Station_ID
* Location or Name (if not secret)
* Lens type/size

For example, "CA0001; Elginfield Observatory, Ontario, Canada; 4mm". The IstraStream crew will enable the weblog page within a few days.

Finally, this document explains what every plot on the IstraStream weblog means:

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/132aHGn0QPzhpVN2s2n6FT6rJn39LAsPkchWJqXQb8Qk/edit?usp=sharing IstraStream Plots Explanation] ===

== For More Information ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=43 Contact the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork Join the Global Meteor Network Forum] ===

=== [https://github.com/markmac99/ukmon-pitools/wiki UK Meteor Network Wiki]===
This wiki has numerous FAQs and tips on maintaining, monitoring and managing your system, and several explainers such as how to calibrate and create a mask, how to copy data and so forth.

=== GMN talks ===

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDdrG_FCyGk 2022 Global Meteor Network Meeting Session 1 (February, 2022)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_75CDPzjI4 2022 Global Meteor Network Meeting Session 2 (February, 2022)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6x9_WCVphY GMN talk at the European Space Agency's Fireball Workshop (June, 2021)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXBTLPnPDWs GMN Workshop (February, 2021)] - [https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ia9vagug5lxm8k9/AAB_i_1jcWThUdAHO_2gF_Ksa?dl=0 Link to slides]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Overview of the GMN - IMC2020 (September, 2020)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oM7lfQ4nmyw Overview of the GMN, Astro Imaging Channel presentation (May, 2020)]

=== GMN related publications ===

: [https://academic.oup.com/mnras/advance-article/doi/10.1093/mnras/stab2557/6368869 Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T., & Vida, D. (2021). Meteor shower radiant dispersions in Global Meteor Network data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2107.12335 Vida, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P. S., Brown, P. G., McIntyre, M. J., Dijkema, T. J., Pavletić, L., Kukić, P., Mazur, M.J., Eschman, P., Roggemans, P., Merlak, A., & Zubović, D. (2021). The Global Meteor Network–Methodology and first results. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 506(4), 5046-5074.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.05458/ Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T. D., & Vida, D. (2020). Realistic gravitational focusing of meteoroid streams. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 494(2), 2982-2994.]

: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Kukic-et-al-2018-Rolling-shutter.pdf Kukić, P., Gural, P., Vida, D., Šegon, D. & Merlak, A. (2018) Correction for meteor centroids observed using rolling shutter cameras. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46:5, 154-118.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_sun_skirter_final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Kukić, P., & Merlak, A. (2018). Compressive strength of a skirting Daytime Arietid-first science results from low-cost Raspberry Pi-based meteor stations. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 113-118.]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.02979.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - I. Theory. arXiv:1911.02979v4 [astro-ph.EP] 21 Apr 2020]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.11734.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - II. Results. arXiv:1911.11734v1 [astro-ph.EP] 26 Novr 2019]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_first_results-final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Zubović, D., Kukić, P., Parag, F., & Macan, A. (2018). First results of a Raspberry Pi based meteor camera system. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 71-78.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Vida_IMC2016_proceedings_final.pdf Vida, D., Zubović, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P., & Cupec, R. (2016). Open-source meteor detection software for low-cost single-board computers. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference (IMC2016), Egmond, The Netherlands (pp. 2-5).]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Zubovic_IMC2015_priceedings_final.pdf Zubović, D., Vida, D., Gural, P., & Šegon, D. (2015). Advances in the development of a low-cost video meteor station. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference, Mistelbach, Austria (pp. 27-30).]

Main Page

2023-03-02T14:40:57Z

Dvida: /* What can I do with my GMN station? */

Welcome to the Global Meteor Network's wiki page!

The Global Meteor Network (GMN) is a world wide organization of amateur and professional astronomers alike, whose goal is to observe the night sky using low-light video cameras and produce meteor trajectories in a coordinated manner. Here you will find information on the purpose and structure of the GMN, assembling and operating your own meteor camera, contributing to the development of RMS the GMN software, as well as information on how your observations as a citizen scientist can contribute to the further understanding of our solar system's formation and evolution.

'''<span style="color:red">If you have come here to find out how to build and setup a camera from scratch, jump ahead to [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#How_do_I_obtain_a_camera.3F this] section !</span>'''

== Global Meteor Network Overview ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=141 Our mission] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=363 A brief history of the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Video introduction - Overview of the Global Meteor Network (IMC2020)] ===

=== [https://youtu.be/oM7lfQ4nmyw Video overview - Meteor tracking and the GMN from Astro Imaging Channel presentation] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ Some 'live' GMN data products] ===

== Meteor Detection Station ==

=== What is an RMS GMN station? ===
: A RMS-based GMN station that is the subject of this Wiki consists of a Raspberry Pi (RPi) single board computer, a low light level security video camera, and the RMS software package. The camera is securely mounted in a weatherproof housing, pointed at the sky, and connected to the RPi with a POE (Power Over Ethernet) cable. The RPi is connected to the Internet via WiFi, and to be a part of GMN network, you’ll need a fairly powerful Raspberry Pi (RPi 3B+, RPi 4 or better) and a reasonably fast Internet connection. The internet connection is primarily required to enable data upload to a central server each morning as well as provide automatic updates for the RMS software.

: Nightly, the RPi starts recording video from the camera shortly after local sunset continuously compressing and storing the video data locally. Each morning before sunrise, after capture is complete, the RPi analyzes the video and extracts your nightly station’s meteor observations. These extracted video “clips” of detected meteors are then archived and uploaded to a server. The clips can total hundreds of megabytes on a “busy” night (e.g., in a heavy meteor shower, or a night with a lot of false detections--progress is being made on the detection software). The server finds meteors which were observed with more than one station and this enables the server to triangulate the meteor trails in 3D and calculate the orbits of the meteors.

===[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS/blob/master/README.md What do I need?] ===

You'll need a Raspberry Pi with the software on, and a camera kit. We strongly recommend the Pi4 model. The software will run on a Pi3 but it is much slower.

It is also possible to run multiple cameras on a Linux PC. More details [https://docs.google.com/document/d/16PSFi8RAqbenPdluhulCRaIenOkEzgs5piUhkX3yaOc/edit here].

=== How do I obtain a camera? ===
There are two options:

==== Buy a Camera ====
You can buy a camera and Pi prebuilt and ready to install. These are available from a couple of suppliers. The Croatian Meteor Network sell prebuilt cameras as explained on [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=136 this page]. Alternatively, if you're in the UK, you can obtain cameras from the [https://ukmeteornetwork.co.uk/ UK Meteor Network]

==== Build your own from scratch ====
This requires some basic DIY skills and some familiarity with the Raspberry PI, but don't be put off. The instructions are comprehensive and if you get stuck, you can ask for advice in the [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork groups.io] forum.

Click on this link if you want to '''[[Build_A_Camera|build a camera from scratch]]'''.

Once you've built the camera, You can '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#Flash_a_pre-built_image flash a Prebuilt image]''' onto an SD card to set up the Pi with the software required to capture meteors and upload data to the network. Although the primary choice for Raspberry Pi 4 is still a microSD card, you may wish to consider '''using a USB flash disk, USB-attached SSD or USB-attached HDD''' as a boot device. Click [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Booting_from_a_USB_device Booting from a USB device] to know more.

=== Can I use a commercial all-sky camera? ===

: Generally no due to the lack of sensitivity. [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=163 But see this recent experiment]

== Operating and maintaining your GMN station ==

=== Overview ===

: Please note that GMS is a nascent operation and you may share some growing pains if you choose to be involved -- we're still working out some bugs and making improvements here, which may be an opportunity to help if you have programming skills! ;-) So note that the workload of day-to-day operation can be non-zero, and might take a little bit of your time.

: Ideally, you'll want to monitor your RMS RPi system(s) daily to look for freezes or glitches or other problems... like birds nesting or soiling the camera window, people accidentally unplugging the power cord, mice (or cats or dogs!) chewing on the camera Ethernet cable, etc.

: Although we are getting close, this is not a "power up and forget about it" system yet.
: However, by its very nature, the GMS network is inhabited by a lot of people who are willing to help newcomers getting started. So, here are some clues for daily operation of your RMS camera.

=== So what does the meteor camera do over the course of 24 hours? ===

: The RMS Python based system calculates the sundown to sunrise interval and schedules video camera capture all night long. Depending on the video camera and capabilities of the RPi, the camera captures 25 or more frames per second between evening and morning twilight. During the continuous image capture, the station begins processing captured image data, doing a pre-screening to target frames with a suitable number of stars (usually around 20) that makes it worth looking for meteor detections. Once data capture has finished, the station switches into processing all the promising frames for detections, then refining the astrometric accuracy of every positive detection. Using the station platepar (plate parameters) calibration file, processing iterates to find the best astrometry and photometry solution for each detected meteor. Once this process has analyzed each detection, summary files are created.
: These summary files include text file data presentation in several widely accepted formats (CAMS and UFOorbit), as well as graphic plots of detection frequencies throughout the night, a set of thumbnail images of detections, a set of thumbnail images of data captured throughout the night, a single image with all detections stacked together, plots of photometry, astrometry, and camera pointing drift in arc minutes throughout the course of the night as the mount or building flexes, a flat file for correcting images, and a plot of all detections showing any identified radiants. Finally all results are combined into a single compressed archive, which is automatically uploaded each morning to the central server. Optionally, you can create a mp4 movie showing a time lapse of the night’s captured images.
: Each morning you can review the result files on the RPi, and copy anything you want to your computer or tablet.

===Archiving data ===

: Your primary scientific data is automatically uploaded to the central server every morning when data processing is done. However once it has done this, RMS will purge out the oldest data to free up space for the next night's run.

: So, you may want to copy some of the data to a PC, NAS or cloud for further analysis of your own. The data you should consider backing up are the contents of '''~/RMS_data/ArchivedFiles''', which holds the individual files and data that RMS determined were probably meteors. Full detail on how to nbare beyond the scope of the GMN Wiki, but tools such as robocopy (for Windows) and rsync(for Linux/MacOS) are ideal. These tools can 'mirror' data across a network. If you want help configuring these, ask in the Globalmeteornetwork group on groups.io.

: We've also built some automated tools that can help to back up any additional data to a thumb drive inserted into the RPi. Please ask in the group about these.

===Backup and restore configuration and RSA keys===

: Open a terminal and execute the command '''Scripts/RMS_Backup.sh'''. A compressed .zip file containing all important configuration files and keys will be created in user's home directory with the prefix RMS_Backup and .zip extension. Example: ''/home/pi/RMS_Backup_XX0001_2023-01-28.zip''.

: Copy the .zip file to a safe place outside RPi, it will be useful later to restore the system in case of failure. Note it contains the RSA public and private keys used to contact GMN servers, keep it secret.

: To restore the configuration, unzip the backup file in some folder on the RPi and copy the files '''.config''', '''platepar_cmn2010.cal''' and '''mask.bmp''' to the folder '''/home/pi/source/RMS/''', and the files '''id_rsa''' and '''id_rsa.pub'' to the folder ''/home/pi/.ssh/''' as in the following example:

:: cp .config platepar_cmn2010.cal mask.bmp /home/pi/source/RMS/
:: cp id_rsa id_rsa.pub /home/pi/.ssh/

: Make sure that RSA key files permission bits are correct by using the command:

:: chmod 400 ~/.ssh/id_rsa*

=== Viewing the data ===

: To view the data, you can use CMN_binViewer software[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer] which is already installed in the RMS SD image.
: There is also a Windows version[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer/releases] you can install.

: '''Important note''' : You can also open the images in astronomical FITS viewers such as FITS Liberator or Pixinsight, though the results may be surprising. For example in FITS Liberator, the image will be '''upside down'''. This is an artefact of how the software reads the image. In space, there's no 'up' or 'down' and so the FITS specification does not dictate whether the pixel (0,0) is at the bottom left or top left, or indeed one of the other corners. Some software, notably FITS Liberator, treats the top left as the origin and so terrestrial images will be displayed mirrored vertically.

=== Tools and Utilities ===

* [https://www.realvnc.com/en/connect/download/viewer/ RealVNC] or [https://anydesk.com/en AnyDesk] remote connect tool allows station access from anywhere. Access from outside your network is enabled by use of an OpenVPN connection address available to meteor stations. Alternatively, with VNC and Teamviewer, you can create an account and team on their websites, and then remotely access your station.
* Samba data directory access, allows you to copy data results directly from your RPi to your computer or tablet.
* [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer CMN_binViewer] can be used to view standard fits image files containing meteor detections. It runs on the RPi, and is also available under Windows.
* [https://sonotaco.com/soft/e_index.html UFO Orbit] allows you to process data from multiple stations and generate unified radiants of two or more stations seeing the same meteor. It can plot the shared object ground path, orbital characteristics, and can output a summary file of all objects seen by more than one station, which can be used for further analysis.
* RMS software can be installed under Windows to allow much of the RMS python-based code to be executed on your computer, so it can be run against meteor station data you have transferred to your computer from the RPi.
* You can run RMS Python jobs on the RPi to sample the image files captured all night long and condense them into a mp4 movie. This creates a sometimes mesmerizing summary that can run for over 2 minutes in length for winter time data.

== Configuring and installing your camera ==

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick start guide] ===

=== [[Focusing_your_camera | Focusing your IP camera]] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2sq1hBwcAA Video tutorial - Configuring your IMX291 IP camera] ===

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1TPotXcRstHz-XWIQYIW71xkRYy7Ca1UCoEiZsqdk9zw/edit?usp=sharing Different ways of connecting the camera] ===

== What can I do with my GMN station? ==

=== Using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration + Manually reducing observations of fireballs and computing their trajectories: ===
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao3J9Jf0iLQ Updated 2023 video tutorial]
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOjb3qxDlX4 Old 2021 video tutorial]

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=310 Generating a Google Earth KML file to show your station's field of view] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=253 Using UFO Orbit program to estimate meteor trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=221 Urban meteor observing] ===

== RMS Software Installation ==

=== Flash a pre-built image ===

Pre-built Images are available with the RMS software pre-installed on Raspbian. Raspbian is the operating system typically used on the Raspberry Pi.

A 128 GB microSD card is preferred, although smaller 64 GB cards will also work. The image is flashed to the microSD card using the Etcher utility for Windows (32 or 64-bit), MacOS or Linux (64-bit), which can be found [https://www.balena.io/etcher/ here]

If you are considering using a USB flash disk, USB-attached SSD or USB-attached HDD as a boot device, click [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Booting_from_a_USB_device Booting from a USB device] to know more.

When you first boot up the Pi make sure you have a keyboard, monitor and mouse attached as you will be taken through a setup process by the RMS software.

The current publicly released images of RMS are:
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/sa9csd4m3jr1vqo/RMS_image_20191203.zip?dl=1 RPi3B+ ]
and
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/3pwwenty43dazq4/RMS_RPi4_image_20210626.zip?dl=1 RPi4 ].

Please see the [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick Start Guide] about how to flash them to an SD card.

Notes:
* The earlier versions of the Raspberry Pi, the 1 and 2, are not powerful enough to run RMS software.

* the pre-installed RMS software images incorporate an auto-updating feature, so that the RMS software is updated to the current release whenever your Raspberry Pi RMS is booted. This way, your station is always running the most recent set of updates.

* For installations into other Linux or windows environments, executing the command ''git pull'' will update to the most recent RMS release.

* The code was designed to run on a RPi, but it will also run an some Linux distributions. We have tested it on Linux Mint 18 and Ubuntu 16. For information on installing into other Linux releases, check portions of the section listed below for installing on RPi, and also check installation instructions found on [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS GitHub]

== [OPTIONAL] Install the software from scratch ==

'''Note: if you're setting up a Raspberry Pi you should use the prebuilt image as this comes with all necessary software installed and is ready to use.'''. If you really really '''really''' do want to install on the RPi from scratch, you can follow the instructions below:

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 4 ===

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/19ImeNqBTD1ml2iisp5y7CjDrRV33wBeF9rtx3mIVjh4/edit?usp=sharing here]

Install on a [[Pi4 with Raspbian Bullseye]]

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 3 ===

'''We no longer recommend the Pi3, as it doesn't have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers. '''

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ChaXx6WkuGfcQ_f5yRbwUOOMxEgIJrjq932UZE6cRjE/edit here].

=== Install for Linux ===

Detailed instructions [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Installation_for_Linux here]

=== Linux GUI and multi-Camera support ===

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/16PSFi8RAqbenPdluhulCRaIenOkEzgs5piUhkX3yaOc/edit?usp=sharing here]

=== Installation for Windows ===
Data capture does not work under windows. However you can use the other tools on your PC, where its much quicker to run SkyFit2 to calibrate your camera to the sky, or you want to use BatchFFToImage to convert data to jpeg format to share on Social Media.

Click '''[[Windows_Installation|here]]''' for detailed instructions. The instructions were tested on Windows 10 64-bit, but should work on any Windows version where git and Anaconda are available.

Aside: If you are a Windows whizz, please feel free to investigate why data capture doesn't work!

=== Installation for MacOS ===
As with Windows, installation for MacOS is useful if you want to analyse the data offline. If you do want to install it, please follow the instructions '''[[MacOS_Install | here]]'''.

== Data analysis with SkyFit2 ==

SkyFit2 is a program within the RMS library which supports analyzing optical meteor data in most optical formats that are in use today, including videos in any popular video format (mp4, avi, mkv), a sequence of static images, or a single image with shutter breaks.

This [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOjb3qxDlX4 video tutorial] explains how to using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration on GMN data and manually reduce observations of fireballs, including computing their trajectories.

A more general and detailed description of SkyFit2 is given at the '''[[SkyFit2|SkyFit2]]''' page.

== FAQ ==

=== What should I back up when re-flashing an SD card or a USB disk? ===

: The .config, platepar and mask files that are in the RMS source directory, plus the whole contents of the hidden directory /home/pi/.ssh.

If your SD card or a USB disk fails or becomes corrupted, the config files can be fetched from the server as they are uploaded every day together with the data. However the contents of .ssh are essential for connection to the server, so you must also save these. Once you set up a new SD card or a USB disk, return the files in their original location.

=== What are the values in FTPdetectinfo_* file designated as hnr mle bin Pix/fm Rho Phi? ===

: Some of these values are not used in RMS (hnr mle bin), but they are in CAMS, so they are here to conform to the standard. Thus they are all zeros. The others are:

: - Pix/fm - Average angular speed of the meteor in pixels per frame.

: - Rho, Phi - Parameters that define the line of the meteor in polar coordinates, see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hough_transform#Theory here] for more details. Rho is the distance of the line from the centre of the image, and phi is the angle of the line as measured from the positive direction of the Y axis (basically a line going from the center of the image to the top of the image), the positive angles are measured clockwise (I think, the CAMS standard might define these parameters a bit differently, the Y axis is flipped).

: The intensity is the sum of all pixel intensities of the meteor on a given frame. Let's say I represent an area around the meteor on a given frame like this, where the numbers are pixel intensities on an 8-bit image (so they can range from 0 to 255):

: [[File:Intensity_sum.png |Intensity_sum.png ]]

: and the pixels values inside the red boundary represent the meteor blob on the frame, the intensity would be the sum of all numbers inside the red boundary.
: This value is later used to compute the magnitude. The magnitude is computed as: mag = -2.5*log10(intensity sum) + photometric_offset. The photometric offset is estimated in SkyFit by fitting the line with slope -2.5 through pairs of known magnitudes of stars and logartihms of their pixel intensity sum. The photometric offset is basically the intercept of that line. The constant slope of -2.5 comes from the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apparent_magnitude#Calculations definition of stellar magnitudes.]

== GMN data policy ==

The Global Meteor Network produces several levles of data products:
* Level 1 - The lowest level data (i.e. as close to "raw" as possible) are the FF image and FR video files saved to the RPi by the capture code and the fireball detector.
* Level 2 - The meteor detector uses these data to extract positional and brightness information of individual meteors (FTPdetectinfo file), and images are also used for astrometric and photometric calibration (platepar file). Meteor and star detections are used to generate a range of plots suchs as the single-station shower association graph, camera drift graph, etc. The calibrated meteors measurements get uploaded to the GMN server together with the raw images of individual meteors.
* Level 3 - The software on the server correlates individual observations and computes multi-station meteor trajectories which are published daily on the GMN [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ data website]. This data is made public under the [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ CC BY 4.0 license].

Operators of individual GMN stations exclusivery own the Level 1 and Level 2 data their stations produce. In practice, this means that they are free to share this data with other meteor networks if they wish to do so. The data that gets uploaded to the GMN server will not be shared publicly nor with other parties without the operator's consent, but may be used internally by the GMN coordinators to manually produce other data products (e.g. trajectory of a meteorite dropping fireball, analysis of a meteor shower). All station operators will be credited for their data in all GMN publications.

== IstraStream ==

=== [http://istrastream.com/rms-gmn/ IstraStream GMN status website] ===

: The IstraStream.com is an independent hosting site which is part of our world wide GMN. It is primarily a host for data from cameras sold by IstraStream, but other station operators can request that their data be included.
To enable the IstraStream upload, the <b>external_script_run</b>, <b>external_script_path</b>, and <b>reboot_after_processing</b> parameters have to be changed. This is how the config file should look:

<pre>
; External script
; An external script will be run after RMS finishes the processing for the night, it will be passed three arguments:
; captured_night_dir, archived_night_dir, config - captured_night dir is the full path to the captured folder of the night
; the second one is the archived, and config is an object holding the values in this config file.
; ---------------
; Enable running an external script at the end of every night of processing
external_script_run: true
; Run the external script after auto reprocess. "auto_reprocess" needs to be turned on for this to work.
auto_reprocess_external_script_run: false
; Full path to the external script
external_script_path: /home/pi/source/RMS/iStream/iStream.py
; Name of the function in the external script which will be called
external_function_name: rmsExternal

; Daily reboot
; ---------------
; Reboot the computer daily after the processing and upload is done
reboot_after_processing: false
</pre>

Then, send an e-mail to [mailto:info@istrastream.com info@istrastream.com] with your:
* Station_ID
* Location or Name (if not secret)
* Lens type/size

For example, "CA0001; Elginfield Observatory, Ontario, Canada; 4mm". The IstraStream crew will enable the weblog page within a few days.

Finally, this document explains what every plot on the IstraStream weblog means:

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/132aHGn0QPzhpVN2s2n6FT6rJn39LAsPkchWJqXQb8Qk/edit?usp=sharing IstraStream Plots Explanation] ===

== For More Information ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=43 Contact the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork Join the Global Meteor Network Forum] ===

=== [https://github.com/markmac99/ukmon-pitools/wiki UK Meteor Network Wiki]===
This wiki has numerous FAQs and tips on maintaining, monitoring and managing your system, and several explainers such as how to calibrate and create a mask, how to copy data and so forth.

=== GMN talks ===

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDdrG_FCyGk 2022 Global Meteor Network Meeting Session 1 (February, 2022)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_75CDPzjI4 2022 Global Meteor Network Meeting Session 2 (February, 2022)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6x9_WCVphY GMN talk at the European Space Agency's Fireball Workshop (June, 2021)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXBTLPnPDWs GMN Workshop (February, 2021)] - [https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ia9vagug5lxm8k9/AAB_i_1jcWThUdAHO_2gF_Ksa?dl=0 Link to slides]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Overview of the GMN - IMC2020 (September, 2020)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oM7lfQ4nmyw Overview of the GMN, Astro Imaging Channel presentation (May, 2020)]

=== GMN related publications ===

: [https://academic.oup.com/mnras/advance-article/doi/10.1093/mnras/stab2557/6368869 Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T., & Vida, D. (2021). Meteor shower radiant dispersions in Global Meteor Network data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2107.12335 Vida, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P. S., Brown, P. G., McIntyre, M. J., Dijkema, T. J., Pavletić, L., Kukić, P., Mazur, M.J., Eschman, P., Roggemans, P., Merlak, A., & Zubović, D. (2021). The Global Meteor Network–Methodology and first results. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 506(4), 5046-5074.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.05458/ Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T. D., & Vida, D. (2020). Realistic gravitational focusing of meteoroid streams. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 494(2), 2982-2994.]

: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Kukic-et-al-2018-Rolling-shutter.pdf Kukić, P., Gural, P., Vida, D., Šegon, D. & Merlak, A. (2018) Correction for meteor centroids observed using rolling shutter cameras. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46:5, 154-118.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_sun_skirter_final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Kukić, P., & Merlak, A. (2018). Compressive strength of a skirting Daytime Arietid-first science results from low-cost Raspberry Pi-based meteor stations. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 113-118.]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.02979.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - I. Theory. arXiv:1911.02979v4 [astro-ph.EP] 21 Apr 2020]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.11734.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - II. Results. arXiv:1911.11734v1 [astro-ph.EP] 26 Novr 2019]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_first_results-final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Zubović, D., Kukić, P., Parag, F., & Macan, A. (2018). First results of a Raspberry Pi based meteor camera system. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 71-78.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Vida_IMC2016_proceedings_final.pdf Vida, D., Zubović, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P., & Cupec, R. (2016). Open-source meteor detection software for low-cost single-board computers. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference (IMC2016), Egmond, The Netherlands (pp. 2-5).]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Zubovic_IMC2015_priceedings_final.pdf Zubović, D., Vida, D., Gural, P., & Šegon, D. (2015). Advances in the development of a low-cost video meteor station. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference, Mistelbach, Austria (pp. 27-30).]

Main Page

2023-03-01T15:25:47Z

Dvida: /* What do I need? */

Welcome to the Global Meteor Network's wiki page!

The Global Meteor Network (GMN) is a world wide organization of amateur and professional astronomers alike, whose goal is to observe the night sky using low-light video cameras and produce meteor trajectories in a coordinated manner. Here you will find information on the purpose and structure of the GMN, assembling and operating your own meteor camera, contributing to the development of RMS the GMN software, as well as information on how your observations as a citizen scientist can contribute to the further understanding of our solar system's formation and evolution.

'''<span style="color:red">If you have come here to find out how to build and setup a camera from scratch, jump ahead to [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#How_do_I_obtain_a_camera.3F this] section !</span>'''

== Global Meteor Network Overview ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=141 Our mission] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=363 A brief history of the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Video introduction - Overview of the Global Meteor Network (IMC2020)] ===

=== [https://youtu.be/oM7lfQ4nmyw Video overview - Meteor tracking and the GMN from Astro Imaging Channel presentation] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ Some 'live' GMN data products] ===

== Meteor Detection Station ==

=== What is an RMS GMN station? ===
: A RMS-based GMN station that is the subject of this Wiki consists of a Raspberry Pi (RPi) single board computer, a low light level security video camera, and the RMS software package. The camera is securely mounted in a weatherproof housing, pointed at the sky, and connected to the RPi with a POE (Power Over Ethernet) cable. The RPi is connected to the Internet via WiFi, and to be a part of GMN network, you’ll need a fairly powerful Raspberry Pi (RPi 3B+, RPi 4 or better) and a reasonably fast Internet connection. The internet connection is primarily required to enable data upload to a central server each morning as well as provide automatic updates for the RMS software.

: Nightly, the RPi starts recording video from the camera shortly after local sunset continuously compressing and storing the video data locally. Each morning before sunrise, after capture is complete, the RPi analyzes the video and extracts your nightly station’s meteor observations. These extracted video “clips” of detected meteors are then archived and uploaded to a server. The clips can total hundreds of megabytes on a “busy” night (e.g., in a heavy meteor shower, or a night with a lot of false detections--progress is being made on the detection software). The server finds meteors which were observed with more than one station and this enables the server to triangulate the meteor trails in 3D and calculate the orbits of the meteors.

===[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS/blob/master/README.md What do I need?] ===

You'll need a Raspberry Pi with the software on, and a camera kit. We strongly recommend the Pi4 model. The software will run on a Pi3 but it is much slower.

It is also possible to run multiple cameras on a Linux PC. More details [https://docs.google.com/document/d/16PSFi8RAqbenPdluhulCRaIenOkEzgs5piUhkX3yaOc/edit here].

=== How do I obtain a camera? ===
There are two options:

==== Buy a Camera ====
You can buy a camera and Pi prebuilt and ready to install. These are available from a couple of suppliers. The Croatian Meteor Network sell prebuilt cameras as explained on [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=136 this page]. Alternatively, if you're in the UK, you can obtain cameras from the [https://ukmeteornetwork.co.uk/ UK Meteor Network]

==== Build your own from scratch ====
This requires some basic DIY skills and some familiarity with the Raspberry PI, but don't be put off. The instructions are comprehensive and if you get stuck, you can ask for advice in the [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork groups.io] forum.

Click on this link if you want to '''[[Build_A_Camera|build a camera from scratch]]'''.

Once you've built the camera, You can '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#Flash_a_pre-built_image flash a Prebuilt image]''' onto an SD card to set up the Pi with the software required to capture meteors and upload data to the network. Although the primary choice for Raspberry Pi 4 is still a microSD card, you may wish to consider '''using a USB flash disk, USB-attached SSD or USB-attached HDD''' as a boot device. Click [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Booting_from_a_USB_device Booting from a USB device] to know more.

=== Can I use a commercial all-sky camera? ===

: Generally no due to the lack of sensitivity. [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=163 But see this recent experiment]

== Operating and maintaining your GMN station ==

=== Overview ===

: Please note that GMS is a nascent operation and you may share some growing pains if you choose to be involved -- we're still working out some bugs and making improvements here, which may be an opportunity to help if you have programming skills! ;-) So note that the workload of day-to-day operation can be non-zero, and might take a little bit of your time.

: Ideally, you'll want to monitor your RMS RPi system(s) daily to look for freezes or glitches or other problems... like birds nesting or soiling the camera window, people accidentally unplugging the power cord, mice (or cats or dogs!) chewing on the camera Ethernet cable, etc.

: Although we are getting close, this is not a "power up and forget about it" system yet.
: However, by its very nature, the GMS network is inhabited by a lot of people who are willing to help newcomers getting started. So, here are some clues for daily operation of your RMS camera.

=== So what does the meteor camera do over the course of 24 hours? ===

: The RMS Python based system calculates the sundown to sunrise interval and schedules video camera capture all night long. Depending on the video camera and capabilities of the RPi, the camera captures 25 or more frames per second between evening and morning twilight. During the continuous image capture, the station begins processing captured image data, doing a pre-screening to target frames with a suitable number of stars (usually around 20) that makes it worth looking for meteor detections. Once data capture has finished, the station switches into processing all the promising frames for detections, then refining the astrometric accuracy of every positive detection. Using the station platepar (plate parameters) calibration file, processing iterates to find the best astrometry and photometry solution for each detected meteor. Once this process has analyzed each detection, summary files are created.
: These summary files include text file data presentation in several widely accepted formats (CAMS and UFOorbit), as well as graphic plots of detection frequencies throughout the night, a set of thumbnail images of detections, a set of thumbnail images of data captured throughout the night, a single image with all detections stacked together, plots of photometry, astrometry, and camera pointing drift in arc minutes throughout the course of the night as the mount or building flexes, a flat file for correcting images, and a plot of all detections showing any identified radiants. Finally all results are combined into a single compressed archive, which is automatically uploaded each morning to the central server. Optionally, you can create a mp4 movie showing a time lapse of the night’s captured images.
: Each morning you can review the result files on the RPi, and copy anything you want to your computer or tablet.

===Archiving data ===

: Your primary scientific data is automatically uploaded to the central server every morning when data processing is done. However once it has done this, RMS will purge out the oldest data to free up space for the next night's run.

: So, you may want to copy some of the data to a PC, NAS or cloud for further analysis of your own. The data you should consider backing up are the contents of '''~/RMS_data/ArchivedFiles''', which holds the individual files and data that RMS determined were probably meteors. Full detail on how to nbare beyond the scope of the GMN Wiki, but tools such as robocopy (for Windows) and rsync(for Linux/MacOS) are ideal. These tools can 'mirror' data across a network. If you want help configuring these, ask in the Globalmeteornetwork group on groups.io.

: We've also built some automated tools that can help to back up any additional data to a thumb drive inserted into the RPi. Please ask in the group about these.

===Backup and restore configuration and RSA keys===

: Open a terminal and execute the command '''Scripts/RMS_Backup.sh'''. A compressed .zip file containing all important configuration files and keys will be created in user's home directory with the prefix RMS_Backup and .zip extension. Example: ''/home/pi/RMS_Backup_XX0001_2023-01-28.zip''.

: Copy the .zip file to a safe place outside RPi, it will be useful later to restore the system in case of failure. Note it contains the RSA public and private keys used to contact GMN servers, keep it secret.

: To restore the configuration, unzip the backup file in some folder on the RPi and copy the files '''.config''', '''platepar_cmn2010.cal''' and '''mask.bmp''' to the folder '''/home/pi/source/RMS/''', and the files '''id_rsa''' and '''id_rsa.pub'' to the folder ''/home/pi/.ssh/''' as in the following example:

:: cp .config platepar_cmn2010.cal mask.bmp /home/pi/source/RMS/
:: cp id_rsa id_rsa.pub /home/pi/.ssh/

: Make sure that RSA key files permission bits are correct by using the command:

:: chmod 400 ~/.ssh/id_rsa*

=== Viewing the data ===

: To view the data, you can use CMN_binViewer software[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer] which is already installed in the RMS SD image.
: There is also a Windows version[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer/releases] you can install.

: '''Important note''' : You can also open the images in astronomical FITS viewers such as FITS Liberator or Pixinsight, though the results may be surprising. For example in FITS Liberator, the image will be '''upside down'''. This is an artefact of how the software reads the image. In space, there's no 'up' or 'down' and so the FITS specification does not dictate whether the pixel (0,0) is at the bottom left or top left, or indeed one of the other corners. Some software, notably FITS Liberator, treats the top left as the origin and so terrestrial images will be displayed mirrored vertically.

=== Tools and Utilities ===

* [https://www.realvnc.com/en/connect/download/viewer/ RealVNC] or [https://anydesk.com/en AnyDesk] remote connect tool allows station access from anywhere. Access from outside your network is enabled by use of an OpenVPN connection address available to meteor stations. Alternatively, with VNC and Teamviewer, you can create an account and team on their websites, and then remotely access your station.
* Samba data directory access, allows you to copy data results directly from your RPi to your computer or tablet.
* [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer CMN_binViewer] can be used to view standard fits image files containing meteor detections. It runs on the RPi, and is also available under Windows.
* [https://sonotaco.com/soft/e_index.html UFO Orbit] allows you to process data from multiple stations and generate unified radiants of two or more stations seeing the same meteor. It can plot the shared object ground path, orbital characteristics, and can output a summary file of all objects seen by more than one station, which can be used for further analysis.
* RMS software can be installed under Windows to allow much of the RMS python-based code to be executed on your computer, so it can be run against meteor station data you have transferred to your computer from the RPi.
* You can run RMS Python jobs on the RPi to sample the image files captured all night long and condense them into a mp4 movie. This creates a sometimes mesmerizing summary that can run for over 2 minutes in length for winter time data.

== Configuring and installing your camera ==

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick start guide] ===

=== [[Focusing_your_camera | Focusing your IP camera]] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2sq1hBwcAA Video tutorial - Configuring your IMX291 IP camera] ===

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1TPotXcRstHz-XWIQYIW71xkRYy7Ca1UCoEiZsqdk9zw/edit?usp=sharing Different ways of connecting the camera] ===

== What can I do with my GMN station? ==

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOjb3qxDlX4 Video Tutorial - Using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration + Manually reducing observations of fireballs and computing their trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=310 Generating a Google Earth KML file to show your station's field of view] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=253 Using UFO Orbit program to estimate meteor trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=221 Urban meteor observing] ===

== RMS Software Installation ==

=== Flash a pre-built image ===

Pre-built Images are available with the RMS software pre-installed on Raspbian. Raspbian is the operating system typically used on the Raspberry Pi.

A 128 GB microSD card is preferred, although smaller 64 GB cards will also work. The image is flashed to the microSD card using the Etcher utility for Windows (32 or 64-bit), MacOS or Linux (64-bit), which can be found [https://www.balena.io/etcher/ here]

If you are considering using a USB flash disk, USB-attached SSD or USB-attached HDD as a boot device, click [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Booting_from_a_USB_device Booting from a USB device] to know more.

When you first boot up the Pi make sure you have a keyboard, monitor and mouse attached as you will be taken through a setup process by the RMS software.

The current publicly released images of RMS are:
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/sa9csd4m3jr1vqo/RMS_image_20191203.zip?dl=1 RPi3B+ ]
and
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/3pwwenty43dazq4/RMS_RPi4_image_20210626.zip?dl=1 RPi4 ].

Please see the [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick Start Guide] about how to flash them to an SD card.

Notes:
* The earlier versions of the Raspberry Pi, the 1 and 2, are not powerful enough to run RMS software.

* the pre-installed RMS software images incorporate an auto-updating feature, so that the RMS software is updated to the current release whenever your Raspberry Pi RMS is booted. This way, your station is always running the most recent set of updates.

* For installations into other Linux or windows environments, executing the command ''git pull'' will update to the most recent RMS release.

* The code was designed to run on a RPi, but it will also run an some Linux distributions. We have tested it on Linux Mint 18 and Ubuntu 16. For information on installing into other Linux releases, check portions of the section listed below for installing on RPi, and also check installation instructions found on [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS GitHub]

== [OPTIONAL] Install the software from scratch ==

'''Note: if you're setting up a Raspberry Pi you should use the prebuilt image as this comes with all necessary software installed and is ready to use.'''. If you really really '''really''' do want to install on the RPi from scratch, you can follow the instructions below:

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 4 ===

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/19ImeNqBTD1ml2iisp5y7CjDrRV33wBeF9rtx3mIVjh4/edit?usp=sharing here]

Install on a [[Pi4 with Raspbian Bullseye]]

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 3 ===

'''We no longer recommend the Pi3, as it doesn't have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers. '''

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ChaXx6WkuGfcQ_f5yRbwUOOMxEgIJrjq932UZE6cRjE/edit here].

=== Install for Linux ===

Detailed instructions [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Installation_for_Linux here]

=== Linux GUI and multi-Camera support ===

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/16PSFi8RAqbenPdluhulCRaIenOkEzgs5piUhkX3yaOc/edit?usp=sharing here]

=== Installation for Windows ===
Data capture does not work under windows. However you can use the other tools on your PC, where its much quicker to run SkyFit2 to calibrate your camera to the sky, or you want to use BatchFFToImage to convert data to jpeg format to share on Social Media.

Click '''[[Windows_Installation|here]]''' for detailed instructions. The instructions were tested on Windows 10 64-bit, but should work on any Windows version where git and Anaconda are available.

Aside: If you are a Windows whizz, please feel free to investigate why data capture doesn't work!

=== Installation for MacOS ===
As with Windows, installation for MacOS is useful if you want to analyse the data offline. If you do want to install it, please follow the instructions '''[[MacOS_Install | here]]'''.

== Data analysis with SkyFit2 ==

SkyFit2 is a program within the RMS library which supports analyzing optical meteor data in most optical formats that are in use today, including videos in any popular video format (mp4, avi, mkv), a sequence of static images, or a single image with shutter breaks.

This [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOjb3qxDlX4 video tutorial] explains how to using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration on GMN data and manually reduce observations of fireballs, including computing their trajectories.

A more general and detailed description of SkyFit2 is given at the '''[[SkyFit2|SkyFit2]]''' page.

== FAQ ==

=== What should I back up when re-flashing an SD card or a USB disk? ===

: The .config, platepar and mask files that are in the RMS source directory, plus the whole contents of the hidden directory /home/pi/.ssh.

If your SD card or a USB disk fails or becomes corrupted, the config files can be fetched from the server as they are uploaded every day together with the data. However the contents of .ssh are essential for connection to the server, so you must also save these. Once you set up a new SD card or a USB disk, return the files in their original location.

=== What are the values in FTPdetectinfo_* file designated as hnr mle bin Pix/fm Rho Phi? ===

: Some of these values are not used in RMS (hnr mle bin), but they are in CAMS, so they are here to conform to the standard. Thus they are all zeros. The others are:

: - Pix/fm - Average angular speed of the meteor in pixels per frame.

: - Rho, Phi - Parameters that define the line of the meteor in polar coordinates, see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hough_transform#Theory here] for more details. Rho is the distance of the line from the centre of the image, and phi is the angle of the line as measured from the positive direction of the Y axis (basically a line going from the center of the image to the top of the image), the positive angles are measured clockwise (I think, the CAMS standard might define these parameters a bit differently, the Y axis is flipped).

: The intensity is the sum of all pixel intensities of the meteor on a given frame. Let's say I represent an area around the meteor on a given frame like this, where the numbers are pixel intensities on an 8-bit image (so they can range from 0 to 255):

: [[File:Intensity_sum.png |Intensity_sum.png ]]

: and the pixels values inside the red boundary represent the meteor blob on the frame, the intensity would be the sum of all numbers inside the red boundary.
: This value is later used to compute the magnitude. The magnitude is computed as: mag = -2.5*log10(intensity sum) + photometric_offset. The photometric offset is estimated in SkyFit by fitting the line with slope -2.5 through pairs of known magnitudes of stars and logartihms of their pixel intensity sum. The photometric offset is basically the intercept of that line. The constant slope of -2.5 comes from the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apparent_magnitude#Calculations definition of stellar magnitudes.]

== GMN data policy ==

The Global Meteor Network produces several levles of data products:
* Level 1 - The lowest level data (i.e. as close to "raw" as possible) are the FF image and FR video files saved to the RPi by the capture code and the fireball detector.
* Level 2 - The meteor detector uses these data to extract positional and brightness information of individual meteors (FTPdetectinfo file), and images are also used for astrometric and photometric calibration (platepar file). Meteor and star detections are used to generate a range of plots suchs as the single-station shower association graph, camera drift graph, etc. The calibrated meteors measurements get uploaded to the GMN server together with the raw images of individual meteors.
* Level 3 - The software on the server correlates individual observations and computes multi-station meteor trajectories which are published daily on the GMN [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ data website]. This data is made public under the [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ CC BY 4.0 license].

Operators of individual GMN stations exclusivery own the Level 1 and Level 2 data their stations produce. In practice, this means that they are free to share this data with other meteor networks if they wish to do so. The data that gets uploaded to the GMN server will not be shared publicly nor with other parties without the operator's consent, but may be used internally by the GMN coordinators to manually produce other data products (e.g. trajectory of a meteorite dropping fireball, analysis of a meteor shower). All station operators will be credited for their data in all GMN publications.

== IstraStream ==

=== [http://istrastream.com/rms-gmn/ IstraStream GMN status website] ===

: The IstraStream.com is an independent hosting site which is part of our world wide GMN. It is primarily a host for data from cameras sold by IstraStream, but other station operators can request that their data be included.
To enable the IstraStream upload, the <b>external_script_run</b>, <b>external_script_path</b>, and <b>reboot_after_processing</b> parameters have to be changed. This is how the config file should look:

<pre>
; External script
; An external script will be run after RMS finishes the processing for the night, it will be passed three arguments:
; captured_night_dir, archived_night_dir, config - captured_night dir is the full path to the captured folder of the night
; the second one is the archived, and config is an object holding the values in this config file.
; ---------------
; Enable running an external script at the end of every night of processing
external_script_run: true
; Run the external script after auto reprocess. "auto_reprocess" needs to be turned on for this to work.
auto_reprocess_external_script_run: false
; Full path to the external script
external_script_path: /home/pi/source/RMS/iStream/iStream.py
; Name of the function in the external script which will be called
external_function_name: rmsExternal

; Daily reboot
; ---------------
; Reboot the computer daily after the processing and upload is done
reboot_after_processing: false
</pre>

Then, send an e-mail to [mailto:info@istrastream.com info@istrastream.com] with your:
* Station_ID
* Location or Name (if not secret)
* Lens type/size

For example, "CA0001; Elginfield Observatory, Ontario, Canada; 4mm". The IstraStream crew will enable the weblog page within a few days.

Finally, this document explains what every plot on the IstraStream weblog means:

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/132aHGn0QPzhpVN2s2n6FT6rJn39LAsPkchWJqXQb8Qk/edit?usp=sharing IstraStream Plots Explanation] ===

== For More Information ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=43 Contact the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork Join the Global Meteor Network Forum] ===

=== [https://github.com/markmac99/ukmon-pitools/wiki UK Meteor Network Wiki]===
This wiki has numerous FAQs and tips on maintaining, monitoring and managing your system, and several explainers such as how to calibrate and create a mask, how to copy data and so forth.

=== GMN talks ===

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDdrG_FCyGk 2022 Global Meteor Network Meeting Session 1 (February, 2022)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_75CDPzjI4 2022 Global Meteor Network Meeting Session 2 (February, 2022)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6x9_WCVphY GMN talk at the European Space Agency's Fireball Workshop (June, 2021)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXBTLPnPDWs GMN Workshop (February, 2021)] - [https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ia9vagug5lxm8k9/AAB_i_1jcWThUdAHO_2gF_Ksa?dl=0 Link to slides]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Overview of the GMN - IMC2020 (September, 2020)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oM7lfQ4nmyw Overview of the GMN, Astro Imaging Channel presentation (May, 2020)]

=== GMN related publications ===

: [https://academic.oup.com/mnras/advance-article/doi/10.1093/mnras/stab2557/6368869 Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T., & Vida, D. (2021). Meteor shower radiant dispersions in Global Meteor Network data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2107.12335 Vida, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P. S., Brown, P. G., McIntyre, M. J., Dijkema, T. J., Pavletić, L., Kukić, P., Mazur, M.J., Eschman, P., Roggemans, P., Merlak, A., & Zubović, D. (2021). The Global Meteor Network–Methodology and first results. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 506(4), 5046-5074.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.05458/ Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T. D., & Vida, D. (2020). Realistic gravitational focusing of meteoroid streams. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 494(2), 2982-2994.]

: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Kukic-et-al-2018-Rolling-shutter.pdf Kukić, P., Gural, P., Vida, D., Šegon, D. & Merlak, A. (2018) Correction for meteor centroids observed using rolling shutter cameras. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46:5, 154-118.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_sun_skirter_final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Kukić, P., & Merlak, A. (2018). Compressive strength of a skirting Daytime Arietid-first science results from low-cost Raspberry Pi-based meteor stations. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 113-118.]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.02979.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - I. Theory. arXiv:1911.02979v4 [astro-ph.EP] 21 Apr 2020]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.11734.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - II. Results. arXiv:1911.11734v1 [astro-ph.EP] 26 Novr 2019]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_first_results-final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Zubović, D., Kukić, P., Parag, F., & Macan, A. (2018). First results of a Raspberry Pi based meteor camera system. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 71-78.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Vida_IMC2016_proceedings_final.pdf Vida, D., Zubović, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P., & Cupec, R. (2016). Open-source meteor detection software for low-cost single-board computers. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference (IMC2016), Egmond, The Netherlands (pp. 2-5).]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Zubovic_IMC2015_priceedings_final.pdf Zubović, D., Vida, D., Gural, P., & Šegon, D. (2015). Advances in the development of a low-cost video meteor station. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference, Mistelbach, Austria (pp. 27-30).]

SkyFit2

2023-02-21T15:57:51Z

Dvida:

= SkyFit2 Anatomy =

This section describes the various physical features of the SkyFit2 GUI.

== SkyFit Mode ==

=== Image Display & Levels ===

[[File:WikiImgDisplay.png]]

=== Fit Parameters Tab ===

[[File:WikiFitParams.png]]

=== Settings Tab ===

[[File:WikiSettingsTab.png]]

== ManualReduction Mode ==

=== Image Display & Levels ===

[[File:WikiImgDisplay2.png]]

=== Settings Tab ===

[[File:WikiSettingsTab2.png]]

= Create or Upgrade a Plate with SkyFit2 =

This page seeks to walkthrough how to create a new plate or upgrade an old plate using RMS' Sky``Fit2 GUI.

== Getting Started ==

To run SkyFit2, first install the RMS git repository and environment. Then run the command

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 INPUT_PATH [-c/--config CONFIG_PATH][-t/--timebeg TIME][-f/--fps FPS][-g/--gamma GAMMA]

This opens the Sky``Fit2 GUI with whatever data is in the directory specified by "INPUT_PATH". Alternatively, can also be a path to a video file or a state file. Make sure to customize the config file to the proper specifications before running this program. The most common options are detailed below:

* Config: Path to the directory containing the appropriate .config file. Default to the DETECTION_PATH.
* Timebeg: Beginning time of the detection in YYYYMMDD_hhmmss.uuuuuu format.
* Fps: Frames per second when images are used. This option overrides the framerate given in from the config file.
* Gamma: Camera gamma value (typically 0.45 or 1.0). This option overrides the framerate read in from the config file

Upon opening, a request for a plate (platepar .cal file) will occur. If you wish to update a plate, select this here. If you wish to make a new plate, simply close this window.

=== Using RMS data ===

Collect the desired data in a directory (e.g. /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY). The directory should contain an FF and an FR file if you're reducing a fireball. Make sure to also copy the required .config file and the platepar_cmn2010.cal if present.

Then run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY --config . --fr

This will load the given data files.

=== Using FRIPON data ===

FRIPON data are usually given as a bunch of individual frames in a FITS format. It is very important that all files have a .fit extension (not .fits). SkyFit2 will automatically read the header and download the station coordinates, so you don't have to specify a config file. If the data are in /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY, simply run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY

=== Using GFO/DFN data ===

DFN data are given as .NEF files in the raw Nikon format. To load a GFO image in SkyFit, you will need a dfnstation.cfg file which is usually present on the system. Copy both a .NEF image and the dfnstation.cfg in a standalone directory called e.g. /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY.

Then run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY --config .

SkyFit will ask you to choose the .NEF file.

Properly calibrating and reducing GFO data can be a bit tricky. The recommended procedure is the following:

* Take a calibration image (the one with the nominally longer exposure) and put it in a separate "calib" directory. Make sure that lots of stars are visible and that there are at least a few very close to the horizon.
* Fit a radial plate (starting with radial3-odd, then fit a radial5-odd, finishing with a radial7-odd), with the asymmetry correction and equal aspect turned on. Set the extinction scale to 0.6 and turn off a fixed vignetting coefficient option. When happy with the fit, hit CTRL + S to save and close SkyFit.
* Prepare the fireball data in another directory and copy the platepar file from the calib directory. The data images have a shorter exposure, so fewer stars are visible. In the previous step, you fit the pointing and the distortion coefficients - because the lens is the same the distortion coefficients remain the same, but the pointing can drift over time. You need to re-calibrate on 10-20 stars but select the "Only fit pointing option".
* Switch to the ManualReduction mode and start picking. Because the timing is encoded using a de Brujin sequence, the fireball consists of dots and gaps (1s and 0s). Start with an obvious dot, clicking it with your mouse. A red cross will appear. Advance to the next point ("frame") by pressing a right arrow key on your keyboard (note that the frame counter will increase). If the next point is a gap, select it with ALT + CLICK (or NUM0 + CLICK) - this will show up as a yellow cross. Keep going until you select all, and you can go back with a left arrow key in case you missed any. It is very important that the order of selected points is correct. Once you've selected about 10-20 points, switch to the Debrujin tab and click "Check sequence". This will try to find a unique solution for the time, but you might be offered with several options. You can choose one if you know the time, or close it and pick a few more points and try again.
* If you want to do photometry, the background needs to be subtracted before pixel colouring is possible. Use a .NEF image that was taken just before or after the fireball as a dark frame by hitting CTRL + D and selecting the file.

=== Using arbitrary video data ===

If you are using a video from e.g. a security camera in either a .avi, .mp4, or in a .mov format, you will need to make a custom configuration file and know the absolute time of the first frame.

First, copy the .config file from the RMS source directory to the directory with the video and rename it with the name of the station (we'll use "London" as the station name), e.g. london.config. Then open this file and change the following entries:

stationID: London
latitude: 51.500761 ; WGS84 +N (degrees) - Use at least 5 decimal places and measure in Google Earth as accurately as possible
longitude: -0.124585 ; WGS84 +E (degrees)
elevation: 20 ; mean sea level EGM96 geoidal datum, not WGS84 ellipsoidal (meters)

...

width: 1280 ; Set the video resolution
height: 720
fps: 25.0 ; frames per second

...

; Approx. horizontal Field-of-view in degrees
fov_w: 87
; Approx. vertical Field-of-view in degrees
fov_h: 45

; Deinterlacing -2 = global shutter, -1 = rolling shutter, 0 = even first, 1 = odd first
deinterlace_order: -1

...

star_catalog_file: BSC5 ; This sets a star catalog with bright stars

...

catalog_mag_limit: 4.0 ; Security cameras usually can't see stars fainter than this, but you can always adjust this later

Then given the absolute UTC time of the first frame in the YYYYMMDD_hhmmss.uuuuuu format (e.g. 20230214_021629.0) and the path to the video file (e.g. /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY/video.mp4), run:

python -m Utils.SkyFit2 /PATH/TO/DATA/DIRECTORY/video.mp4 --config . --timebeg 20230214_021629.0

== Creating a Plate ==

*NOTE: When entering hotkey commands in SkyFit2, you must be in the main frame/viewer.

Adjust the levels on the right as required or automatically set them by pressing ctrl+A. Once you are happy, begin to rotate the catalog stars into an approximately correct position using your keyboard. A/D control the azimuth, S/W control the altitude, Q/E control the position angle, and Up/Down controls the scale. Don't worry about getting them exactly, just get them close enough to the image for the program to associate the observed stars with the catalog stars when manually picking.

To enter star picking mode, press ctrl+R. This should bring up an annulus around your reticle, whose size you can control by holding ctrl and scrolling with the mouse wheel. To pick a star, click on the star and the program should automatically snap the point to the centroid. If you are unhappy with its choice, you can force the centroid position by holding ctrl and clicking. The position will appear as an orange cross. Your pick of star will automatically associate with the nearest catalog star (which will be filled with a blue X). If you wish to choose a different catalog star, simply click this again and notice as the blue X switches. To accept a pair, press Enter or Space.

Once you have a centroided a number of stars (minimum 5 to adjust pointing, 12 to adjust distortion), you can fit the plate by clicking "Fit Parameters">"Fit" on the sidebar or ctrl+Z. The green numbers that appear are the star magnitudes and the white numbers are the magnitude errors. The bars represent the fitting errors (magnitude and direction). This will print a residual table to the console, as well as the average error and FOV.

Under the "Fit Parameters" tab, there are several options to adjust to improve your astrometry. The refraction correction should be checked for all camera. If the camera is older and does not have square pixels, uncheck equal aspect. If you suspect that the lens is not completely flat with the sensor (nearly always), check the asymmetry correction. The older distortion models are the poly3+radial models. It is preferable to use the radial-odd models as they do not require stars in all parts of the field to accurately model the distortion. To see which you should use, begin with the lowest order model and check the astrometry residuals by clicking "Fit Parameters">"Astrometry" or by pressing the L key. If there is structure to the residuals, then increase the order until the structure disappears.

Fixed vignetting should only be enabled for cameras with well-measured vignetting. This is preferable to the modeled vignetting parameter, but unless it has been measured in the lab or under controlled conditions it will worsen the photometry fit. Extinction values also typically vary between 0.6 and 1.0 and should be measured on a per-camera basis. Both of these effects increase with distance from the center of the lens, as can be seen by clicking "Fit Parameters">"Photometry" or by pressing the P key. Adjust the extinction until it follows the downward curved line.

After creating a plate, it can be useful to remove high residual error stars. You can filter stars by adjusting "Settings">"Filter Mag Err". Manual add and remove stars until you obtain a fit you are satisfied with. You can check the RMSD to get an idea of how good the fit is.

Build A Camera

2023-02-19T00:18:53Z

Dvida: /* Sensor */

= Parts and Tools needed =
[[File:01_annotated.jpg|thumb|right|Annotated Parts List]]

Click on the image to the right to see a larger version with the parts labelled

# IMX291 sensor board
# Lens with the lens holder - 4mm, 6mm are M16 mount as pictured, while other lenses might be CS which have a different holder
# 2x M2 screws, 6mm long - for mounting lens holder
# Camera housing
# Small cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Large cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Camera Power over Ethernet (PoE) cable (sometimes called a network cable by the sellers)
# Camera board holder (supplied with the housing)
# Holder metal plate (supplied with the housing)
# 4x M2 screws, 12 mm long - for mounting camera module to bracket
# 1x M3-.50 screw, 6mm long - for mounting camera module L-bracket to base plate
# Metal plate screws (supplied with the housing)
# Transparent weatherproof silicone
# Housing mounting bracket (supplied with the housing)
# Waterproof ethernet cable protector
# PoE injector to supply 48v to the camera (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi 4 Model B 2GB (or at least a 3B+ with 2GB) with official power supply (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi housing (not shown)
# 128 GB or greater microSD card (not shown)
# Self-amalgamating tape (not shown)

== Purchasing Parts ==
For consistency across the network and to make collaborative support possible, it is recommended that the camera and lenses listed below are used in preference to random handy bits that are cobbled together. The selected components are proven and known to work well. Other components can be sourced from any convenient seller.

Many components such as the Pi and microSD cards are are readily available in most locations. For other items such as lens, camera and housing, AliExpress - the Chinese equivalent of eBay - is the preferred online source as it serves most of the globe and has been reliably suppling parts to date.

NB: Links are given to current sellers, but stock levels vary and if the link is dead or the seller is out of stock, you should be able to find an equivalent from another seller on AliExpress.

=== Sensor ===
The bare IP security camera featuring a Sony IMX291 has been selected for the RMS system. This is available from many sellers on AliExpress. Out of the options offered, choose "With 48V POE cable" and "No lens":
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002315913099.html IVG-HP203Y-AE]
Always buy a lens separately from the list in the following section.

We used to recommend the IMX307 sensor, but their quality appears to vary even if they're purchased from the same vendor. Some cameras perform well, but some apply too much video processing, making the data virtually useless.

=== Lens ===
Most cameras available on Aliexpress come with a choice of lenses. The preferred lens is a 4mm f/0.95 M16 lens providing ~88x45° field of view, which can also be bought separately for example via this link.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32876034491.html 4mm f/0.95 M16]

If you live in an area with heavy light pollution, other options are available. We wholeheartedly recommend only using lenses from the following list, as others might not be as sensitive or might have large distortion. See [[Lens Options|this page]] for more lens options.

=== Housing ===
A security camera housing is used, providing weather-tight protection without distortion introduced by plastic domes. From the options offered, select "Plate and Bracket" to get a plate for mounting a 38x38mm bare IP camera module, and an L-shaped mounting bracket.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32355130687.html IP66 CCTV Camera Housing with Plate and Bracket] This will also provide a pair of cable glands and some essential screws.

=== Power Over Ethernet Injector ===
This connects by network cables to both the Raspberry Pi and the camera sensor, and injects 48V DC onto the network cable to the camera to supply it with power. Pick a suitable plug style for your location from the options offered. An example unit is:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002704227705.html PoE Injector 48V 0.5A]

Note that over short lengths of up to about 5m you can also use plain PoE connectors. These simply feed 12V from a power supply into the ethernet and extract it at the other end. Over short distances this will supply the camera with adequate power without the need for 48V injectors.

Finally, if you are operating several cameras, you can use a PoE switch instead of a PoE injector.

=== Cooled Housing for Raspberry Pi ===
This is one of the rare cases that fulfills our needs. It has a fan which is relatively quiet, it’s sturdy, and it can fit the RTC with the addition of riser pins. '''Please buy this case''', we have tried many others, but they are not as good. From the options offered, make sure you select one that says "for Pi 4" if you are using a Raspberry Pi 4, or "for Pi 3B Plus" if you are using a Raspbery Pi 3B+. Additionally there is a case variation that is fully enclosed and has no fans; do not select this option.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32959825297.html Raspberry Pi Aluminium Enclosure with fans]

=== Real Time Clock for Raspberry Pi ===
[[File:rtc.jpg|thumb|RTC installation|200px]]

Very precise timing is essential to processing the meteor data, so unless you are confident in your internet connection an RTC module ensures the Raspberry Pi always has the precise time, even when power or internet is unreliable. AliExpress sells a pack of 10 but they are inexpensive - maybe share the extras among other camera constructors in your area. The AliExpress store lists two RTC modules, one labelled "DS3231 module" and the other "mini DS3231 module." Select the "mini DS3231 module" option; it is designed for the Raspberry Pi. It has 5 pins and includes a battery.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32770348851.html DS3231 RTC]

Once you plug it into the Pi (see image on the right) and make sure the current time is correct on the Pi, open the terminal and run:

<pre>
sudo hwclock -w
</pre>

This will set the current computer time to the RTC. Every time the Pi boots up, it will read the correct time from the RTC.

=== Pin Headers ===
Required to raise the height of the Raspberry GPIO bins to allow the RTC to sit proud of the Raspberry Pi case. You only need 1 but the pack of 20 is available for only a dollar or so.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32549850046.html Tall header pins]

=== Network cabling ===
You will need two lengths of network cabling, one (probably quite short) between the Raspberry Pi and the PoE injector and the other between the PoE injector and the camera. You can purchase suitable lengths locally or on AliExpress. Some people have found the following thin flat network cable to be useful for sneaking the wire through a window or door to avoid drilling holes in walls or eaves, although it will require some extra attention to seal the cable at the camera's PoE connector:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002311509668.html Cat6 Flat Ethernet Cable]

=== Waterproof Cable Connector ===
One end of the network cable will be outside, connected into the PoE cable from the camera. This is not only carrying data but 48V DC power and needs to be kept sealed. This waterproof connector is fitted over the end of the network cable connector then after the network cable is plugged into the camera's PoE cable, the connector is locked into the end of the PoE cable. For extra weatherproofing, wrap in self-amalgamating tape.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32834472563.html RJ45 Waterproof Connector Cap]

=== 128GB Micro SD Card ===
You need at least a 64GB card but a 128GB is recommended as 20+ GB of data is collected every night. Make sure it is a fast card eg Class 10 UHS-1 or better. A card can either be purchased locally or [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32676225311.html from AliExpress]. Be warned that there is an [https://photographylife.com/fake-memory-cards ongoing problem with the production and sale of fraudulent memory cards misreporting the available storage] and even supplies from a reputable outlet can be affected - test the card you purchase. The AliExpress link has been used successfully to obtain suitable micro SD cards. If you live in North America, buy your SD cards at Costco.

=== Raspberry Pi 4 ===
These are likely to be available to be purchased locally or from a domestic online source. You need at least a 2GB RAM model. The Raspberry Pi Model 4B is now the minimum spec. Previously, a Raspberry Pi Model 3B+ was considered the minimum but these do not have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers. Purchase the official 5.1V 3A 15.3W power supply to go with it - most problems with Raspberry Pi units are due to inadequate power supplies being used instead of purchasing the official power pack. Note: to connect a RPi 4B to a monitor you will also need a micro-HDMI cable, so that might be necessary to add to the shopping cart also.

=== Additional items and tools ===
* Source suitable M2 and M3 screws. It might be possible to find these locally but in some places they are just odd enough to be quite hard to find. You could order some hardware from the [https://www.aliexpress.com/store/4714020?spm=a2g0o.detail.1000007.1.5fc666d9tN1f8i ScrewHome Store] on AliExpress. Each [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32981714992.html?spm=a2g0o.store_pc_groupList.8148356.10.be65539dLjPgfh packet of 50 M2x6mm, M2x12mm, and M3x6mm] machine screws will cost only a few dollars.
* A tube of silicone sealant is used to seal the glass window for the housing and the front screws in the housing.
* Self-amalgamating tape can be used to wrap and seal the cable connector(s) to ensure they remain weathertight in all conditions.
* Tools such as small wire cutters or a sharp knife, various sized screwdrivers, a drill and screws to mount the camera bracket will be required.

Deprecated shopping list: [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1XBSdrkwrOGPONIn5PBJ7YzH2vr7pUIxW3l8S62BQXEQ/edit LINK]

Some cameras come with a slightly different cable with a separate 12V socket for power input as shown [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/images/d/dc/Alternatecable.jpg here].
If the power input port has a small cap, then you can just cover it and use the PoE on the ethernet port. If it's open, then you will need a pair of PoE adapters (seen in that picture in the background).

To test and focus the camera you will need VLC. This software is preinstalled on the Pi but is also available for Mac, Windows or Linux from [https://www.videolan.org/vlc/ here].

= Assembly =
[Note: there's a longer version of the camera assembly section of this page available on Google Docs. Please refer to [https://docs.google.com/document/d/18TT-Jm7z9kYskl5ua07jQWD91OiyBemBnOosiNdW6nY/edit?usp=sharing this] if you need more information.]

<table><tr><td>
== Preparing the Lens ==
[[File:Irblock.jpg|thumb|right|single filter: punch out the filter]]
* Start by removing protective covers from the sensor and lens. Take care not to touch the sensor after this is removed.

* The cameras come with an IR Block filter in the lens holder. We don't want this.

'''Lens holder with single filter'''
* If you have a lens like the one shown in the first image, unscrew the lens from the holder.
* Then using a screwdriver, carefully push the filter out of the lens holder as shown in the image on the right. If you push from the front, the filter may come out intact.
* If it shatters, make sure there are no shards left.

'''Lens holder with electronic filter drawer'''
* Some lenses come an electronic day/night filter drawer. These have a small cable to plug into the camera board. Two different types of these filter holders are shown here.
[[File:lensholders2.jpg|thumb|right|Two sorts of lens holder with day/night filters]]

* DO NOT try to punch out the filter directly as this may jam the mechanism or leave shards of glass inside.
* If your holder is the type with a rectangular sliding drawer, remove the drawer by undoing the screw on the end. Then remove the while filter glass entirely.
[[File:slidedrawer.jpg|thumb|right|Sliding type: Remove the filter entirely]]

* If your holder is the other type, undo the three small screws on the top and take off the cover. Then remove the clear filter. You can leave the reddish daylight filter.
[[File:rotatingfilter.jpg|thumb|right|Rotating type: Remove just the clear filter]]

* Now reassemble the filter holder. Do not connect the power cable to the camera.

* Next look on the underside of the lens holder where you will see two plastic nubbins. These get in the way, so using the wire cutters snip them off. Make sure you get the base completely flat.

* Then screw the lens back into the lens holder.
</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Attaching the Lens to the Camera ==
[[File:lensattaching.jpg|thumb|right|Attaching the Lens]]

* Carefully unclip the circuit board from the plastic holder but do not detach the ribbon cable.

* Using the supplied screws, attach the lens to the sensor.

* Replace the circuit board in the plastic holder.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

= Preparing the Camera Housing =
[[File:glands.jpg|thumb|right|Glands in Place]]
* Fit the small cable gland to the housing and pass the loose ends of the Camera PoE cable up through, but don't tighten it up yet. Remember to slip the cap over the cable first!

* Fit the large cable gland in the other opening, and push a piece of plastic packing foam into it. Don't seal it up completely though this is to keep insects from getting in, but allow moisture out.

* We do not recommend that you put the whole cable inside the housing, as the LEDs on it will create light pollution inside the housing.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>
== Attaching the Camera ==
[[File:camerafitted.jpg|thumb|right|Camera In Mount]]

'''Note: I recommend installing the camera in the housing at this point so that you do not have to detach the cables or risk knocking focus later on. However, you can proceed to test focus etc before installing the camera in the housing if you wish.''' If you prefer to do that, skip this section for now and come back later. Otherwise:

* Connect the metal camera holder to the metal plate using one 6mm M3 screw. Note the orientation of the plate as shown in the photo.

* Using three 12 mm M2 screws, connect the camera board to the metal holder, passing the lens through the square hole from the back.

* Note that on some camera models, the writing on the camera board or image of a stick man must be UPSIDE DOWN to get the correct orientation of the camera. In this orientation, the sockets for power and networking will be at the bottom of the rear of the camera board. To be sure you have it the right way up, see advice in the section on Testing and Focusing.

* Finally, remove the plastic cap on the lens.
See image for the proper camera board orientation, so the video is not sideways or upside down.
</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Installing the Camera in the Housing ==
[[File:camerainhousing.jpg|thumb|right|Camera In Housing]]

* Remove the plastic plate from inside the housing and discard it.

* Fit the camera on its metal plate into the housing, as close to the front glass as you can get it without actually touching. A few millimetres away should be good.

* Looking at the camera from the rear, attach the largest connector (often with blue/green wires) to the right hand socket.

* Attach the power connector to the left hand socket. This connector has several pins but only two are connected (red/black).

* The third connector (two pins, red/black) is for a powered lens and is not used so tape it back out of the way.

* Once you've secured the camera in position, you can tighten up the cable glands.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

= Testing and Focusing =
At this point, your camera must be tested and focused. There's no point sealing up the housing and screwing it to the wall if its not working or isn't focused !

== Testing the Camera ==
* If your camera came with a single PoE cable, connect this to a netork cable and plug the other end of the network cable into your PoE injector.

* if your camera came with a cable with separate network and power sockets, plug the "output" PoE adapter into the camera cable and plug a network cable into the PoE adapter, then connect the other end of the network cable into the other PoE adapter.
*. Connect the PoE adapter or injector into a spare socket on your home router and connect the camera power supply to it.

The Camera PoE cable lights should come on, indicating traffic is flowing. After a few seconds, it should steady down to irregular flashing. If you don't see flashing lights then check the cable connections to make sure everything is plugged in properly.

=== Find its IP Address ===
[[File:ip-scan.jpg|thumb|right|Finding the Camera Address]]
The camera should now appear as a device on your network and to test it properly you will need to find its IP Address. The easiest way to do this is using a free piece of software called [[https://www.advanced-ip-scanner.com/|Advanced IP Scanner]]. Download and run it (no need to install). Click "Scan" and wait till it finishes. The camera can usually be identified by Manufacturer 'ICP Internet Communications' or 'Motion Control Systems', though other vendor names are possible such as 'Koenig & Bauer AG' and 'Metrohm AG'. If none of the names look right you may need to experiment by trying to connect to each candidate in turn.

=== Checking the Connection ===
[[File:vlcconfig.jpg|thumb|right|VLC Network Stream]]
* Once you have the IP Address, open VLC on your Pi, Mac or Windows machine, and from the "Media" menu, select "Open Network Stream".

* Enter the following into the address box, replacing '''1.2.3.4''' with the address you got in the previous step

<blockquote>rtsp://'''1.2.3.4''':554/user=admin&password=&channel=1&stream=0.sdp</blockquote>

* After a second or two, you should get a view through the camera. If nothing comes up, check you have got the right IP address, and that the cables are secure.

* You can now double-check that you installed the camera the right way up.
If the image is upside down in VLC, turn it through 180 degrees in the housing. do '''not''' be tempted to use firmware settings to flip or mirror the image. These cameras have a 'rolling' shutter and to work out precise timings of meteors, the RMS software compensates for the shutter movement. If the camera is upside down and the image then flipped, the shutter is working in the opposite direction to that expected by RMS and timings will be wrong. You '''must''' physically rotate the camera.

* Note that its entirely normal for the image to be very red and overexposed in daylight. We've removed the IR Block filter so the camera picks up a lot of red light. This is exactly what we want.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Checking for Obstructions ==
[[File:vlcview.jpg|thumb|right|Obstructions]]
* Temporarily close the housing case up and check if it can be seen obstructing the view anywhere.

* Move the camera around on the mount to minimise the obstructions, and if necessary bend or tilt the bracket to angle the camera down a bit.

* However, don't worry if you can't eliminate all obstructions. Later on you will create a software mask to prevent these areas causing false detections.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Focusing the Camera ==

There's a whole separate section of the Wiki on [[Focusing_your_camera|focusing]], but here's the short version !!
* connect the camera to your network as above.
* Open VLC.
* Aim the camera at something at around 30-50 metres away.
* Screw the lens in and out slowly to get best focus.

You can usually do an initial focus with the camera assembled on a desk. Point it out a window during the hours of darkness and focus on a building at least 50m away.

You can do this using the RMS utility ShowLivestream instead of VLC, if you have already fully configured the camera and Pi as explained in the next step.

Note that there's a short lag due to the network, so you should wait a second or two after each adjustment to allow the change to be reflected in VLC.

Important note: if your camera came with an electronic filter, and you have left the 'daytime' filter in place you MUST finalise focus at night. The filters slightly alter focus.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Setting Camera Parameters ==
To operate at night, the camera must be reset to the correct gain, colour mode and video mode. There are two ways you can do this:

=== Using the CMS Software ===
<table>
* If you have a Pi3, you will currently have to use CMS.
* CMS is a security camera software package you can [https://learncctv.com/download-cms-software/ download] from the internet. You can use the software as explained in [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2sq1hBwcAA this] video by Denis Vida.
* Note however that you should reset the network as the LAST thing you do. The video does it a bit soon.
</table>

=== Using the RMS software ===
[[File:Ping-camera.JPG|thumb|right|Making sure the Pi can see the Camera]]

'''Note that all RMS scripts MUST be run from the source/RMS folder as the Pi user. Don't be tempted to cd into a different folder! It won't work.'''

* If you have a Pi4, you can use a utility that's part of RMS, as follows:

* If you're not using the pre-built image, first install RMS on the Pi as explained [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#RMS_Software_Installation here].

* Now plug the camera into your router, open a Terminal window on the Pi and, using the address of your camera, make sure the Pi can ping the camera:
<pre>ping a.b.c.d</pre>
If you get any errors or timeouts, check the camera IP address, and check that the Pi is connected to your home network.

* Next open a terminal window and run this script to reset the camera IP address.
<pre> python -m Utils.SetCameraAddress a.b.c.d 192.168.42.10</pre>
* You will lose connection to the camera and see a bunch of error messages. Thats normal. Once you see a timeout message, unplug the power and network from the camera.

* Now plug the camera directly into the Pi's ethernet port, open a Terminal window and run the following script to update the camera gain, video mode, and other settings.
[[File:Setting-camer-params.JPG|thumb|right|Setting Camera Params]]
<pre>Scripts/RMS_SetCameraParams.sh</pre>

* Note: If you have RMS installed on your PC then you can change the camera address from your PC instead, then connect it to the Pi and run the 2nd script.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

= Final Steps =
== Sealing the Housing ==
[[File:sealedhousing.jpg|thumb|right|Sealing the Housing]]
Depending on your climate, its usually advisable to seal up the camera housing against rain and snow.

From the outside, carefully go round the edge of the glass with silicone sealant. Also squirt sealant into any screw holes visible on the front of the camera housing, where it will be most exposed to rain.

But DONT seal up the hinged door because you will occasionally need to maintain the camera, and you don't want to have to prise it open with a chisel!

If there are any cable connections outside the casing, you should also seal these up thoroughhly. This writer can attest to the damage caused by water ingress into a PoE connector! Tape up or seal the connections tightly with some sort of waterproof product (I used electrical tape), but remember you may need to change the cable, so don't seal it irreversibly.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>
== Mounting Outside ==
Mount the camera somewhere with a good view of the sky and without too many 'terrestrial' obstructions such as trees, hills and buildings. Take special care to angle well away from security lights. These lights emit infrared and without the IR Block filter, the IMX cameras are extremely sensitive to this.

When locating the camera, bear in mind that you will need to be able to get to the camera to maintain it. The cameras do not need to be high up as long as they have a good view of the sky. Mine are at eye-level on my observatory shed.

As before, don't worry if its not practical to eliminate all obstructions as you can mask off any that can't be avoided.

=== Aiming the Camera ===
[[file:cameraview.jpg|thumb|right|Aiming the Camera]]
The cameras have a field of about 40-45 degrees vertically and 90 degrees horizontally so angle the camera upwards at between 35-45 degrees, higher if you have lots of nearby hills or trees. This should maximise meteor detection.

If you can arrange so that the camera view overlaps with other RMS users, thats even better. Check with the network to get an idea of a good direction.

In this photo, the camera is aimed up at about 40 degrees, just above the top of the hill behind the camera location. The parts of the hill that are visible will be masked off in the software to avoid 'meteor-wrongs' due to dog-walkers with head torches!
</td></tr></table>

= Thats it! =
Once the camera is installed, connect up the PoE adapter, attach a long network cable and run it to wherever you are going to keep the Raspberry Pi. Remember to ask permission before drilling holes in the walls... :)

= Now install the Software =
Now you can finish configuring the Raspberry Pi by installing a prebuilt image. This is covered in a separate guide [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#RMS_Software_Installation here].

Build A Camera

2023-02-19T00:18:40Z

Dvida: /* Sensor */

= Parts and Tools needed =
[[File:01_annotated.jpg|thumb|right|Annotated Parts List]]

Click on the image to the right to see a larger version with the parts labelled

# IMX291 sensor board
# Lens with the lens holder - 4mm, 6mm are M16 mount as pictured, while other lenses might be CS which have a different holder
# 2x M2 screws, 6mm long - for mounting lens holder
# Camera housing
# Small cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Large cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Camera Power over Ethernet (PoE) cable (sometimes called a network cable by the sellers)
# Camera board holder (supplied with the housing)
# Holder metal plate (supplied with the housing)
# 4x M2 screws, 12 mm long - for mounting camera module to bracket
# 1x M3-.50 screw, 6mm long - for mounting camera module L-bracket to base plate
# Metal plate screws (supplied with the housing)
# Transparent weatherproof silicone
# Housing mounting bracket (supplied with the housing)
# Waterproof ethernet cable protector
# PoE injector to supply 48v to the camera (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi 4 Model B 2GB (or at least a 3B+ with 2GB) with official power supply (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi housing (not shown)
# 128 GB or greater microSD card (not shown)
# Self-amalgamating tape (not shown)

== Purchasing Parts ==
For consistency across the network and to make collaborative support possible, it is recommended that the camera and lenses listed below are used in preference to random handy bits that are cobbled together. The selected components are proven and known to work well. Other components can be sourced from any convenient seller.

Many components such as the Pi and microSD cards are are readily available in most locations. For other items such as lens, camera and housing, AliExpress - the Chinese equivalent of eBay - is the preferred online source as it serves most of the globe and has been reliably suppling parts to date.

NB: Links are given to current sellers, but stock levels vary and if the link is dead or the seller is out of stock, you should be able to find an equivalent from another seller on AliExpress.

=== Sensor ===
The bare IP security camera featuring a Sony IMX291 has been selected for the RMS system. This is available from many sellers on AliExpress. Out of the options offered, choose "With 48V POE cable" and "No lens":
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002315913099.html IVG-HP203Y-AE]
Always buy a lens separately from the list in the following section.
We used to recommend the IMX307 sensor, but their quality appears to vary even if they're purchased from the same vendor. Some cameras perform well, but some apply too much video processing, making the data virtually useless.

=== Lens ===
Most cameras available on Aliexpress come with a choice of lenses. The preferred lens is a 4mm f/0.95 M16 lens providing ~88x45° field of view, which can also be bought separately for example via this link.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32876034491.html 4mm f/0.95 M16]

If you live in an area with heavy light pollution, other options are available. We wholeheartedly recommend only using lenses from the following list, as others might not be as sensitive or might have large distortion. See [[Lens Options|this page]] for more lens options.

=== Housing ===
A security camera housing is used, providing weather-tight protection without distortion introduced by plastic domes. From the options offered, select "Plate and Bracket" to get a plate for mounting a 38x38mm bare IP camera module, and an L-shaped mounting bracket.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32355130687.html IP66 CCTV Camera Housing with Plate and Bracket] This will also provide a pair of cable glands and some essential screws.

=== Power Over Ethernet Injector ===
This connects by network cables to both the Raspberry Pi and the camera sensor, and injects 48V DC onto the network cable to the camera to supply it with power. Pick a suitable plug style for your location from the options offered. An example unit is:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002704227705.html PoE Injector 48V 0.5A]

Note that over short lengths of up to about 5m you can also use plain PoE connectors. These simply feed 12V from a power supply into the ethernet and extract it at the other end. Over short distances this will supply the camera with adequate power without the need for 48V injectors.

Finally, if you are operating several cameras, you can use a PoE switch instead of a PoE injector.

=== Cooled Housing for Raspberry Pi ===
This is one of the rare cases that fulfills our needs. It has a fan which is relatively quiet, it’s sturdy, and it can fit the RTC with the addition of riser pins. '''Please buy this case''', we have tried many others, but they are not as good. From the options offered, make sure you select one that says "for Pi 4" if you are using a Raspberry Pi 4, or "for Pi 3B Plus" if you are using a Raspbery Pi 3B+. Additionally there is a case variation that is fully enclosed and has no fans; do not select this option.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32959825297.html Raspberry Pi Aluminium Enclosure with fans]

=== Real Time Clock for Raspberry Pi ===
[[File:rtc.jpg|thumb|RTC installation|200px]]

Very precise timing is essential to processing the meteor data, so unless you are confident in your internet connection an RTC module ensures the Raspberry Pi always has the precise time, even when power or internet is unreliable. AliExpress sells a pack of 10 but they are inexpensive - maybe share the extras among other camera constructors in your area. The AliExpress store lists two RTC modules, one labelled "DS3231 module" and the other "mini DS3231 module." Select the "mini DS3231 module" option; it is designed for the Raspberry Pi. It has 5 pins and includes a battery.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32770348851.html DS3231 RTC]

Once you plug it into the Pi (see image on the right) and make sure the current time is correct on the Pi, open the terminal and run:

<pre>
sudo hwclock -w
</pre>

This will set the current computer time to the RTC. Every time the Pi boots up, it will read the correct time from the RTC.

=== Pin Headers ===
Required to raise the height of the Raspberry GPIO bins to allow the RTC to sit proud of the Raspberry Pi case. You only need 1 but the pack of 20 is available for only a dollar or so.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32549850046.html Tall header pins]

=== Network cabling ===
You will need two lengths of network cabling, one (probably quite short) between the Raspberry Pi and the PoE injector and the other between the PoE injector and the camera. You can purchase suitable lengths locally or on AliExpress. Some people have found the following thin flat network cable to be useful for sneaking the wire through a window or door to avoid drilling holes in walls or eaves, although it will require some extra attention to seal the cable at the camera's PoE connector:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002311509668.html Cat6 Flat Ethernet Cable]

=== Waterproof Cable Connector ===
One end of the network cable will be outside, connected into the PoE cable from the camera. This is not only carrying data but 48V DC power and needs to be kept sealed. This waterproof connector is fitted over the end of the network cable connector then after the network cable is plugged into the camera's PoE cable, the connector is locked into the end of the PoE cable. For extra weatherproofing, wrap in self-amalgamating tape.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32834472563.html RJ45 Waterproof Connector Cap]

=== 128GB Micro SD Card ===
You need at least a 64GB card but a 128GB is recommended as 20+ GB of data is collected every night. Make sure it is a fast card eg Class 10 UHS-1 or better. A card can either be purchased locally or [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32676225311.html from AliExpress]. Be warned that there is an [https://photographylife.com/fake-memory-cards ongoing problem with the production and sale of fraudulent memory cards misreporting the available storage] and even supplies from a reputable outlet can be affected - test the card you purchase. The AliExpress link has been used successfully to obtain suitable micro SD cards. If you live in North America, buy your SD cards at Costco.

=== Raspberry Pi 4 ===
These are likely to be available to be purchased locally or from a domestic online source. You need at least a 2GB RAM model. The Raspberry Pi Model 4B is now the minimum spec. Previously, a Raspberry Pi Model 3B+ was considered the minimum but these do not have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers. Purchase the official 5.1V 3A 15.3W power supply to go with it - most problems with Raspberry Pi units are due to inadequate power supplies being used instead of purchasing the official power pack. Note: to connect a RPi 4B to a monitor you will also need a micro-HDMI cable, so that might be necessary to add to the shopping cart also.

=== Additional items and tools ===
* Source suitable M2 and M3 screws. It might be possible to find these locally but in some places they are just odd enough to be quite hard to find. You could order some hardware from the [https://www.aliexpress.com/store/4714020?spm=a2g0o.detail.1000007.1.5fc666d9tN1f8i ScrewHome Store] on AliExpress. Each [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32981714992.html?spm=a2g0o.store_pc_groupList.8148356.10.be65539dLjPgfh packet of 50 M2x6mm, M2x12mm, and M3x6mm] machine screws will cost only a few dollars.
* A tube of silicone sealant is used to seal the glass window for the housing and the front screws in the housing.
* Self-amalgamating tape can be used to wrap and seal the cable connector(s) to ensure they remain weathertight in all conditions.
* Tools such as small wire cutters or a sharp knife, various sized screwdrivers, a drill and screws to mount the camera bracket will be required.

Deprecated shopping list: [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1XBSdrkwrOGPONIn5PBJ7YzH2vr7pUIxW3l8S62BQXEQ/edit LINK]

Some cameras come with a slightly different cable with a separate 12V socket for power input as shown [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/images/d/dc/Alternatecable.jpg here].
If the power input port has a small cap, then you can just cover it and use the PoE on the ethernet port. If it's open, then you will need a pair of PoE adapters (seen in that picture in the background).

To test and focus the camera you will need VLC. This software is preinstalled on the Pi but is also available for Mac, Windows or Linux from [https://www.videolan.org/vlc/ here].

= Assembly =
[Note: there's a longer version of the camera assembly section of this page available on Google Docs. Please refer to [https://docs.google.com/document/d/18TT-Jm7z9kYskl5ua07jQWD91OiyBemBnOosiNdW6nY/edit?usp=sharing this] if you need more information.]

<table><tr><td>
== Preparing the Lens ==
[[File:Irblock.jpg|thumb|right|single filter: punch out the filter]]
* Start by removing protective covers from the sensor and lens. Take care not to touch the sensor after this is removed.

* The cameras come with an IR Block filter in the lens holder. We don't want this.

'''Lens holder with single filter'''
* If you have a lens like the one shown in the first image, unscrew the lens from the holder.
* Then using a screwdriver, carefully push the filter out of the lens holder as shown in the image on the right. If you push from the front, the filter may come out intact.
* If it shatters, make sure there are no shards left.

'''Lens holder with electronic filter drawer'''
* Some lenses come an electronic day/night filter drawer. These have a small cable to plug into the camera board. Two different types of these filter holders are shown here.
[[File:lensholders2.jpg|thumb|right|Two sorts of lens holder with day/night filters]]

* DO NOT try to punch out the filter directly as this may jam the mechanism or leave shards of glass inside.
* If your holder is the type with a rectangular sliding drawer, remove the drawer by undoing the screw on the end. Then remove the while filter glass entirely.
[[File:slidedrawer.jpg|thumb|right|Sliding type: Remove the filter entirely]]

* If your holder is the other type, undo the three small screws on the top and take off the cover. Then remove the clear filter. You can leave the reddish daylight filter.
[[File:rotatingfilter.jpg|thumb|right|Rotating type: Remove just the clear filter]]

* Now reassemble the filter holder. Do not connect the power cable to the camera.

* Next look on the underside of the lens holder where you will see two plastic nubbins. These get in the way, so using the wire cutters snip them off. Make sure you get the base completely flat.

* Then screw the lens back into the lens holder.
</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Attaching the Lens to the Camera ==
[[File:lensattaching.jpg|thumb|right|Attaching the Lens]]

* Carefully unclip the circuit board from the plastic holder but do not detach the ribbon cable.

* Using the supplied screws, attach the lens to the sensor.

* Replace the circuit board in the plastic holder.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

= Preparing the Camera Housing =
[[File:glands.jpg|thumb|right|Glands in Place]]
* Fit the small cable gland to the housing and pass the loose ends of the Camera PoE cable up through, but don't tighten it up yet. Remember to slip the cap over the cable first!

* Fit the large cable gland in the other opening, and push a piece of plastic packing foam into it. Don't seal it up completely though this is to keep insects from getting in, but allow moisture out.

* We do not recommend that you put the whole cable inside the housing, as the LEDs on it will create light pollution inside the housing.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>
== Attaching the Camera ==
[[File:camerafitted.jpg|thumb|right|Camera In Mount]]

'''Note: I recommend installing the camera in the housing at this point so that you do not have to detach the cables or risk knocking focus later on. However, you can proceed to test focus etc before installing the camera in the housing if you wish.''' If you prefer to do that, skip this section for now and come back later. Otherwise:

* Connect the metal camera holder to the metal plate using one 6mm M3 screw. Note the orientation of the plate as shown in the photo.

* Using three 12 mm M2 screws, connect the camera board to the metal holder, passing the lens through the square hole from the back.

* Note that on some camera models, the writing on the camera board or image of a stick man must be UPSIDE DOWN to get the correct orientation of the camera. In this orientation, the sockets for power and networking will be at the bottom of the rear of the camera board. To be sure you have it the right way up, see advice in the section on Testing and Focusing.

* Finally, remove the plastic cap on the lens.
See image for the proper camera board orientation, so the video is not sideways or upside down.
</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Installing the Camera in the Housing ==
[[File:camerainhousing.jpg|thumb|right|Camera In Housing]]

* Remove the plastic plate from inside the housing and discard it.

* Fit the camera on its metal plate into the housing, as close to the front glass as you can get it without actually touching. A few millimetres away should be good.

* Looking at the camera from the rear, attach the largest connector (often with blue/green wires) to the right hand socket.

* Attach the power connector to the left hand socket. This connector has several pins but only two are connected (red/black).

* The third connector (two pins, red/black) is for a powered lens and is not used so tape it back out of the way.

* Once you've secured the camera in position, you can tighten up the cable glands.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

= Testing and Focusing =
At this point, your camera must be tested and focused. There's no point sealing up the housing and screwing it to the wall if its not working or isn't focused !

== Testing the Camera ==
* If your camera came with a single PoE cable, connect this to a netork cable and plug the other end of the network cable into your PoE injector.

* if your camera came with a cable with separate network and power sockets, plug the "output" PoE adapter into the camera cable and plug a network cable into the PoE adapter, then connect the other end of the network cable into the other PoE adapter.
*. Connect the PoE adapter or injector into a spare socket on your home router and connect the camera power supply to it.

The Camera PoE cable lights should come on, indicating traffic is flowing. After a few seconds, it should steady down to irregular flashing. If you don't see flashing lights then check the cable connections to make sure everything is plugged in properly.

=== Find its IP Address ===
[[File:ip-scan.jpg|thumb|right|Finding the Camera Address]]
The camera should now appear as a device on your network and to test it properly you will need to find its IP Address. The easiest way to do this is using a free piece of software called [[https://www.advanced-ip-scanner.com/|Advanced IP Scanner]]. Download and run it (no need to install). Click "Scan" and wait till it finishes. The camera can usually be identified by Manufacturer 'ICP Internet Communications' or 'Motion Control Systems', though other vendor names are possible such as 'Koenig & Bauer AG' and 'Metrohm AG'. If none of the names look right you may need to experiment by trying to connect to each candidate in turn.

=== Checking the Connection ===
[[File:vlcconfig.jpg|thumb|right|VLC Network Stream]]
* Once you have the IP Address, open VLC on your Pi, Mac or Windows machine, and from the "Media" menu, select "Open Network Stream".

* Enter the following into the address box, replacing '''1.2.3.4''' with the address you got in the previous step

<blockquote>rtsp://'''1.2.3.4''':554/user=admin&password=&channel=1&stream=0.sdp</blockquote>

* After a second or two, you should get a view through the camera. If nothing comes up, check you have got the right IP address, and that the cables are secure.

* You can now double-check that you installed the camera the right way up.
If the image is upside down in VLC, turn it through 180 degrees in the housing. do '''not''' be tempted to use firmware settings to flip or mirror the image. These cameras have a 'rolling' shutter and to work out precise timings of meteors, the RMS software compensates for the shutter movement. If the camera is upside down and the image then flipped, the shutter is working in the opposite direction to that expected by RMS and timings will be wrong. You '''must''' physically rotate the camera.

* Note that its entirely normal for the image to be very red and overexposed in daylight. We've removed the IR Block filter so the camera picks up a lot of red light. This is exactly what we want.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Checking for Obstructions ==
[[File:vlcview.jpg|thumb|right|Obstructions]]
* Temporarily close the housing case up and check if it can be seen obstructing the view anywhere.

* Move the camera around on the mount to minimise the obstructions, and if necessary bend or tilt the bracket to angle the camera down a bit.

* However, don't worry if you can't eliminate all obstructions. Later on you will create a software mask to prevent these areas causing false detections.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Focusing the Camera ==

There's a whole separate section of the Wiki on [[Focusing_your_camera|focusing]], but here's the short version !!
* connect the camera to your network as above.
* Open VLC.
* Aim the camera at something at around 30-50 metres away.
* Screw the lens in and out slowly to get best focus.

You can usually do an initial focus with the camera assembled on a desk. Point it out a window during the hours of darkness and focus on a building at least 50m away.

You can do this using the RMS utility ShowLivestream instead of VLC, if you have already fully configured the camera and Pi as explained in the next step.

Note that there's a short lag due to the network, so you should wait a second or two after each adjustment to allow the change to be reflected in VLC.

Important note: if your camera came with an electronic filter, and you have left the 'daytime' filter in place you MUST finalise focus at night. The filters slightly alter focus.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Setting Camera Parameters ==
To operate at night, the camera must be reset to the correct gain, colour mode and video mode. There are two ways you can do this:

=== Using the CMS Software ===
<table>
* If you have a Pi3, you will currently have to use CMS.
* CMS is a security camera software package you can [https://learncctv.com/download-cms-software/ download] from the internet. You can use the software as explained in [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2sq1hBwcAA this] video by Denis Vida.
* Note however that you should reset the network as the LAST thing you do. The video does it a bit soon.
</table>

=== Using the RMS software ===
[[File:Ping-camera.JPG|thumb|right|Making sure the Pi can see the Camera]]

'''Note that all RMS scripts MUST be run from the source/RMS folder as the Pi user. Don't be tempted to cd into a different folder! It won't work.'''

* If you have a Pi4, you can use a utility that's part of RMS, as follows:

* If you're not using the pre-built image, first install RMS on the Pi as explained [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#RMS_Software_Installation here].

* Now plug the camera into your router, open a Terminal window on the Pi and, using the address of your camera, make sure the Pi can ping the camera:
<pre>ping a.b.c.d</pre>
If you get any errors or timeouts, check the camera IP address, and check that the Pi is connected to your home network.

* Next open a terminal window and run this script to reset the camera IP address.
<pre> python -m Utils.SetCameraAddress a.b.c.d 192.168.42.10</pre>
* You will lose connection to the camera and see a bunch of error messages. Thats normal. Once you see a timeout message, unplug the power and network from the camera.

* Now plug the camera directly into the Pi's ethernet port, open a Terminal window and run the following script to update the camera gain, video mode, and other settings.
[[File:Setting-camer-params.JPG|thumb|right|Setting Camera Params]]
<pre>Scripts/RMS_SetCameraParams.sh</pre>

* Note: If you have RMS installed on your PC then you can change the camera address from your PC instead, then connect it to the Pi and run the 2nd script.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

= Final Steps =
== Sealing the Housing ==
[[File:sealedhousing.jpg|thumb|right|Sealing the Housing]]
Depending on your climate, its usually advisable to seal up the camera housing against rain and snow.

From the outside, carefully go round the edge of the glass with silicone sealant. Also squirt sealant into any screw holes visible on the front of the camera housing, where it will be most exposed to rain.

But DONT seal up the hinged door because you will occasionally need to maintain the camera, and you don't want to have to prise it open with a chisel!

If there are any cable connections outside the casing, you should also seal these up thoroughhly. This writer can attest to the damage caused by water ingress into a PoE connector! Tape up or seal the connections tightly with some sort of waterproof product (I used electrical tape), but remember you may need to change the cable, so don't seal it irreversibly.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>
== Mounting Outside ==
Mount the camera somewhere with a good view of the sky and without too many 'terrestrial' obstructions such as trees, hills and buildings. Take special care to angle well away from security lights. These lights emit infrared and without the IR Block filter, the IMX cameras are extremely sensitive to this.

When locating the camera, bear in mind that you will need to be able to get to the camera to maintain it. The cameras do not need to be high up as long as they have a good view of the sky. Mine are at eye-level on my observatory shed.

As before, don't worry if its not practical to eliminate all obstructions as you can mask off any that can't be avoided.

=== Aiming the Camera ===
[[file:cameraview.jpg|thumb|right|Aiming the Camera]]
The cameras have a field of about 40-45 degrees vertically and 90 degrees horizontally so angle the camera upwards at between 35-45 degrees, higher if you have lots of nearby hills or trees. This should maximise meteor detection.

If you can arrange so that the camera view overlaps with other RMS users, thats even better. Check with the network to get an idea of a good direction.

In this photo, the camera is aimed up at about 40 degrees, just above the top of the hill behind the camera location. The parts of the hill that are visible will be masked off in the software to avoid 'meteor-wrongs' due to dog-walkers with head torches!
</td></tr></table>

= Thats it! =
Once the camera is installed, connect up the PoE adapter, attach a long network cable and run it to wherever you are going to keep the Raspberry Pi. Remember to ask permission before drilling holes in the walls... :)

= Now install the Software =
Now you can finish configuring the Raspberry Pi by installing a prebuilt image. This is covered in a separate guide [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#RMS_Software_Installation here].

Lens Options

2023-01-16T20:17:54Z

Dvida:

In city skies or if you have lots of obstructions (trees, buildings, etc.), we recommend the following 6mm lens with a ~55x30° field of view:
* Seller 1 - [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005003145991079.html 6mm f/0.95 M16]
* Seller 2 - [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32959421060.html 6mm f/0.95 M16]

In very light-polluted city skies, an alternative is the 8mm f/0.9 M16 lens which provides ~40x20° field of view:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005004122188232.html 8mm f/0.9 M16]

For observing fainter meteors, the following 16mm f/1.0 lens can be used that provides only a limited 20x10° field of view. This stations with this lens should only be paired with other stations using the same lens:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32857028953.html 16mm f/1.0 CS]
Note that this lens also requires a special CS lens mount, not supplied with the lens:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32833667462.html CS lens mount]

SkyFit2

2022-11-15T01:12:35Z

Dvida: Created page with "WORK IN PROGRESS"

WORK IN PROGRESS

Main Page

2022-11-15T01:12:13Z

Dvida:

Welcome to the Global Meteor Network's wiki page!

The Global Meteor Network (GMN) is a world wide organization of amateur and professional astronomers alike, whose goal is to observe the night sky using low-light video cameras and produce meteor trajectories in a coordinated manner. Here you will find information on the purpose and structure of the GMN, assembling and operating your own meteor camera, contributing to the development of RMS the GMN software, as well as information on how your observations as a citizen scientist can contribute to the further understanding of our solar system's formation and evolution.

'''<span style="color:red">If you have come here to find out how to build and setup a camera from scratch, jump ahead to [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#How_do_I_obtain_a_camera.3F this] section !</span>'''

== Global Meteor Network Overview ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=141 Our mission] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=363 A brief history of the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Video introduction - Overview of the Global Meteor Network (IMC2020)] ===

=== [https://youtu.be/oM7lfQ4nmyw Video overview - Meteor tracking and the GMN from Astro Imaging Channel presentation] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ Some 'live' GMN data products] ===

== Meteor Detection Station ==

=== What is an RMS GMN station? ===
: A RMS-based GMN station that is the subject of this Wiki consists of a Raspberry Pi (RPi) single board computer, a low light level security video camera, and the RMS software package. The camera is securely mounted in a weatherproof housing, pointed at the sky, and connected to the RPi with a POE (Power Over Ethernet) cable. The RPi is connected to the Internet via WiFi, and to be a part of GMN network, you’ll need a fairly powerful Raspberry Pi (RPi 3B+, RPi 4 or better) and a reasonably fast Internet connection. The internet connection is primarily required to enable data upload to a central server each morning as well as provide automatic updates for the RMS software.

: Nightly, the RPi starts recording video from the camera shortly after local sunset continuously compressing and storing the video data locally. Each morning before sunrise, after capture is complete, the RPi analyzes the video and extracts your nightly station’s meteor observations. These extracted video “clips” of detected meteors are then archived and uploaded to a server. The clips can total hundreds of megabytes on a “busy” night (e.g., in a heavy meteor shower, or a night with a lot of false detections--progress is being made on the detection software). The server finds meteors which were observed with more than one station and this enables the server to triangulate the meteor trails in 3D and calculate the orbits of the meteors.

===[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS/blob/master/README.md What do I need?] ===

You'll need a Raspberry Pi with the software on, and a camera kit. We strongly recommend the Pi4 model. The software will run on a Pi3 but it is much slower.

=== How do I obtain a camera? ===
There are two options:

==== Buy a Camera ====
You can buy a camera and Pi prebuilt and ready to install. These are available from a couple of suppliers. The Croatian Meteor Network sell prebuilt cameras as explained on [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=136 this page]. Alternatively, if you're in the UK, you can obtain cameras from the [https://ukmeteornetwork.co.uk/ UK Meteor Network]

==== Build your own from scratch ====
This requires some basic DIY skills and some familiarity with the Raspberry PI, but don't be put off. The instructions are comprehensive and if you get stuck, you can ask for advice in the [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork groups.io] forum.

Click on this link if you want to '''[[Build_A_Camera|build a camera from scratch]]'''.

Once you've built the camera, You can '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#Flash_a_pre-built_image flash a Prebuilt image]''' onto an SD card to set up the Pi with the software required to capture meteors and upload data to the network. Although the primary choice for Raspberry Pi 4 is still a microSD card, you may wish to consider '''using a USB flash disk, USB-attached SSD or USB-attached HDD''' as a boot device. Click [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Booting_from_a_USB_device Booting from a USB device] to know more.

=== Can I use a commercial all-sky camera? ===

: Generally no due to the lack of sensitivity. [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=163 But see this recent experiment]

== Operating and maintaining your GMN station ==

=== Overview ===

: Please note that GMS is a nascent operation and you may share some growing pains if you choose to be involved -- we're still working out some bugs and making improvements here, which may be an opportunity to help if you have programming skills! ;-) So note that the workload of day-to-day operation can be non-zero, and might take a little bit of your time.

: Ideally, you'll want to monitor your RMS RPi system(s) daily to look for freezes or glitches or other problems... like birds nesting or soiling the camera window, people accidentally unplugging the power cord, mice (or cats or dogs!) chewing on the camera Ethernet cable, etc.

: Although we are getting close, this is not a "power up and forget about it" system yet.
: However, by its very nature, the GMS network is inhabited by a lot of people who are willing to help newcomers getting started. So, here are some clues for daily operation of your RMS camera.

=== So what does the meteor camera do over the course of 24 hours? ===

: The RMS Python based system calculates the sundown to sunrise interval and schedules video camera capture all night long. Depending on the video camera and capabilities of the RPi, the camera captures 25 or more frames per second between evening and morning twilight. During the continuous image capture, the station begins processing captured image data, doing a pre-screening to target frames with a suitable number of stars (usually around 20) that makes it worth looking for meteor detections. Once data capture has finished, the station switches into processing all the promising frames for detections, then refining the astrometric accuracy of every positive detection. Using the station platepar (plate parameters) calibration file, processing iterates to find the best astrometry and photometry solution for each detected meteor. Once this process has analyzed each detection, summary files are created.
: These summary files include text file data presentation in several widely accepted formats (CAMS and UFOorbit), as well as graphic plots of detection frequencies throughout the night, a set of thumbnail images of detections, a set of thumbnail images of data captured throughout the night, a single image with all detections stacked together, plots of photometry, astrometry, and camera pointing drift in arc minutes throughout the course of the night as the mount or building flexes, a flat file for correcting images, and a plot of all detections showing any identified radiants. Finally all results are combined into a single compressed archive, which is automatically uploaded each morning to the central server. Optionally, you can create a mp4 movie showing a time lapse of the night’s captured images.
: Each morning you can review the result files on the RPi, and copy anything you want to your computer or tablet.

===Archiving data and backing up configuration ===

: Your primary scientific data is automatically uploaded to the central server every morning when data processing is done. However once it has done this, RMS will purge out the oldest data to free up space for the next night's run.

: So, you may want to copy some of the data to a PC, NAS or cloud for further analysis of your own. The data you should consider backing up are the contents of '''~/RMS_data/ArchivedFiles''', which holds the individual files and data that RMS determined were probably meteors. Full detail on how to nbare beyond the scope of the GMN Wiki, but tools such as robocopy (for Windows) and rsync(for Linux/MacOS) are ideal. These tools can 'mirror' data across a network. If you want help configuring these, ask in the Globalmeteornetwork group on groups.io.

: We've also built some automated tools that can help to back up any additional data to a thumb drive inserted into the RPi. Please ask in the group about these.

=== Viewing the data ===

: To view the data, you can use CMN_binViewer software[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer] which is already installed in the RMS SD image.
: There is also a Windows version[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer/releases] you can install.

: '''Important note''' : You can also open the images in astronomical FITS viewers such as FITS Liberator or Pixinsight, though the results may be surprising. For example in FITS Liberator, the image will be '''upside down'''. This is an artefact of how the software reads the image. In space, there's no 'up' or 'down' and so the FITS specification does not dictate whether the pixel (0,0) is at the bottom left or top left, or indeed one of the other corners. Some software, notably FITS Liberator, treats the top left as the origin and so terrestrial images will be displayed mirrored vertically.

=== Tools and Utilities ===

* [https://www.realvnc.com/en/connect/download/viewer/ RealVNC] or [https://anydesk.com/en AnyDesk] remote connect tool allows station access from anywhere. Access from outside your network is enabled by use of an OpenVPN connection address available to meteor stations. Alternatively, with VNC and Teamviewer, you can create an account and team on their websites, and then remotely access your station.
* Samba data directory access, allows you to copy data results directly from your RPi to your computer or tablet.
* [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer CMN_binViewer] can be used to view standard fits image files containing meteor detections. It runs on the RPi, and is also available under Windows.
* [https://sonotaco.com/soft/e_index.html UFO Orbit] allows you to process data from multiple stations and generate unified radiants of two or more stations seeing the same meteor. It can plot the shared object ground path, orbital characteristics, and can output a summary file of all objects seen by more than one station, which can be used for further analysis.
* RMS software can be installed under Windows to allow much of the RMS python-based code to be executed on your computer, so it can be run against meteor station data you have transferred to your computer from the RPi.
* You can run RMS Python jobs on the RPi to sample the image files captured all night long and condense them into a mp4 movie. This creates a sometimes mesmerizing summary that can run for over 2 minutes in length for winter time data.

== Configuring and installing your camera ==

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick start guide] ===

=== [[Focusing_your_camera | Focusing your IP camera]] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2sq1hBwcAA Video tutorial - Configuring your IMX291 IP camera] ===

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1TPotXcRstHz-XWIQYIW71xkRYy7Ca1UCoEiZsqdk9zw/edit?usp=sharing Different ways of connecting the camera] ===

== What can I do with my GMN station? ==

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOjb3qxDlX4 Video Tutorial - Using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration + Manually reducing observations of fireballs and computing their trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=310 Generating a Google Earth KML file to show your station's field of view] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=253 Using UFO Orbit program to estimate meteor trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=221 Urban meteor observing] ===

== RMS Software Installation ==

=== Flash a pre-built image ===

Pre-built Images are available with the RMS software pre-installed on Raspbian. Raspbian is the operating system typically used on the Raspberry Pi.

A 128 GB microSD card is preferred, although smaller 64 GB cards will also work. The image is flashed to the microSD card using the Etcher utility for Windows (32 or 64-bit), MacOS or Linux (64-bit), which can be found [https://www.balena.io/etcher/ here]

If you are considering using a USB flash disk, USB-attached SSD or USB-attached HDD as a boot device, click [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Booting_from_a_USB_device Booting from a USB device] to know more.

When you first boot up the Pi make sure you have a keyboard, monitor and mouse attached as you will be taken through a setup process by the RMS software.

The current publicly released images of RMS are:
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/sa9csd4m3jr1vqo/RMS_image_20191203.zip?dl=1 RPi3B+ ]
and
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/3pwwenty43dazq4/RMS_RPi4_image_20210626.zip?dl=1 RPi4 ].

Please see the [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick Start Guide] about how to flash them to an SD card.

Notes:
* The earlier versions of the Raspberry Pi, the 1 and 2, are not powerful enough to run RMS software.

* the pre-installed RMS software images incorporate an auto-updating feature, so that the RMS software is updated to the current release whenever your Raspberry Pi RMS is booted. This way, your station is always running the most recent set of updates.

* For installations into other Linux or windows environments, executing the command ''git pull'' will update to the most recent RMS release.

* The code was designed to run on a RPi, but it will also run an some Linux distributions. We have tested it on Linux Mint 18 and Ubuntu 16. For information on installing into other Linux releases, check portions of the section listed below for installing on RPi, and also check installation instructions found on [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS GitHub]

== [OPTIONAL] Install the software from scratch ==

'''Note: if you're setting up a Raspberry Pi you should use the prebuilt image as this comes with all necessary software installed and is ready to use.'''. If you really really '''really''' do want to install on the RPi from scratch, you can follow the instructions below:

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 4 ===

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/19ImeNqBTD1ml2iisp5y7CjDrRV33wBeF9rtx3mIVjh4/edit?usp=sharing here]

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 3 ===

'''We no longer recommend the Pi3, as it doesn't have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers. '''

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ChaXx6WkuGfcQ_f5yRbwUOOMxEgIJrjq932UZE6cRjE/edit here].

=== Install for Linux ===

Detailed instructions [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Installation_for_Linux here]

=== Installation for Windows ===
Data capture does not work under windows. However you can use the other tools on your PC, where its much quicker to run SkyFit2 to calibrate your camera to the sky, or you want to use BatchFFToImage to convert data to jpeg format to share on Social Media.

Click '''[[Windows_Installation|here]]''' for detailed instructions. The instructions were tested on Windows 10 64-bit, but should work on any Windows version where git and Anaconda are available.

Aside: If you are a Windows whizz, please feel free to investigate why data capture doesn't work!

=== Installation for MacOS ===
As with Windows, installation for MacOS is useful if you want to analyse the data offline. If you do want to install it, please follow the instructions '''[[MacOS_Install | here]]'''.

== Data analysis with SkyFit2 ==

SkyFit2 is a program within the RMS library which supports analyzing optical meteor data in most optical formats that are in use today, including videos in any popular video format (mp4, avi, mkv), a sequence of static images, or a single image with shutter breaks.

This [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOjb3qxDlX4 video tutorial] explains how to using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration on GMN data and manually reduce observations of fireballs, including computing their trajectories.

A more general and detailed description of SkyFit2 is given at the '''[[SkyFit2|SkyFit2]]''' page.

== FAQ ==

=== What should I back up when re-flashing an SD card or a USB disk? ===

: The .config, platepar and mask files that are in the RMS source directory, plus the whole contents of the hidden directory /home/pi/.ssh.

If your SD card or a USB disk fails or becomes corrupted, the config files can be fetched from the server as they are uploaded every day together with the data. However the contents of .ssh are essential for connection to the server, so you must also save these. Once you set up a new SD card or a USB disk, return the files in their original location.

=== What are the values in FTPdetectinfo_* file designated as hnr mle bin Pix/fm Rho Phi? ===

: Some of these values are not used in RMS (hnr mle bin), but they are in CAMS, so they are here to conform to the standard. Thus they are all zeros. The others are:

: - Pix/fm - Average angular speed of the meteor in pixels per frame.

: - Rho, Phi - Parameters that define the line of the meteor in polar coordinates, see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hough_transform#Theory here] for more details. Rho is the distance of the line from the centre of the image, and phi is the angle of the line as measured from the positive direction of the Y axis (basically a line going from the center of the image to the top of the image), the positive angles are measured clockwise (I think, the CAMS standard might define these parameters a bit differently, the Y axis is flipped).

: The intensity is the sum of all pixel intensities of the meteor on a given frame. Let's say I represent an area around the meteor on a given frame like this, where the numbers are pixel intensities on an 8-bit image (so they can range from 0 to 255):

: [[File:Intensity_sum.png |Intensity_sum.png ]]

: and the pixels values inside the red boundary represent the meteor blob on the frame, the intensity would be the sum of all numbers inside the red boundary.
: This value is later used to compute the magnitude. The magnitude is computed as: mag = -2.5*log10(intensity sum) + photometric_offset. The photometric offset is estimated in SkyFit by fitting the line with slope -2.5 through pairs of known magnitudes of stars and logartihms of their pixel intensity sum. The photometric offset is basically the intercept of that line. The constant slope of -2.5 comes from the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apparent_magnitude#Calculations definition of stellar magnitudes.]

== GMN data policy ==

The Global Meteor Network produces several levles of data products:
* Level 1 - The lowest level data (i.e. as close to "raw" as possible) are the FF image and FR video files saved to the RPi by the capture code and the fireball detector.
* Level 2 - The meteor detector uses these data to extract positional and brightness information of individual meteors (FTPdetectinfo file), and images are also used for astrometric and photometric calibration (platepar file). Meteor and star detections are used to generate a range of plots suchs as the single-station shower association graph, camera drift graph, etc. The calibrated meteors measurements get uploaded to the GMN server together with the raw images of individual meteors.
* Level 3 - The software on the server correlates individual observations and computes multi-station meteor trajectories which are published daily on the GMN [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ data website]. This data is made public under the [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ CC BY 4.0 license].

Operators of individual GMN stations exclusivery own the Level 1 and Level 2 data their stations produce. In practice, this means that they are free to share this data with other meteor networks if they wish to do so. The data that gets uploaded to the GMN server will not be shared publicly nor with other parties without the operator's consent, but may be used internally by the GMN coordinators to manually produce other data products (e.g. trajectory of a meteorite dropping fireball, analysis of a meteor shower). All station operators will be credited for their data in all GMN publications.

== IstraStream ==

=== [http://istrastream.com/rms-gmn/ IstraStream GMN status website] ===

: The IstraStream.com is an independent hosting site which is part of our world wide GMN. It is primarily a host for data from cameras sold by IstraStream, but other station operators can request that their data be included.
To enable the IstraStream upload, the <b>external_script_run</b>, <b>external_script_path</b>, and <b>reboot_after_processing</b> parameters have to be changed. This is how the config file should look:

<pre>
; External script
; An external script will be run after RMS finishes the processing for the night, it will be passed three arguments:
; captured_night_dir, archived_night_dir, config - captured_night dir is the full path to the captured folder of the night
; the second one is the archived, and config is an object holding the values in this config file.
; ---------------
; Enable running an external script at the end of every night of processing
external_script_run: true
; Run the external script after auto reprocess. "auto_reprocess" needs to be turned on for this to work.
auto_reprocess_external_script_run: false
; Full path to the external script
external_script_path: /home/pi/source/RMS/iStream/iStream.py
; Name of the function in the external script which will be called
external_function_name: rmsExternal

; Daily reboot
; ---------------
; Reboot the computer daily after the processing and upload is done
reboot_after_processing: false
</pre>

Then, send an e-mail to [mailto:info@istrastream.com info@istrastream.com] with your:
* Station_ID
* Location or Name (if not secret)
* Lens type/size

For example, "CA0001; Elginfield Observatory, Ontario, Canada; 4mm". The IstraStream crew will enable the weblog page within a few days.

Finally, this document explains what every plot on the IstraStream weblog means:

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/132aHGn0QPzhpVN2s2n6FT6rJn39LAsPkchWJqXQb8Qk/edit?usp=sharing IstraStream Plots Explanation] ===

== For More Information ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=43 Contact the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork Join the Global Meteor Network Forum] ===

=== [https://github.com/markmac99/ukmon-pitools/wiki UK Meteor Network Wiki]===
This wiki has numerous FAQs and tips on maintaining, monitoring and managing your system, and several explainers such as how to calibrate and create a mask, how to copy data and so forth.

=== GMN talks ===

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDdrG_FCyGk 2022 Global Meteor Network Meeting Session 1 (February, 2022)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_75CDPzjI4 2022 Global Meteor Network Meeting Session 2 (February, 2022)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6x9_WCVphY GMN talk at the European Space Agency's Fireball Workshop (June, 2021)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXBTLPnPDWs GMN Workshop (February, 2021)] - [https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ia9vagug5lxm8k9/AAB_i_1jcWThUdAHO_2gF_Ksa?dl=0 Link to slides]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Overview of the GMN - IMC2020 (September, 2020)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oM7lfQ4nmyw Overview of the GMN, Astro Imaging Channel presentation (May, 2020)]

=== GMN related publications ===

: [https://academic.oup.com/mnras/advance-article/doi/10.1093/mnras/stab2557/6368869 Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T., & Vida, D. (2021). Meteor shower radiant dispersions in Global Meteor Network data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2107.12335 Vida, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P. S., Brown, P. G., McIntyre, M. J., Dijkema, T. J., Pavletić, L., Kukić, P., Mazur, M.J., Eschman, P., Roggemans, P., Merlak, A., & Zubović, D. (2021). The Global Meteor Network–Methodology and first results. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 506(4), 5046-5074.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.05458/ Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T. D., & Vida, D. (2020). Realistic gravitational focusing of meteoroid streams. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 494(2), 2982-2994.]

: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Kukic-et-al-2018-Rolling-shutter.pdf Kukić, P., Gural, P., Vida, D., Šegon, D. & Merlak, A. (2018) Correction for meteor centroids observed using rolling shutter cameras. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46:5, 154-118.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_sun_skirter_final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Kukić, P., & Merlak, A. (2018). Compressive strength of a skirting Daytime Arietid-first science results from low-cost Raspberry Pi-based meteor stations. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 113-118.]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.02979.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - I. Theory. arXiv:1911.02979v4 [astro-ph.EP] 21 Apr 2020]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.11734.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - II. Results. arXiv:1911.11734v1 [astro-ph.EP] 26 Novr 2019]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_first_results-final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Zubović, D., Kukić, P., Parag, F., & Macan, A. (2018). First results of a Raspberry Pi based meteor camera system. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 71-78.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Vida_IMC2016_proceedings_final.pdf Vida, D., Zubović, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P., & Cupec, R. (2016). Open-source meteor detection software for low-cost single-board computers. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference (IMC2016), Egmond, The Netherlands (pp. 2-5).]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Zubovic_IMC2015_priceedings_final.pdf Zubović, D., Vida, D., Gural, P., & Šegon, D. (2015). Advances in the development of a low-cost video meteor station. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference, Mistelbach, Austria (pp. 27-30).]

Booting from an USB device

2022-09-24T13:02:20Z

Dvida: Dvida moved page Booting from an USB device to Booting from a USB device over redirect

#REDIRECT [[Booting from a USB device]]

Booting from a USB device

2022-09-24T13:02:20Z

Dvida: Dvida moved page Booting from an USB device to Booting from a USB device over redirect

This page is meant for the people who would like to boot a Raspberry Pi directly from a USB device and would like to avoid using a microSD card due to various reasons e.g. USB 3.X devices are faster, by some considered more reliable or simply some of them are available unused at your disposal. This page deals with and brings the how-to for the Raspberry Pi 4B only.
In general Raspberry Pi 4B is able to boot from any USB device out of the box. Please see the caveats section for the possible issues you may encounter and how to solve them. As such Raspberry Pi 4B can be booted from a USB flash, USB-attached Solid State Disk (SSD) or USB-attached Hard Disk Drive (HDD) either 2.5” or 3.5”. The list of proven devices that are in use by other members will be provided in each section. The easiest setup with almost no caveats comes with a USB flash drive which is as easy as booting from a microSD card. By using a USB-attached SDD or HDD there are some things you need to consider.

== USB flash disk ==
=== How-to ===

# Download the zipped Image for Raspberry Pi 4B [https://www.dropbox.com/s/3pwwenty43dazq4/RMS_RPi4_image_20210626.zip?dl=1 here] and save it on the PC somewhere.
# Download the [https://www.balena.io/etcher/ BalenaEtcher], if you haven’t done it yet.
# Insert a USB flash disk into your PC, and note the letter it was assigned.
# Run BalenaEtcher, and flash the image file onto your USB flash disk: Select Flash from file, find your zip file and select it. As Target select your USB flash disk. Normally the system disks are hidden but verify the name, letter and size of your USB flash disk to be sure you have the correct target. Click Flash, once again verify the target and confirm it. Wait for the process to finish. (In case you will receive an error you may need to run BalenaEtcher as administrator)
# Eject the USB flash disk in windows if necessary and then remove your USB flash disk from your PC and insert it into your Raspberry Pi, which should be connected to a TV or Monitor, and have a keyboard and mouse connected. Power on a Raspberry Pi. Make sure that a microSD card is not inserted.
# Wait for the boot. If the boot takes too long to occur, please have a look at the next section. If it booted successfully, follow the on-screen instructions. You may return to the previous page as you are done with flashing the image onto a USB flash disk.

This is what the selection should look like:
[[File:BalenaEtcher_selection.png|center]]

This is what the process should look like:
[[File:BalenaEtcher_process.png|center]]

=== Pre-2021 Raspberry Pi 4 Bootloader update ===

If you encountered a problem booting Raspberry Pi 4 from a USB device (common for all USB devices, not only flash disks), the most probable reason is that your Raspberry Pi 4 is from an older batch and its bootloader has to be updated. The procedure is simple and you will need a blank small MicroSD card to continue, the data are around 1MB in size, so any small microSD card will do the job. The process is nicely described in [https://www.raspberrypi.com/documentation/computers/raspberry-pi.html#updating-the-bootloader the raspberry pi official documentation].

=== Proven HW ===
{| class="wikitable" style="margin:auto"
|-
! HW !! Note
|-
| [https://www.kingston.com/en/usb-flash-drives/datatraveler-kyson-high-performance-usb-flash-drive Kingston DataTraveler Kyson 256 GB] || Operated in 4 stations since Nov 2021, no issues
|}

== USB-atached SSD ==
=== What to consider ===

The first thing to consider is that raspberry Pi 4B provides approximately 1.2A to the USB ports combined, so you need to make sure that your SSD disk does not need more current. Also, it is advisable to not use any other hungry USB-powered devices in the live operation of a station. Although it has not been reported by the members using SSD disks it might happen that you may need a powered USB hub to be connected to a Raspberry Pi 4 to provide enough current during peak operations. Please note that Raspberry Pi 4 is under heavy writing during its night operation. Also due to the power requirements, it is highly advisable to use the official 3A power supply.

The second thing to consider is the mode that Linux will detect your SSD disk. Although in the majority of cases this won’t be an issue, it is almost impossible to get this information from the datasheet of an SSD. While it is cumbersome, the best approach is to connect the disk to a Raspberry Pi 4 already running the RMS image (from a microSD card) and issue the following command from the terminal “sudo dmesg | grep usb-storage” without quotes. If you see some lines returned, you are fine to proceed.

=== How-to ===

Will be added after the test will be undergone.

=== Proven HW ===
{| class="wikitable" style="margin:auto"
|-
! HW !! Note
|-
| [https://www.crucial.com/ssd/bx500/ct240bx500ssd1 Crucial BX500 240GB 3D NAND SATA 2.5-inch SSD] || Operated in 1 station since Aug 2021, without powered USB hub, no issues
|-
| [https://www.crucial.com/ssd/mx500/ct250mx500ssd1 Crucial MX500 250GB 3D NAND SATA 2.5-inch SSD] || Operated in 1 station since Aug 2021, without powered USB hub, no issues
|-
| [https://www.orico.cc/us/product/detail/3487.html ORICO 2.5 inch USB3.0 Hard Drive Enclosure] || Operated in 2 stations since Aug 2021, no issues
|}

== USB-attached HDD ==
=== What to consider ===

For the USB-attached HDD of size 2.5” applied the same things to consider as for the USB-attached SDD, please see above.

For the USB-attached HDD of size 3.5” the power requirements may be ignored, as by default these disks need 12V to be fed from the additional power supply bundled to the HDD enclosure.

=== How-to ===

Will be added after the test will be undergone.

=== Proven HW ===

There are two no-name refurbished HDDs used in two stations, however one had to be replaced, so at the moment no branded HDD is reported to be used in the station. The list will be updated as soon as someone starts using it.

== Useful resources ==

More in-depth information about a Raspberry Pi 4B boot process and boot options can be found [https://www.raspberrypi.com/documentation/computers/raspberry-pi.html#boot-sequence in the official documentation]

Booting from a USB device

2022-09-24T13:01:07Z

Dvida: Dvida moved page Booting from a USB device to Booting from an USB device over redirect: grammar typo

Lens Options

2022-05-20T16:02:01Z

Dvida:

In city skies or if you have lots of obstructions (trees, buildings, etc.), we recommend the following 6mm lens with a ~55x30° field of view:
* Seller 1 - [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32876034491.html 6mm f/0.95 M16]
* Seller 2 - [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32959421060.html 6mm f/0.95 M16]

In very light-polluted city skies, an alternative is the 8mm f/0.9 M16 lens which provides ~40x20° field of view:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005004122188232.html 8mm f/0.9 M16]

For observing fainter meteors, the following 16mm f/1.0 lens can be used that provides only a limited 20x10° field of view. This stations with this lens should only be paired with other stations using the same lens:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32857028953.html 16mm f/1.0 CS]
Note that this lens also requires a special CS lens mount, not supplied with the lens:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32833667462.html CS lens mount]

Main Page

2022-01-25T16:42:19Z

Dvida: /* Viewing the data */

Welcome to the Global Meteor Network's wiki page!

The Global Meteor Network (GMN) is a world wide organization of amateur and professional astronomers alike, whose goal is to observe the night sky using low-light video cameras and produce meteor trajectories in a coordinated manner. Here you will find information on the purpose and structure of the GMN, assembling and operating your own meteor camera, contributing to the development of RMS the GMN software, as well as information on how your observations as a citizen scientist can contribute to the further understanding of our solar system's formation and evolution.

'''<span style="color:red">If you have come here to find out how to build and setup a camera from scratch, jump ahead to [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#How_do_I_obtain_a_camera.3F this] section !</span>'''

== Global Meteor Network Overview ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=141 Our mission] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=363 A brief history of the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Video introduction - Overview of the Global Meteor Network (IMC2020)] ===

=== [https://youtu.be/oM7lfQ4nmyw Video overview - Meteor tracking and the GMN from Astro Imaging Channel presentation] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ Some 'live' GMN data products] ===

== Meteor Detection Station ==

=== What is an RMS GMN station? ===
: A RMS-based GMN station that is the subject of this Wiki consists of a Raspberry Pi (RPi) single board computer, a low light level security video camera, and the RMS software package. The camera is securely mounted in a weatherproof housing, pointed at the sky, and connected to the RPi with a POE (Power Over Ethernet) cable. The RPi is connected to the Internet via WiFi, and to be a part of GMN network, you’ll need a fairly powerful Raspberry Pi (RPi 3B+, RPi 4 or better) and a reasonably fast Internet connection. The internet connection is primarily required to enable data upload to a central server each morning as well as provide automatic updates for the RMS software.

: Nightly, the RPi starts recording video from the camera shortly after local sunset continuously compressing and storing the video data locally. Each morning before sunrise, after capture is complete, the RPi analyzes the video and extracts your nightly station’s meteor observations. These extracted video “clips” of detected meteors are then archived and uploaded to a server. The clips can total hundreds of megabytes on a “busy” night (e.g., in a heavy meteor shower, or a night with a lot of false detections--progress is being made on the detection software). The server finds meteors which were observed with more than one station and this enables the server to triangulate the meteor trails in 3D and calculate the orbits of the meteors.

===[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS/blob/master/README.md What do I need?] ===

You'll need a Raspberry Pi with the software on, and a camera kit. We strongly recommend the Pi4 model. The software will run on a Pi3 but it is much slower.

=== How do I obtain a camera? ===
There are two options:

==== Buy a Camera ====
You can buy a camera and Pi prebuilt and ready to install. These are available from a couple of suppliers. The Croatian Meteor Network sell prebuilt cameras as explained on [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=136 this page]. Alternatively, if you're in the UK, you can obtain cameras from the [https://ukmeteornetwork.co.uk/ UK Meteor Network]

==== Build your own from scratch ====
This requires some basic DIY skills and some familiarity with the Raspberry PI, but don't be put off. The instructions are comprehensive and if you get stuck, you can ask for advice in the [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork groups.io] forum.

Click on this link if you want to '''[[Build_A_Camera|build a camera from scratch]]'''.

Once you've built the camera, You can '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#Flash_a_pre-built_image flash a Prebuilt image]''' onto an SD card to set up the Pi with the software required to capture meteors and upload data to the network.

=== Can I use a commercial all-sky camera? ===

: Generally no due to the lack of sensitivity. [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=163 But see this recent experiment]

== Operating and maintaining your GMN station ==

=== Overview ===

: Please note that GMS is a nascent operation and you may share some growing pains if you choose to be involved -- we're still working out some bugs and making improvements here, which may be an opportunity to help if you have programming skills! ;-) So note that the workload of day-to-day operation can be non-zero, and might take a little bit of your time.

: Ideally, you'll want to monitor your RMS RPi system(s) daily to look for freezes or glitches or other problems... like birds nesting or soiling the camera window, people accidentally unplugging the power cord, mice (or cats or dogs!) chewing on the camera Ethernet cable, etc.

: Although we are getting close, this is not a "power up and forget about it" system yet.
: However, by its very nature, the GMS network is inhabited by a lot of people who are willing to help newcomers getting started. So, here are some clues for daily operation of your RMS camera.

=== So what does the meteor camera do over the course of 24 hours? ===

: The RMS Python based system calculates the sundown to sunrise interval and schedules video camera capture all night long. Depending on the video camera and capabilities of the RPi, the camera captures 25 or more frames per second between evening and morning twilight. During the continuous image capture, the station begins processing captured image data, doing a pre-screening to target frames with a suitable number of stars (usually around 20) that makes it worth looking for meteor detections. Once data capture has finished, the station switches into processing all the promising frames for detections, then refining the astrometric accuracy of every positive detection. Using the station platepar (plate parameters) calibration file, processing iterates to find the best astrometry and photometry solution for each detected meteor. Once this process has analyzed each detection, summary files are created.
: These summary files include text file data presentation in several widely accepted formats (CAMS and UFOorbit), as well as graphic plots of detection frequencies throughout the night, a set of thumbnail images of detections, a set of thumbnail images of data captured throughout the night, a single image with all detections stacked together, plots of photometry, astrometry, and camera pointing drift in arc minutes throughout the course of the night as the mount or building flexes, a flat file for correcting images, and a plot of all detections showing any identified radiants. Finally all results are combined into a single compressed archive, which is automatically uploaded each morning to the central server. Optionally, you can create a mp4 movie showing a time lapse of the night’s captured images.
: Each morning you can review the result files on the RPi, and copy anything you want to your computer or tablet.

===Archiving data and backing up configuration ===

: Your primary scientific data is automatically uploaded to the central server every morning when data processing is done. However once it has done this, RMS will purge out the oldest data to free up space for the next night's run.

: So, you may want to copy some of the data to a PC, NAS or cloud for further analysis of your own. The data you should consider backing up are the contents of '''~/RMS_data/ArchivedFiles''', which holds the individual files and data that RMS determined were probably meteors. Full detail on how to nbare beyond the scope of the GMN Wiki, but tools such as robocopy (for Windows) and rsync(for Linux/MacOS) are ideal. These tools can 'mirror' data across a network. If you want help configuring these, ask in the Globalmeteornetwork group on groups.io.

: We've also built some automated tools that can help to back up any additional data to a thumb drive inserted into the RPi. Please ask in the group about these.

=== Viewing the data ===

: To view the data, you can use CMN_binViewer software[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer] which is already installed in the RMS SD image.
: There is also a Windows version[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer/releases] you can install.

: '''Important note''' : You can also open the images in astronomical FITS viewers such as FITS Liberator or Pixinsight, though the results may be surprising. For example in FITS Liberator, the image will be '''upside down'''. This is an artefact of how the software reads the image. In space, there's no 'up' or 'down' and so the FITS specification does not dictate whether the pixel (0,0) is at the bottom left or top left, or indeed one of the other corners. Some software, notably FITS Liberator, treats the top left as the origin and so terrestrial images will be displayed mirrored vertically.

=== Tools and Utilities ===

* [https://www.realvnc.com/en/connect/download/viewer/ RealVNC] or [https://anydesk.com/en AnyDesk] remote connect tool allows station access from anywhere. Access from outside your network is enabled by use of an OpenVPN connection address available to meteor stations. Alternatively, with VNC and Teamviewer, you can create an account and team on their websites, and then remotely access your station.
* Samba data directory access, allows you to copy data results directly from your RPi to your computer or tablet.
* [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer CMN_binViewer] can be used to view standard fits image files containing meteor detections. It runs on the RPi, and is also available under Windows.
* [https://sonotaco.com/soft/e_index.html UFO Orbit] allows you to process data from multiple stations and generate unified radiants of two or more stations seeing the same meteor. It can plot the shared object ground path, orbital characteristics, and can output a summary file of all objects seen by more than one station, which can be used for further analysis.
* RMS software can be installed under Windows to allow much of the RMS python-based code to be executed on your computer, so it can be run against meteor station data you have transferred to your computer from the RPi.
* You can run RMS Python jobs on the RPi to sample the image files captured all night long and condense them into a mp4 movie. This creates a sometimes mesmerizing summary that can run for over 2 minutes in length for winter time data.

== Configuring and installing your camera ==

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick start guide] ===

=== [[Focusing_your_camera | Focusing your IP camera]] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2sq1hBwcAA Video tutorial - Configuring your IMX291 IP camera] ===

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1TPotXcRstHz-XWIQYIW71xkRYy7Ca1UCoEiZsqdk9zw/edit?usp=sharing Different ways of connecting the camera] ===

== What can I do with my GMN station? ==

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOjb3qxDlX4 Video Tutorial - Using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration + Manually reducing observations of fireballs and computing their trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=310 Generating a Google Earth KML file to show your station's field of view] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=253 Using UFO Orbit program to estimate meteor trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=221 Urban meteor observing] ===

== RMS Software Installation ==

=== Flash a pre-built image ===

Pre-built Images are available with the RMS software pre-installed on Raspbian. Raspbian is the operating system typically used on the Raspberry Pi.

A 128 GB microSD card is preferred, although smaller 64 GB cards will also work. The image is flashed to the microSD card using the Etcher utility for Windows (32 or 64-bit), MacOS or Linux (64-bit), which can be found [https://www.balena.io/etcher/ here]

When you first boot up the Pi make sure you have a keyboard, monitor and mouse attached as you will be taken through a setup process by the RMS software.

The current publicly released images of RMS are:
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/sa9csd4m3jr1vqo/RMS_image_20191203.zip?dl=1 RPi3B+ ]
and
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/3pwwenty43dazq4/RMS_RPi4_image_20210626.zip?dl=1 RPi4 ].

Please see the [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick Start Guide] about how to flash them to an SD card.

Notes:
* The earlier versions of the Raspberry Pi, the 1 and 2, are not powerful enough to run RMS software.

* the pre-installed RMS software images incorporate an auto-updating feature, so that the RMS software is updated to the current release whenever your Raspberry Pi RMS is booted. This way, your station is always running the most recent set of updates.

* For installations into other Linux or windows environments, executing the command ''git pull'' will update to the most recent RMS release.

* The code was designed to run on a RPi, but it will also run an some Linux distributions. We have tested it on Linux Mint 18 and Ubuntu 16. For information on installing into other Linux releases, check portions of the section listed below for installing on RPi, and also check installation instructions found on [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS GitHub]

== [OPTIONAL] Install the software from scratch ==

'''Note: if you're setting up a Raspberry Pi you should use the prebuilt image as this comes with all necessary software installed and is ready to use.'''. If you really really '''really''' do want to install on the RPi from scratch, you can follow the instructions below:

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 4 ===

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/19ImeNqBTD1ml2iisp5y7CjDrRV33wBeF9rtx3mIVjh4/edit?usp=sharing here]

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 3 ===

'''We no longer recommend the Pi3, as it doesn't have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers. '''

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ChaXx6WkuGfcQ_f5yRbwUOOMxEgIJrjq932UZE6cRjE/edit here].

=== Install for Linux ===

Detailed instructions [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Installation_for_Linux here]

=== Installation for Windows ===
Data capture does not work under windows. However you can use the other tools on your PC, where its much quicker to run SkyFit2 to calibrate your camera to the sky, or you want to use BatchFFToImage to convert data to jpeg format to share on Social Media.

Click '''[[Windows_Installation|here]]''' for detailed instructions. The instructions were tested on Windows 10 64-bit, but should work on any Windows version where git and Anaconda are available.

Aside: If you are a Windows whizz, please feel free to investigate why data capture doesn't work!

=== Installation for MacOS ===
As with Windows, installation for MacOS is useful if you want to analyse the data offline. If you do want to install it, please follow the instructions '''[[MacOS_Install | here]]'''.

== FAQ ==

=== What should I back up when re-flashing an SD card? ===

: The .config, platepar and mask files that are in the RMS source directory, plus the whole contents of the hidden directory /home/pi/.ssh.

If your SD card fails or becomes corrupted, the config files can be fetched from the server as they are uploaded every day together with the data. However the contents of .ssh are essential for connection to the server, so you must also save these. Once you set up a new SD card, return the files in their original location.

=== What are the values in FTPdetectinfo_* file designated as hnr mle bin Pix/fm Rho Phi? ===

: Some of these values are not used in RMS (hnr mle bin), but they are in CAMS, so they are here to conform to the standard. Thus they are all zeros. The others are:

: - Pix/fm - Average angular speed of the meteor in pixels per frame.

: - Rho, Phi - Parameters that define the line of the meteor in polar coordinates, see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hough_transform#Theory here] for more details. Rho is the distance of the line from the centre of the image, and phi is the angle of the line as measured from the positive direction of the Y axis (basically a line going from the center of the image to the top of the image), the positive angles are measured clockwise (I think, the CAMS standard might define these parameters a bit differently, the Y axis is flipped).

: The intensity is the sum of all pixel intensities of the meteor on a given frame. Let's say I represent an area around the meteor on a given frame like this, where the numbers are pixel intensities on an 8-bit image (so they can range from 0 to 255):

: [[File:Intensity_sum.png |Intensity_sum.png ]]

: and the pixels values inside the red boundary represent the meteor blob on the frame, the intensity would be the sum of all numbers inside the red boundary.
: This value is later used to compute the magnitude. The magnitude is computed as: mag = -2.5*log10(intensity sum) + photometric_offset. The photometric offset is estimated in SkyFit by fitting the line with slope -2.5 through pairs of known magnitudes of stars and logartihms of their pixel intensity sum. The photometric offset is basically the intercept of that line. The constant slope of -2.5 comes from the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apparent_magnitude#Calculations definition of stellar magnitudes.]

== GMN data policy ==

The Global Meteor Network produces several levles of data products:
* Level 1 - The lowest level data (i.e. as close to "raw" as possible) are the FF image and FR video files saved to the RPi by the capture code and the fireball detector.
* Level 2 - The meteor detector uses these data to extract positional and brightness information of individual meteors (FTPdetectinfo file), and images are also used for astrometric and photometric calibration (platepar file). Meteor and star detections are used to generate a range of plots suchs as the single-station shower association graph, camera drift graph, etc. The calibrated meteors measurements get uploaded to the GMN server together with the raw images of individual meteors.
* Level 3 - The software on the server correlates individual observations and computes multi-station meteor trajectories which are published daily on the GMN [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ data website]. This data is made public under the [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ CC BY 4.0 license].

Operators of individual GMN stations exclusivery own the Level 1 and Level 2 data their stations produce. In practice, this means that they are free to share this data with other meteor networks if they wish to do so. The data that gets uploaded to the GMN server will not be shared publicly nor with other parties without the operator's consent, but may be used internally by the GMN coordinators to manually produce other data products (e.g. trajectory of a meteorite dropping fireball, analysis of a meteor shower). All station operators will be credited for their data in all GMN publications.

== IstraStream ==

=== [http://istrastream.com/rms-gmn/ IstraStream GMN status website] ===

: The IstraStream.com is an independent hosting site which is part of our world wide GMN. It is primarily a host for data from cameras sold by IstraStream, but other station operators can request that their data be included.
To enable the IstraStream upload, the <b>external_script_run</b>, <b>external_script_path</b>, and <b>reboot_after_processing</b> parameters have to be changed. This is how the config file should look:

<pre>
; External script
; An external script will be run after RMS finishes the processing for the night, it will be passed three arguments:
; captured_night_dir, archived_night_dir, config - captured_night dir is the full path to the captured folder of the night
; the second one is the archived, and config is an object holding the values in this config file.
; ---------------
; Enable running an external script at the end of every night of processing
external_script_run: true
; Run the external script after auto reprocess. "auto_reprocess" needs to be turned on for this to work.
auto_reprocess_external_script_run: false
; Full path to the external script
external_script_path: /home/pi/source/RMS/iStream/iStream.py
; Name of the function in the external script which will be called
external_function_name: rmsExternal

; Daily reboot
; ---------------
; Reboot the computer daily after the processing and upload is done
reboot_after_processing: false
</pre>

Then, send an e-mail to [mailto:info@istrastream.com info@istrastream.com] with your:
* Station_ID
* Location or Name (if not secret)
* Lens type/size

For example, "CA0001; Elginfield Observatory, Ontario, Canada; 4mm". The IstraStream crew will enable the weblog page within a few days.

Finally, this document explains what every plot on the IstraStream weblog means:

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/132aHGn0QPzhpVN2s2n6FT6rJn39LAsPkchWJqXQb8Qk/edit?usp=sharing IstraStream Plots Explanation] ===

== For More Information ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=43 Contact the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork Join the Global Meteor Network Forum] ===

=== [https://github.com/markmac99/ukmon-pitools/wiki UK Meteor Network Wiki]===
This wiki has numerous FAQs and tips on maintaining, monitoring and managing your system, and several explainers such as how to calibrate and create a mask, how to copy data and so forth.

=== GMN talks ===

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6x9_WCVphY GMN talk at the European Space Agency's Fireball Workshop (June, 2021)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXBTLPnPDWs GMN Workshop (February, 2021)] - [https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ia9vagug5lxm8k9/AAB_i_1jcWThUdAHO_2gF_Ksa?dl=0 Link to slides]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Overview of the GMN - IMC2020 (September, 2020)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oM7lfQ4nmyw Overview of the GMN, Astro Imaging Channel presentation (May, 2020)]

=== GMN related publications ===

: [https://academic.oup.com/mnras/advance-article/doi/10.1093/mnras/stab2557/6368869 Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T., & Vida, D. (2021). Meteor shower radiant dispersions in Global Meteor Network data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2107.12335 Vida, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P. S., Brown, P. G., McIntyre, M. J., Dijkema, T. J., Pavletić, L., Kukić, P., Mazur, M.J., Eschman, P., Roggemans, P., Merlak, A., & Zubović, D. (2021). The Global Meteor Network–Methodology and first results. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 506(4), 5046-5074.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.05458/ Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T. D., & Vida, D. (2020). Realistic gravitational focusing of meteoroid streams. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 494(2), 2982-2994.]

: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Kukic-et-al-2018-Rolling-shutter.pdf Kukić, P., Gural, P., Vida, D., Šegon, D. & Merlak, A. (2018) Correction for meteor centroids observed using rolling shutter cameras. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46:5, 154-118.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_sun_skirter_final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Kukić, P., & Merlak, A. (2018). Compressive strength of a skirting Daytime Arietid-first science results from low-cost Raspberry Pi-based meteor stations. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 113-118.]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.02979.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - I. Theory. arXiv:1911.02979v4 [astro-ph.EP] 21 Apr 2020]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.11734.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - II. Results. arXiv:1911.11734v1 [astro-ph.EP] 26 Novr 2019]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_first_results-final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Zubović, D., Kukić, P., Parag, F., & Macan, A. (2018). First results of a Raspberry Pi based meteor camera system. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 71-78.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Vida_IMC2016_proceedings_final.pdf Vida, D., Zubović, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P., & Cupec, R. (2016). Open-source meteor detection software for low-cost single-board computers. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference (IMC2016), Egmond, The Netherlands (pp. 2-5).]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Zubovic_IMC2015_priceedings_final.pdf Zubović, D., Vida, D., Gural, P., & Šegon, D. (2015). Advances in the development of a low-cost video meteor station. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference, Mistelbach, Austria (pp. 27-30).]

Main Page

2021-11-24T17:27:07Z

Dvida: /* Install the software from scratch */

Welcome to the Global Meteor Network's wiki page!

The Global Meteor Network (GMN) is a world wide organization of amateur and professional astronomers alike, whose goal is to observe the night sky using low-light video cameras and produce meteor trajectories in a coordinated manner. Here you will find information on the purpose and structure of the GMN, assembling and operating your own meteor camera, contributing to the development of RMS the GMN software, as well as information on how your observations as a citizen scientist can contribute to the further understanding of our solar system's formation and evolution.

'''<span style="color:red">If you have come here to find out how to build and setup a camera from scratch, jump ahead to [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#How_do_I_obtain_a_camera.3F this] section !</span>'''

== Global Meteor Network Overview ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=141 Our mission] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=363 A brief history of the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Video introduction - Overview of the Global Meteor Network (IMC2020)] ===

=== [https://youtu.be/oM7lfQ4nmyw Video overview - Meteor tracking and the GMN from Astro Imaging Channel presentation] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ Some 'live' GMN data products] ===

== Meteor Detection Station ==

=== What is an RMS GMN station? ===
: A RMS-based GMN station that is the subject of this Wiki consists of a Raspberry Pi (RPi) single board computer, a low light level security video camera, and the RMS software package. The camera is securely mounted in a weatherproof housing, pointed at the sky, and connected to the RPi with a POE (Power Over Ethernet) cable. The RPi is connected to the Internet via WiFi, and to be a part of GMN network, you’ll need a fairly powerful Raspberry Pi (RPi 3B+, RPi 4 or better) and a reasonably fast Internet connection. The internet connection is primarily required to enable data upload to a central server each morning as well as provide automatic updates for the RMS software.

: Nightly, the RPi starts recording video from the camera shortly after local sunset continuously compressing and storing the video data locally. Each morning before sunrise, after capture is complete, the RPi analyzes the video and extracts your nightly station’s meteor observations. These extracted video “clips” of detected meteors are then archived and uploaded to a server. The clips can total hundreds of megabytes on a “busy” night (e.g., in a heavy meteor shower, or a night with a lot of false detections--progress is being made on the detection software). The server finds meteors which were observed with more than one station and this enables the server to triangulate the meteor trails in 3D and calculate the orbits of the meteors.

===[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS/blob/master/README.md What do I need?] ===

You'll need a Raspberry Pi with the software on, and a camera kit. We strongly recommend the Pi4 model. The software will run on a Pi3 but it is much slower.

=== How do I obtain a camera? ===
There are two options:

==== Buy a Camera ====
You can buy a camera and Pi prebuilt and ready to install. These are available from a couple of suppliers. The Croatian Meteor Network sell prebuilt cameras as explained on [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=136 this page]. Alternatively, if you're in the UK, you can obtain cameras from the [https://ukmeteornetwork.co.uk/ UK Meteor Network]

==== Build your own from scratch ====
This requires some basic DIY skills and some familiarity with the Raspberry PI, but don't be put off. The instructions are comprehensive and if you get stuck, you can ask for advice in the [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork groups.io] forum.

Click on this link if you want to '''[[Build_A_Camera|build a camera from scratch]]'''.

Once you've built the camera, You can '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#Flash_a_pre-built_image flash a Prebuilt image]''' onto an SD card to set up the Pi with the software required to capture meteors and upload data to the network.

=== Can I use a commercial all-sky camera? ===

: Generally no due to the lack of sensitivity. [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=163 But see this recent experiment]

== Operating and maintaining your GMN station ==

=== Overview ===

: Please note that GMS is a nascent operation and you may share some growing pains if you choose to be involved -- we're still working out some bugs and making improvements here, which may be an opportunity to help if you have programming skills! ;-) So note that the workload of day-to-day operation can be non-zero, and might take a little bit of your time.

: Ideally, you'll want to monitor your RMS RPi system(s) daily to look for freezes or glitches or other problems... like birds nesting or soiling the camera window, people accidentally unplugging the power cord, mice (or cats or dogs!) chewing on the camera Ethernet cable, etc.

: Although we are getting close, this is not a "power up and forget about it" system yet.
: However, by its very nature, the GMS network is inhabited by a lot of people who are willing to help newcomers getting started. So, here are some clues for daily operation of your RMS camera.

=== So what does the meteor camera do over the course of 24 hours? ===

: The RMS Python based system calculates the sundown to sunrise interval and schedules video camera capture all night long. Depending on the video camera and capabilities of the RPi, the camera captures 25 or more frames per second between evening and morning twilight. During the continuous image capture, the station begins processing captured image data, doing a pre-screening to target frames with a suitable number of stars (usually around 20) that makes it worth looking for meteor detections. Once data capture has finished, the station switches into processing all the promising frames for detections, then refining the astrometric accuracy of every positive detection. Using the station platepar (plate parameters) calibration file, processing iterates to find the best astrometry and photometry solution for each detected meteor. Once this process has analyzed each detection, summary files are created.
: These summary files include text file data presentation in several widely accepted formats (CAMS and UFOorbit), as well as graphic plots of detection frequencies throughout the night, a set of thumbnail images of detections, a set of thumbnail images of data captured throughout the night, a single image with all detections stacked together, plots of photometry, astrometry, and camera pointing drift in arc minutes throughout the course of the night as the mount or building flexes, a flat file for correcting images, and a plot of all detections showing any identified radiants. Finally all results are combined into a single compressed archive, which is automatically uploaded each morning to the central server. Optionally, you can create a mp4 movie showing a time lapse of the night’s captured images.
: Each morning you can review the result files on the RPi, and copy anything you want to your computer or tablet.

===Archiving data and backing up configuration ===

: Your primary scientific data is automatically uploaded to the central server every morning when data processing is done. However once it has done this, RMS will purge out the oldest data to free up space for the next night's run.

: So, you may want to copy some of the data to a PC, NAS or cloud for further analysis of your own. The data you should consider backing up are the contents of '''~/RMS_data/ArchivedFiles''', which holds the individual files and data that RMS determined were probably meteors. Full detail on how to nbare beyond the scope of the GMN Wiki, but tools such as robocopy (for Windows) and rsync(for Linux/MacOS) are ideal. These tools can 'mirror' data across a network. If you want help configuring these, ask in the Globalmeteornetwork group on groups.io.

: We've also built some automated tools that can help to back up any additional data to a thumb drive inserted into the RPi. Please ask in the group about these.

=== Viewing the data ===

: To view the data, you can use CMN_binViewer software[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer] which is already installed in the RMS SD image.
: There is also a Windows version[https://www.dropbox.com/s/4eutahlxojrkvsa/CMN_binViewer-setup64.exe?dl=1] you can install.

: '''Important note''' : You can also open the images in astronomical FITS viewers such as FITS Liberator or Pixinsight, though the results may be surprising. For example in FITS Liberator, the image will be '''upside down'''. This is an artefact of how the software reads the image. In space, there's no 'up' or 'down' and so the FITS specification does not dictate whether the pixel (0,0) is at the bottom left or top left, or indeed one of the other corners. Some software, notably FITS Liberator, treats the top left as the origin and so terrestrial images will be displayed mirrored vertically.

=== Tools and Utilities ===

* [https://www.realvnc.com/en/connect/download/viewer/ RealVNC] or [https://anydesk.com/en AnyDesk] remote connect tool allows station access from anywhere. Access from outside your network is enabled by use of an OpenVPN connection address available to meteor stations. Alternatively, with VNC and Teamviewer, you can create an account and team on their websites, and then remotely access your station.
* Samba data directory access, allows you to copy data results directly from your RPi to your computer or tablet.
* [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer CMN_binViewer] can be used to view standard fits image files containing meteor detections. It runs on the RPi, and is also available under Windows.
* [https://sonotaco.com/soft/e_index.html UFO Orbit] allows you to process data from multiple stations and generate unified radiants of two or more stations seeing the same meteor. It can plot the shared object ground path, orbital characteristics, and can output a summary file of all objects seen by more than one station, which can be used for further analysis.
* RMS software can be installed under Windows to allow much of the RMS python-based code to be executed on your computer, so it can be run against meteor station data you have transferred to your computer from the RPi.
* You can run RMS Python jobs on the RPi to sample the image files captured all night long and condense them into a mp4 movie. This creates a sometimes mesmerizing summary that can run for over 2 minutes in length for winter time data.

== Configuring and installing your camera ==

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick start guide] ===

=== [[Focusing_your_camera | Focusing your IP camera]] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2sq1hBwcAA Video tutorial - Configuring your IMX291 IP camera] ===

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1TPotXcRstHz-XWIQYIW71xkRYy7Ca1UCoEiZsqdk9zw/edit?usp=sharing Different ways of connecting the camera] ===

== What can I do with my GMN station? ==

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOjb3qxDlX4 Video Tutorial - Using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration + Manually reducing observations of fireballs and computing their trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=310 Generating a Google Earth KML file to show your station's field of view] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=253 Using UFO Orbit program to estimate meteor trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=221 Urban meteor observing] ===

== RMS Software Installation ==

=== Flash a pre-built image ===

Pre-built Images are available with the RMS software pre-installed on Raspbian. Raspbian is the operating system typically used on the Raspberry Pi.

A 128 GB microSD card is preferred, although smaller 64 GB cards will also work. The image is flashed to the microSD card using the Etcher utility for Windows (32 or 64-bit), MacOS or Linux (64-bit), which can be found [https://www.balena.io/etcher/ here]

When you first boot up the Pi make sure you have a keyboard, monitor and mouse attached as you will be taken through a setup process by the RMS software.

The current publicly released images of RMS are:
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/sa9csd4m3jr1vqo/RMS_image_20191203.zip?dl=1 RPi3B+ ]
and
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/3pwwenty43dazq4/RMS_RPi4_image_20210626.zip?dl=1 RPi4 ].

Please see the [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick Start Guide] about how to flash them to an SD card.

Notes:
* The earlier versions of the Raspberry Pi, the 1 and 2, are not powerful enough to run RMS software.

* the pre-installed RMS software images incorporate an auto-updating feature, so that the RMS software is updated to the current release whenever your Raspberry Pi RMS is booted. This way, your station is always running the most recent set of updates.

* For installations into other Linux or windows environments, executing the command ''git pull'' will update to the most recent RMS release.

* The code was designed to run on a RPi, but it will also run an some Linux distributions. We have tested it on Linux Mint 18 and Ubuntu 16. For information on installing into other Linux releases, check portions of the section listed below for installing on RPi, and also check installation instructions found on [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS GitHub]

== [OPTIONAL] Install the software from scratch ==

'''Note: if you're setting up a Raspberry Pi you should use the prebuilt image as this comes with all necessary software installed and is ready to use.'''. If you really really '''really''' do want to install on the RPi from scratch, you can follow the instructions below:

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 4 ===

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/19ImeNqBTD1ml2iisp5y7CjDrRV33wBeF9rtx3mIVjh4/edit?usp=sharing here]

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 3 ===

'''We no longer recommend the Pi3, as it doesn't have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers. '''

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ChaXx6WkuGfcQ_f5yRbwUOOMxEgIJrjq932UZE6cRjE/edit here].

=== Install for Linux ===

Detailed instructions [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Installation_for_Linux here]

=== Installation for Windows ===
Data capture does not work under windows. However you can use the other tools on your PC, where its much quicker to run SkyFit2 to calibrate your camera to the sky, or you want to use BatchFFToImage to convert data to jpeg format to share on Social Media.

Click '''[[Windows_Installation|here]]''' for detailed instructions. The instructions were tested on Windows 10 64-bit, but should work on any Windows version where git and Anaconda are available.

Aside: If you are a Windows whizz, please feel free to investigate why data capture doesn't work!

=== Installation for MacOS ===
As with Windows, installation for MacOS is useful if you want to analyse the data offline. If you do want to install it, please follow the instructions '''[[MacOS_Install | here]]'''.

== FAQ ==

=== What should I back up when re-flashing an SD card? ===

: The .config, platepar and mask files that are in the RMS source directory, plus the whole contents of the hidden directory /home/pi/.ssh.

If your SD card fails or becomes corrupted, the config files can be fetched from the server as they are uploaded every day together with the data. However the contents of .ssh are essential for connection to the server, so you must also save these. Once you set up a new SD card, return the files in their original location.

=== What are the values in FTPdetectinfo_* file designated as hnr mle bin Pix/fm Rho Phi? ===

: Some of these values are not used in RMS (hnr mle bin), but they are in CAMS, so they are here to conform to the standard. Thus they are all zeros. The others are:

: - Pix/fm - Average angular speed of the meteor in pixels per frame.

: - Rho, Phi - Parameters that define the line of the meteor in polar coordinates, see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hough_transform#Theory here] for more details. Rho is the distance of the line from the centre of the image, and phi is the angle of the line as measured from the positive direction of the Y axis (basically a line going from the center of the image to the top of the image), the positive angles are measured clockwise (I think, the CAMS standard might define these parameters a bit differently, the Y axis is flipped).

: The intensity is the sum of all pixel intensities of the meteor on a given frame. Let's say I represent an area around the meteor on a given frame like this, where the numbers are pixel intensities on an 8-bit image (so they can range from 0 to 255):

: [[File:Intensity_sum.png |Intensity_sum.png ]]

: and the pixels values inside the red boundary represent the meteor blob on the frame, the intensity would be the sum of all numbers inside the red boundary.
: This value is later used to compute the magnitude. The magnitude is computed as: mag = -2.5*log10(intensity sum) + photometric_offset. The photometric offset is estimated in SkyFit by fitting the line with slope -2.5 through pairs of known magnitudes of stars and logartihms of their pixel intensity sum. The photometric offset is basically the intercept of that line. The constant slope of -2.5 comes from the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apparent_magnitude#Calculations definition of stellar magnitudes.]

== GMN data policy ==

The Global Meteor Network produces several levles of data products:
* Level 1 - The lowest level data (i.e. as close to "raw" as possible) are the FF image and FR video files saved to the RPi by the capture code and the fireball detector.
* Level 2 - The meteor detector uses these data to extract positional and brightness information of individual meteors (FTPdetectinfo file), and images are also used for astrometric and photometric calibration (platepar file). Meteor and star detections are used to generate a range of plots suchs as the single-station shower association graph, camera drift graph, etc. The calibrated meteors measurements get uploaded to the GMN server together with the raw images of individual meteors.
* Level 3 - The software on the server correlates individual observations and computes multi-station meteor trajectories which are published daily on the GMN [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ data website]. This data is made public under the [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ CC BY 4.0 license].

Operators of individual GMN stations exclusivery own the Level 1 and Level 2 data their stations produce. In practice, this means that they are free to share this data with other meteor networks if they wish to do so. The data that gets uploaded to the GMN server will not be shared publicly nor with other parties without the operator's consent, but may be used internally by the GMN coordinators to manually produce other data products (e.g. trajectory of a meteorite dropping fireball, analysis of a meteor shower). All station operators will be credited for their data in all GMN publications.

== IstraStream ==

=== [http://istrastream.com/rms-gmn/ IstraStream GMN status website] ===

: The IstraStream.com is an independent hosting site which is part of our world wide GMN. It is primarily a host for data from cameras sold by IstraStream, but other station operators can request that their data be included.
To enable the IstraStream upload, the <b>external_script_run</b>, <b>external_script_path</b>, and <b>reboot_after_processing</b> parameters have to be changed. This is how the config file should look:

<pre>
; External script
; An external script will be run after RMS finishes the processing for the night, it will be passed three arguments:
; captured_night_dir, archived_night_dir, config - captured_night dir is the full path to the captured folder of the night
; the second one is the archived, and config is an object holding the values in this config file.
; ---------------
; Enable running an external script at the end of every night of processing
external_script_run: true
; Run the external script after auto reprocess. "auto_reprocess" needs to be turned on for this to work.
auto_reprocess_external_script_run: false
; Full path to the external script
external_script_path: /home/pi/source/RMS/iStream/iStream.py
; Name of the function in the external script which will be called
external_function_name: rmsExternal

; Daily reboot
; ---------------
; Reboot the computer daily after the processing and upload is done
reboot_after_processing: false
</pre>

Then, send an e-mail to [mailto:info@istrastream.com info@istrastream.com] with your:
* Station_ID
* Location or Name (if not secret)
* Lens type/size

For example, "CA0001; Elginfield Observatory, Ontario, Canada; 4mm". The IstraStream crew will enable the weblog page within a few days.

Finally, this document explains what every plot on the IstraStream weblog means:

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/132aHGn0QPzhpVN2s2n6FT6rJn39LAsPkchWJqXQb8Qk/edit?usp=sharing IstraStream Plots Explanation] ===

== For More Information ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=43 Contact the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork Join the Global Meteor Network Forum] ===

=== [https://github.com/markmac99/ukmon-pitools/wiki UK Meteor Network Wiki]===
This wiki has numerous FAQs and tips on maintaining, monitoring and managing your system, and several explainers such as how to calibrate and create a mask, how to copy data and so forth.

=== GMN talks ===

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6x9_WCVphY GMN talk at the European Space Agency's Fireball Workshop (June, 2021)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXBTLPnPDWs GMN Workshop (February, 2021)] - [https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ia9vagug5lxm8k9/AAB_i_1jcWThUdAHO_2gF_Ksa?dl=0 Link to slides]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Overview of the GMN - IMC2020 (September, 2020)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oM7lfQ4nmyw Overview of the GMN, Astro Imaging Channel presentation (May, 2020)]

=== GMN related publications ===

: [https://academic.oup.com/mnras/advance-article/doi/10.1093/mnras/stab2557/6368869 Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T., & Vida, D. (2021). Meteor shower radiant dispersions in Global Meteor Network data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2107.12335 Vida, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P. S., Brown, P. G., McIntyre, M. J., Dijkema, T. J., Pavletić, L., Kukić, P., Mazur, M.J., Eschman, P., Roggemans, P., Merlak, A., & Zubović, D. (2021). The Global Meteor Network–Methodology and first results. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 506(4), 5046-5074.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.05458/ Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T. D., & Vida, D. (2020). Realistic gravitational focusing of meteoroid streams. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 494(2), 2982-2994.]

: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Kukic-et-al-2018-Rolling-shutter.pdf Kukić, P., Gural, P., Vida, D., Šegon, D. & Merlak, A. (2018) Correction for meteor centroids observed using rolling shutter cameras. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46:5, 154-118.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_sun_skirter_final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Kukić, P., & Merlak, A. (2018). Compressive strength of a skirting Daytime Arietid-first science results from low-cost Raspberry Pi-based meteor stations. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 113-118.]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.02979.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - I. Theory. arXiv:1911.02979v4 [astro-ph.EP] 21 Apr 2020]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.11734.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - II. Results. arXiv:1911.11734v1 [astro-ph.EP] 26 Novr 2019]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_first_results-final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Zubović, D., Kukić, P., Parag, F., & Macan, A. (2018). First results of a Raspberry Pi based meteor camera system. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 71-78.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Vida_IMC2016_proceedings_final.pdf Vida, D., Zubović, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P., & Cupec, R. (2016). Open-source meteor detection software for low-cost single-board computers. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference (IMC2016), Egmond, The Netherlands (pp. 2-5).]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Zubovic_IMC2015_priceedings_final.pdf Zubović, D., Vida, D., Gural, P., & Šegon, D. (2015). Advances in the development of a low-cost video meteor station. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference, Mistelbach, Austria (pp. 27-30).]

Build A Camera

2021-11-12T14:25:16Z

Dvida: /* Additional items and tools */

= Parts and Tools needed =
[[File:01_annotated.jpg|thumb|right|Annotated Parts List]]

Click on the image to the right to see a larger version with the parts labelled

# IMX291 sensor board
# Lens with the lens holder - 4mm, 6mm are M16 mount as pictured, while other lenses might be CS which have a different holder
# 2x M2 screws
# Camera housing
# Small cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Large cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Camera Power over Ethernet (PoE) cable (sometimes called a network cable by the sellers)
# Camera board holder (supplied with the housing)
# Holder metal plate (supplied with the housing)
# 3x M2 screws, 12 mm long
# 1x M3-.50 screws, 6mm long
# Metal plate screws (supplied with the housing)
# Transparent weatherproof silicone
# Housing mounting bracket (supplied with the housing)
# Waterproof ethernet cable protector
# PoE injector to supply 48v to the camera (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi 4 Model B 2GB (or at least a 3B+ with 2GB) with official power supply (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi housing (not shown)
# 128 GB or greater microSD card (not shown)
# Self-amalgamating tape (not shown)

== Purchasing Parts ==
For consistency across the network and to make collaborative support possible, it is recommended that the camera and lenses listed below are used in preference to random handy bits that are cobbled together. The selected components are proven and known to work well. Other components can be sourced from any convenient seller.

Many components such as the Pi and microSD cards are are readily available in most locations. For other items such as lens, camera and housing, AliExpress - the Chinese equivalent of eBay - is the preferred online source as it serves most of the globe and has been reliably suppling parts to date.

NB: Links are given to current sellers, but stock levels vary and if the link is dead or the seller is out of stock, you should be able to find an equivalent from another seller on AliExpress.

=== Sensor ===
The bare IP security camera featuring a Sony IMX291 has been selected for the RMS system. This is available from many sellers on AliExpress. Out of the options offered, choose "With 48V POE cable" and "No lens":
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002315913099.html IVG-HP203Y-AE]
Always buy a lens separately from the list in the following section.

=== Lens ===
Most cameras available on Aliexpress come with a choice of lenses. The preferred lens is a 4mm f/0.95 M16 lens providing ~88x45° field of view, which can also be bought separately for example via this link.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32876034491.html 4mm f/0.95 M16]

If you live in an area with heavy light pollution, other options are available. We wholeheartedly recommend only using lenses from the following list, as others might not be as sensitive or might have large distortion. See [[Lens Options|this page]] for more lens options.

=== Housing ===
A security camera housing is used, providing weather-tight protection without distortion introduced by plastic domes. From the options offered, select "Plate and Bracket" to get a plate for mounting a 38x38mm bare IP camera module, and an L-shaped mounting bracket.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32355130687.html IP66 CCTV Camera Housing with Plate and Bracket] This will also provide a pair of cable glands and some essential screws.

=== Power Over Ethernet Injector ===
This connects by network cables to both the Raspberry Pi and the camera sensor, and injects 48V DC onto the network cable to the camera to supply it with power. Pick a suitable plug style for your location from the options offered. An example unit is:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32787153455.html PoE Injector 48V 0.5A]

Note that over short lengths of up to about 5m you can also use plain PoE connectors. These simply feed 12V from a power supply into the ethernet and extract it at the other end. Over short distances this will supply the camera with adequate power without the need for 48V injectors.

Finally, if you are operating several cameras, you can use a PoE switch instead of a PoE injector.

=== Cooled Housing for Raspberry Pi ===
This is one of the rare cases that fulfills our needs. It has a fan which is relatively quiet, it’s sturdy, and it can fit the RTC with the addition of riser pins. '''Please buy this case''', we have tried many others, but they are not as good. From the options offered, make sure you select one that says "for Pi 4" if you are using a Raspberry Pi 4, or "for Pi 3B Plus" if you are using a Raspbery Pi 3B+. Additionally there is a case variation that is fully enclosed and has no fans; do not select this option.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32959825297.html Raspberry Pi Aluminium Enclosure with fans]

=== Real Time Clock for Raspberry Pi ===
[[File:rtc.jpg|thumb|RTC installation|200px]]

Very precise timing is essential to processing the meteor data, so unless you are confident in your internet connection an RTC module ensures the Raspberry Pi always has the precise time, even when power or internet is unreliable. AliExpress sells a pack of 10 but they are inexpensive - maybe share the extras among other camera constructors in your area.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32770348851.html DS3231 RTC]

Once you plug it into the Pi (see image on the right) and make sure the current time is correct on the Pi, open the terminal and run:

<pre>
sudo hwclock -w
</pre>

This will set the current computer time to the RTC. Every time the Pi boots up, it will read the correct time from the RTC.

=== Pin Headers ===
Required to raise the height of the Raspberry GPIO bins to allow the RTC to sit proud of the Raspberry Pi case. You only need 1 but the pack of 20 is available for only a dollar or so.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32549850046.html Tall header pins]

=== Network cabling ===
You will need two lengths of network cabling, one (probably quite short) between the Raspberry Pi and the PoE injector and the other between the PoE injector and the camera. You can purchase suitable lengths locally or on AliExpress. Some people have found the following thin flat network cable to be useful for sneaking the wire through a window or door to avoid drilling holes in walls or eaves, although it will require some extra attention to seal the cable at the camera's PoE connector:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002311509668.html Cat6 Flat Ethernet Cable]

=== Waterproof Cable Connector ===
One end of the network cable will be outside, connected into the PoE cable from the camera. This is not only carrying data but 48V DC power and needs to be kept sealed. This waterproof connector is fitted over the end of the network cable connector then after the network cable is plugged into the camera's PoE cable, the connector is locked into the end of the PoE cable. For extra weatherproofing, wrap in self-amalgamating tape.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32834472563.html RJ45 Waterproof Connector Cap]

=== 128GB Micro SD Card ===
You need at least a 64GB card but a 128GB is recommended as 20+ GB of data is collected every night. Make sure it is a fast card eg Class 10 UHS-1 or better. A card can either be purchased locally or [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32676225311.html from AliExpress]. Be warned that there is an [https://photographylife.com/fake-memory-cards ongoing problem with the production and sale of fraudulent memory cards misreporting the available storage] and even supplies from a reputable outlet can be affected - test the card you purchase. The AliExpress link has been used successfully to obtain suitable micro SD cards. If you live in North America, buy your SD cards at Costco.

=== Raspberry Pi 4 ===
These are likely to be available to be purchased locally or from a domestic online source. You need at least a 2GB RAM model. The Raspberry Pi Model 3B+ is the minimum specification, and a Raspberry Pi Model 4B is preferred. Purchase the official 5.1V 3A 15.3W power supply to go with it - most problems with Raspberry Pi units are due to inadequate power supplies being used instead of purchasing the official power pack. Note: to connect a RPi 4B to a monitor you will also need a micro-HDMI cable, so that might be necessary to add to the shopping cart also.

=== Additional items and tools ===
* If the camera lens does not arrive with two small screws to mount the lens to the camera, you will need to locate two suitable small screws.
* A tube of silicone sealant is used to seal the glass window for the housing and the front screws in the housing.
* Self-amalgamating tape can be used to wrap and seal the cable connector(s) to ensure they remain weathertight in all conditions.
* Tools such as small wire cutters or a sharp knife, various sized screwdrivers, a drill and screws to mount the camera bracket will be required.

Deprecated shopping list: [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1XBSdrkwrOGPONIn5PBJ7YzH2vr7pUIxW3l8S62BQXEQ/edit LINK]

Some cameras come with a slightly different cable with a separate 12V socket for power input as shown [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/images/d/dc/Alternatecable.jpg here].
If the power input port has a small cap, then you can just cover it and use the PoE on the ethernet port. If it's open, then you will need a pair of PoE adapters (seen in that picture in the background).

To test and focus the camera you will need VLC. This software is preinstalled on the Pi but is also available for Mac, Windows or Linux from [https://www.videolan.org/vlc/ here].

= Assembly =
[Note: there's a longer version of the camera assembly section of this page available on Google Docs. Please refer to [https://docs.google.com/document/d/18TT-Jm7z9kYskl5ua07jQWD91OiyBemBnOosiNdW6nY/edit?usp=sharing this] if you need more information.]

<table><tr><td>
== Preparing the Lens ==
[[File:Irblock.jpg|thumb|right|Punching out the filter]]
* Start by removing protective covers from the sensor and lens. Take care not to touch the sensor after this is removed.

* The cameras come with an IR Block filter in the lens holder. We don't want this.
* If you have a lens like the one shown, unscrew the lens from the holder and using a screwdriver, carefully punch out the filter from the front as shown in the image on the right. If it shatters, make sure there are no shards left.

* Some lenses come with two filters, one for day and one for night. You'll be able to tell because the lens holder will have a small cable to plug into the camera board. If your lens is like this DO NOT try to punch out the filter. Instead remove the cover from the lens holder and carefully remove the clear filter. You can leave the other, reddish, daylight filter.

* Next look on the underside of the lens holder where you will see two plastic nubbins. These get in the way, so using the wire cutters snip them off. Make sure you get the base completely flat.

* Then screw the lens back into the lens holder.
</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Attaching the Lens to the Camera ==
[[File:lensattaching.jpg|thumb|right|Attaching the Lens]]

* Carefully unclip the circuit board from the plastic holder but do not detach the ribbon cable.

* Using the supplied screws, attach the lens to the sensor.

* Replace the circuit board in the plastic holder.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

= Preparing the Camera Housing =
[[File:glands.jpg|thumb|right|Glands in Place]]
* Fit the small cable gland to the housing and pass the loose ends of the Camera PoE cable up through, but don't tighten it up yet. Remember to slip the cap over the cable first!

* Fit the large cable gland in the other opening, and push a piece of plastic packing foam into it. Don't seal it up completely though this is to keep insects from getting in, but allow moisture out.
</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>
== Attaching the Camera ==
[[File:camerafitted.jpg|thumb|right|Camera In Mount]]

* Connect the metal camera holder to the metal plate using one 6mm M3 screw. Note the orientation of the plate as shown in the photo.

* Using three 12 mm M2 screws, connect the camera board to the metal holder passing the lens through the square hole from the back.

* Note that on some camera models, the writing on the camera board must be UPSIDE DOWN to get the correct orientation of the camera. In this orientation, the sockets for power and networking will be at the bottom of the rear of the camera board. To be sure you have it the right way up, see advice in the section on Testing and Focusing.

* Finally, remove the plastic cap on the lens.
See image for the proper camera board orientation, so the video is not sideways or upside down.
</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Installing the Camera in the Housing ==
[[File:camerainhousing.jpg|thumb|right|Camera In Housing]]

* Remove the plastic plate from inside the housing and discard it.

* Fit the camera on its metal plate into the housing, as close to the front glass as you can get it without actually touching. A few millimetres away should be good.

* Looking at the camera from the rear, attach the largest connector (often with blue/green wires) to the right hand socket.

* Attach the power connector to the left hand socket. This connector has several pins but only two are connected (red/black).

* The third connector (two pins, red/black) is for a powered lens and is not used so tape it back out of the way.

* Once you've secured the camera in position, you can tighten up the cable glands.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

= Testing and Focusing =
At this point, your camera must be tested and focused. There's no point sealing up the housing and screwing it to the wall if its not working or isn't focused !

== Testing the Camera ==
* If your camera came with a single PoE cable, connect this to a netork cable and plug the other end of the network cable into your PoE injector.

* if your camera came with a cable with separate network and power sockets, plug the "output" PoE adapter into the camera cable and plug a network cable into the PoE adapter, then connect the other end of the network cable into the other PoE adapter.
*. Connect the PoE adapter or injector into a spare socket on your home router and connect the camera power supply to it.

The Camera PoE cable lights should come on, indicating traffic is flowing. After a few seconds, it should steady down to irregular flashing. If you don't see flashing lights then check the cable connections to make sure everything is plugged in properly.

=== Find its IP Address ===
[[File:ip-scan.jpg|thumb|right|Finding the Camera Address]]
The camera should now appear as a device on your network and to test it properly you will need to find its IP Address. The easiest way to do this is using a free piece of software called [[https://www.advanced-ip-scanner.com/|Advanced IP Scanner]]. Download and run it (no need to install). Click "Scan" and wait till it finishes. The camera can usually be identified by Manufacturer 'ICP Internet Communications' or 'Motion Control Systems', though other vendor names are possible (see screenshot - i have five cameras!). If none of the names look right you may need to experiment by trying to connect.

=== Checking the Connection ===
[[File:vlcconfig.jpg|thumb|right|VLC Network Stream]]
* Once you have the IP Address, open VLC on your Pi, Mac or Windows machine, and from the "Media" menu, select "Open Network Stream".

* Enter the following into the address box, replacing '''1.2.3.4''' with the address you got in the previous step

<blockquote>rtsp://'''1.2.3.4''':554/user=admin&password=&channel=1&stream=0.sdp</blockquote>

* After a second or two, you should get a view through the camera. If nothing comes up, check you have got the right IP address, and that the cables are secure.

* You can now double-check that you installed the camera the right way up. If the image is upside down in VLC, turn it through 180 degrees in the housing.

* If the image is upside down, do '''not''' be tempted to use firmware settings to flip or mirror the image. These cameras have a 'rolling' shutter and to work out precise timings of meteors, the RMS software compensates for the shutter. If the camera is upside down and the image then flipped, the shutter is working in the opposite direction to that expected by RMS and timings will be wrong. You '''must''' physically rotate the camera.

* Note that its entirely normal for the image to be very red and overexposed in daylight. We've removed the IR Block filter, so the camera picks up a lot of red light. This is exactly what we want.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Checking for Obstructions ==
[[File:vlcview.jpg|thumb|right|Obstructions]]
* Temporarily close the housing case up and check if it can be seen obstructing the view anywhere.

* Move the camera around on the mount to minimise the obstructions, and if necessary bend or tilt the bracket to angle the camera down a bit.

* However, don't worry if you can't eliminate all obstructions. Later on you will create a software mask to prevent these areas causing false detections.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Focusing the Camera ==

There's a whole separate section of the Wiki on [[Focusing_your_camera|focusing]], but here's the short version !!
* connect the camera to your network as above.
* Open VLC.
* Aim the camera at something at around 30-50 metres away.
* Screw the lens in and out slowly to get best focus.

Note that there's a short lag due to the network, so you should wait a second or two after each adjustment to allow the change to be reflected in VLC.

Important note: if your camera came with an electronic filter, and you have left the 'daytime' filter in place, you MUST finalise focus at night. The filters slightly alter focus, so the daytime view is not focused when the nighttime view is!.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Setting Camera Parameters ==
To operate at night, the camera must be reset to the correct gain, colour mode and video mode. There are two ways you can do this:

=== Using the CMS Software ===
CMS is a security camera software package you can [https://learncctv.com/download-cms-software/ download] from the internet. You can use the CMS software as explained in [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2sq1hBwcAA this] video by Denis Vida.
Note however that you should reset the network as the LAST thing you do. The video does it a bit soon.

=== Using the RMS software (only for Pi4 systems) ===
[[File:Ping-camera.JPG|thumb|right|Making sure the Pi can see the Camera]]

* If not using the pre-built image, install RMS on the Pi as explained [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#RMS_Software_Installation here].

* Open a Terminal window on the Pi and, using the address of your camera, first make sure the Pi can ping the camera:
<pre>ping a.b.c.d</pre>

* Run this script to reset the camera IP address. You will lose connection to the camera and see a bunch of error messages. Thats normal. Once you see a timeout message, unplug the power and network from the camera.
<pre> python -m Utils.SetCameraAddress a.b.c.d 192.168.42.10</pre>

* Now plug the camera directly into the Pi's ethernet port and run the following script to update the camera gain, video mode, and other settings.
[[File:Setting-camer-params.JPG|thumb|right|Setting Camera Params]]
<pre>Scripts/RMS_SetCameraParams.sh</pre>

* Note: If you have RMS installed on your PC, you can change the camera address from your PC instead, then connect it to the Pi and run the 2nd script.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

= Final Steps =
== Sealing the Housing ==
[[File:sealedhousing.jpg|thumb|right|Sealing the Housing]]
Depending on your climate, its usually advisable to seal up the camera housing against rain and snow.

From the outside, carefully go round the edge of the glass with silicone sealant. Also squirt sealant into any screw holes visible on the front of the camera housing, where it will be most exposed to rain.

But DONT seal up the hinged door because you will occasionally need to maintain the camera, and you don't want to have to prise it open with a chisel!

If there are any cable connections outside the casing, you should also seal these up thoroughhly. This writer can attest to the damage caused by water ingress into a PoE connector! Tape up or seal the connections tightly with some sort of waterproof product (I used electrical tape), but remember you may need to change the cable, so don't seal it irreversibly.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>
== Mounting Outside ==
Mount the camera somewhere with a good view of the sky and without too many 'terrestrial' obstructions such as trees, hills and buildings. Take special care to angle well away from security lights. These lights emit infrared and without the IR Block filter, the IMX cameras are extremely sensitive to this.

When locating the camera, bear in mind that you will need to be able to get to the camera to maintain it. The cameras do not need to be high up as long as they have a good view of the sky. Mine are at eye-level on my observatory shed.

As before, don't worry if its not practical to eliminate all obstructions as you can mask off any that can't be avoided.

=== Aiming the Camera ===
[[file:cameraview.jpg|thumb|right|Aiming the Camera]]
The cameras have a field of about 40-45 degrees vertically and 90 degrees horizontally so angle the camera upwards at between 35-45 degrees, higher if you have lots of nearby hills or trees. This should maximise meteor detection.

If you can arrange so that the camera view overlaps with other RMS users, thats even better. Check with the network to get an idea of a good direction.

In this photo, the camera is aimed up at about 40 degrees, just above the top of the hill behind the camera location. The parts of the hill that are visible will be masked off in the software to avoid 'meteor-wrongs' due to dog-walkers with head torches!
</td></tr></table>

= Thats it! =
Once the camera is installed, connect up the PoE adapter, attach a long network cable and run it to wherever you are going to keep the Raspberry Pi. Remember to ask permission before drilling holes in the walls... :)

= Now install the Software =
Now you can finish configuring the Raspberry Pi by installing a prebuilt image. This is covered in a separate guide [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#RMS_Software_Installation here].

Build A Camera

2021-11-12T14:19:00Z

Dvida: /* Real Time Clock for Raspberry Pi */

= Parts and Tools needed =
[[File:01_annotated.jpg|thumb|right|Annotated Parts List]]

Click on the image to the right to see a larger version with the parts labelled

# IMX291 sensor board
# Lens with the lens holder - 4mm, 6mm are M16 mount as pictured, while other lenses might be CS which have a different holder
# 2x M2 screws
# Camera housing
# Small cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Large cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Camera Power over Ethernet (PoE) cable (sometimes called a network cable by the sellers)
# Camera board holder (supplied with the housing)
# Holder metal plate (supplied with the housing)
# 3x M2 screws, 12 mm long
# 1x M3-.50 screws, 6mm long
# Metal plate screws (supplied with the housing)
# Transparent weatherproof silicone
# Housing mounting bracket (supplied with the housing)
# Waterproof ethernet cable protector
# PoE injector to supply 48v to the camera (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi 4 Model B 2GB (or at least a 3B+ with 2GB) with official power supply (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi housing (not shown)
# 128 GB or greater microSD card (not shown)
# Self-amalgamating tape (not shown)

== Purchasing Parts ==
For consistency across the network and to make collaborative support possible, it is recommended that the camera and lenses listed below are used in preference to random handy bits that are cobbled together. The selected components are proven and known to work well. Other components can be sourced from any convenient seller.

Many components such as the Pi and microSD cards are are readily available in most locations. For other items such as lens, camera and housing, AliExpress - the Chinese equivalent of eBay - is the preferred online source as it serves most of the globe and has been reliably suppling parts to date.

NB: Links are given to current sellers, but stock levels vary and if the link is dead or the seller is out of stock, you should be able to find an equivalent from another seller on AliExpress.

=== Sensor ===
The bare IP security camera featuring a Sony IMX291 has been selected for the RMS system. This is available from many sellers on AliExpress. Out of the options offered, choose "With 48V POE cable" and "No lens":
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002315913099.html IVG-HP203Y-AE]
Always buy a lens separately from the list in the following section.

=== Lens ===
Most cameras available on Aliexpress come with a choice of lenses. The preferred lens is a 4mm f/0.95 M16 lens providing ~88x45° field of view, which can also be bought separately for example via this link.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32876034491.html 4mm f/0.95 M16]

If you live in an area with heavy light pollution, other options are available. We wholeheartedly recommend only using lenses from the following list, as others might not be as sensitive or might have large distortion. See [[Lens Options|this page]] for more lens options.

=== Housing ===
A security camera housing is used, providing weather-tight protection without distortion introduced by plastic domes. From the options offered, select "Plate and Bracket" to get a plate for mounting a 38x38mm bare IP camera module, and an L-shaped mounting bracket.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32355130687.html IP66 CCTV Camera Housing with Plate and Bracket] This will also provide a pair of cable glands and some essential screws.

=== Power Over Ethernet Injector ===
This connects by network cables to both the Raspberry Pi and the camera sensor, and injects 48V DC onto the network cable to the camera to supply it with power. Pick a suitable plug style for your location from the options offered. An example unit is:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32787153455.html PoE Injector 48V 0.5A]

Note that over short lengths of up to about 5m you can also use plain PoE connectors. These simply feed 12V from a power supply into the ethernet and extract it at the other end. Over short distances this will supply the camera with adequate power without the need for 48V injectors.

Finally, if you are operating several cameras, you can use a PoE switch instead of a PoE injector.

=== Cooled Housing for Raspberry Pi ===
This is one of the rare cases that fulfills our needs. It has a fan which is relatively quiet, it’s sturdy, and it can fit the RTC with the addition of riser pins. '''Please buy this case''', we have tried many others, but they are not as good. From the options offered, make sure you select one that says "for Pi 4" if you are using a Raspberry Pi 4, or "for Pi 3B Plus" if you are using a Raspbery Pi 3B+. Additionally there is a case variation that is fully enclosed and has no fans; do not select this option.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32959825297.html Raspberry Pi Aluminium Enclosure with fans]

=== Real Time Clock for Raspberry Pi ===
[[File:rtc.jpg|thumb|RTC installation|200px]]

Very precise timing is essential to processing the meteor data, so unless you are confident in your internet connection an RTC module ensures the Raspberry Pi always has the precise time, even when power or internet is unreliable. AliExpress sells a pack of 10 but they are inexpensive - maybe share the extras among other camera constructors in your area.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32770348851.html DS3231 RTC]

Once you plug it into the Pi (see image on the right) and make sure the current time is correct on the Pi, open the terminal and run:

<pre>
sudo hwclock -w
</pre>

This will set the current computer time to the RTC. Every time the Pi boots up, it will read the correct time from the RTC.

=== Pin Headers ===
Required to raise the height of the Raspberry GPIO bins to allow the RTC to sit proud of the Raspberry Pi case. You only need 1 but the pack of 20 is available for only a dollar or so.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32549850046.html Tall header pins]

=== Network cabling ===
You will need two lengths of network cabling, one (probably quite short) between the Raspberry Pi and the PoE injector and the other between the PoE injector and the camera. You can purchase suitable lengths locally or on AliExpress. Some people have found the following thin flat network cable to be useful for sneaking the wire through a window or door to avoid drilling holes in walls or eaves, although it will require some extra attention to seal the cable at the camera's PoE connector:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002311509668.html Cat6 Flat Ethernet Cable]

=== Waterproof Cable Connector ===
One end of the network cable will be outside, connected into the PoE cable from the camera. This is not only carrying data but 48V DC power and needs to be kept sealed. This waterproof connector is fitted over the end of the network cable connector then after the network cable is plugged into the camera's PoE cable, the connector is locked into the end of the PoE cable. For extra weatherproofing, wrap in self-amalgamating tape.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32834472563.html RJ45 Waterproof Connector Cap]

=== 128GB Micro SD Card ===
You need at least a 64GB card but a 128GB is recommended as 20+ GB of data is collected every night. Make sure it is a fast card eg Class 10 UHS-1 or better. A card can either be purchased locally or [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32676225311.html from AliExpress]. Be warned that there is an [https://photographylife.com/fake-memory-cards ongoing problem with the production and sale of fraudulent memory cards misreporting the available storage] and even supplies from a reputable outlet can be affected - test the card you purchase. The AliExpress link has been used successfully to obtain suitable micro SD cards. If you live in North America, buy your SD cards at Costco.

=== Raspberry Pi 4 ===
These are likely to be available to be purchased locally or from a domestic online source. You need at least a 2GB RAM model. The Raspberry Pi Model 3B+ is the minimum specification, and a Raspberry Pi Model 4B is preferred. Purchase the official 5.1V 3A 15.3W power supply to go with it - most problems with Raspberry Pi units are due to inadequate power supplies being used instead of purchasing the official power pack. Note: to connect a RPi 4B to a monitor you will also need a micro-HDMI cable, so that might be necessary to add to the shopping cart also.

=== Additional items and tools ===
* If the camera lens does not arrive with two small screws to mount the lens to the camera, you will need to locate two suitable small screws.
* A tube of silicone sealant is used to seal the glass window for the housing and the front screws in the housing.
* Self-amalgamating tape can be used to wrap and seal the cable connector(s) to ensure they remain weathertight in all conditions.
* Tools such as small wire cutters or a sharp knife, various sized screwdrivers, a drill and screws to mount the camera bracket will be required.

Deprecated shopping list: [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1XBSdrkwrOGPONIn5PBJ7YzH2vr7pUIxW3l8S62BQXEQ/edit LINK]

Some cameras come with a slightly different cable with a separate 12v socket for power input as shown [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/images/d/dc/Alternatecable.jpg here]. If you have this cable you will need a pair of PoE adapters (seen in that picture in the background). If your camera has a single cable as shown in the main picture, you will need a PoE injector or single adapter.

To test and focus the camera you will need VLC. This software is preinstalled on the Pi but is also available for Mac, Windows or Linux from [https://www.videolan.org/vlc/ here].

= Assembly =
[Note: there's a longer version of the camera assembly section of this page available on Google Docs. Please refer to [https://docs.google.com/document/d/18TT-Jm7z9kYskl5ua07jQWD91OiyBemBnOosiNdW6nY/edit?usp=sharing this] if you need more information.]

<table><tr><td>
== Preparing the Lens ==
[[File:Irblock.jpg|thumb|right|Punching out the filter]]
* Start by removing protective covers from the sensor and lens. Take care not to touch the sensor after this is removed.

* The cameras come with an IR Block filter in the lens holder. We don't want this.
* If you have a lens like the one shown, unscrew the lens from the holder and using a screwdriver, carefully punch out the filter from the front as shown in the image on the right. If it shatters, make sure there are no shards left.

* Some lenses come with two filters, one for day and one for night. You'll be able to tell because the lens holder will have a small cable to plug into the camera board. If your lens is like this DO NOT try to punch out the filter. Instead remove the cover from the lens holder and carefully remove the clear filter. You can leave the other, reddish, daylight filter.

* Next look on the underside of the lens holder where you will see two plastic nubbins. These get in the way, so using the wire cutters snip them off. Make sure you get the base completely flat.

* Then screw the lens back into the lens holder.
</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Attaching the Lens to the Camera ==
[[File:lensattaching.jpg|thumb|right|Attaching the Lens]]

* Carefully unclip the circuit board from the plastic holder but do not detach the ribbon cable.

* Using the supplied screws, attach the lens to the sensor.

* Replace the circuit board in the plastic holder.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

= Preparing the Camera Housing =
[[File:glands.jpg|thumb|right|Glands in Place]]
* Fit the small cable gland to the housing and pass the loose ends of the Camera PoE cable up through, but don't tighten it up yet. Remember to slip the cap over the cable first!

* Fit the large cable gland in the other opening, and push a piece of plastic packing foam into it. Don't seal it up completely though this is to keep insects from getting in, but allow moisture out.
</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>
== Attaching the Camera ==
[[File:camerafitted.jpg|thumb|right|Camera In Mount]]

* Connect the metal camera holder to the metal plate using one 6mm M3 screw. Note the orientation of the plate as shown in the photo.

* Using three 12 mm M2 screws, connect the camera board to the metal holder passing the lens through the square hole from the back.

* Note that on some camera models, the writing on the camera board must be UPSIDE DOWN to get the correct orientation of the camera. In this orientation, the sockets for power and networking will be at the bottom of the rear of the camera board. To be sure you have it the right way up, see advice in the section on Testing and Focusing.

* Finally, remove the plastic cap on the lens.
See image for the proper camera board orientation, so the video is not sideways or upside down.
</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Installing the Camera in the Housing ==
[[File:camerainhousing.jpg|thumb|right|Camera In Housing]]

* Remove the plastic plate from inside the housing and discard it.

* Fit the camera on its metal plate into the housing, as close to the front glass as you can get it without actually touching. A few millimetres away should be good.

* Looking at the camera from the rear, attach the largest connector (often with blue/green wires) to the right hand socket.

* Attach the power connector to the left hand socket. This connector has several pins but only two are connected (red/black).

* The third connector (two pins, red/black) is for a powered lens and is not used so tape it back out of the way.

* Once you've secured the camera in position, you can tighten up the cable glands.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

= Testing and Focusing =
At this point, your camera must be tested and focused. There's no point sealing up the housing and screwing it to the wall if its not working or isn't focused !

== Testing the Camera ==
* If your camera came with a single PoE cable, connect this to a netork cable and plug the other end of the network cable into your PoE injector.

* if your camera came with a cable with separate network and power sockets, plug the "output" PoE adapter into the camera cable and plug a network cable into the PoE adapter, then connect the other end of the network cable into the other PoE adapter.
*. Connect the PoE adapter or injector into a spare socket on your home router and connect the camera power supply to it.

The Camera PoE cable lights should come on, indicating traffic is flowing. After a few seconds, it should steady down to irregular flashing. If you don't see flashing lights then check the cable connections to make sure everything is plugged in properly.

=== Find its IP Address ===
[[File:ip-scan.jpg|thumb|right|Finding the Camera Address]]
The camera should now appear as a device on your network and to test it properly you will need to find its IP Address. The easiest way to do this is using a free piece of software called [[https://www.advanced-ip-scanner.com/|Advanced IP Scanner]]. Download and run it (no need to install). Click "Scan" and wait till it finishes. The camera can usually be identified by Manufacturer 'ICP Internet Communications' or 'Motion Control Systems', though other vendor names are possible (see screenshot - i have five cameras!). If none of the names look right you may need to experiment by trying to connect.

=== Checking the Connection ===
[[File:vlcconfig.jpg|thumb|right|VLC Network Stream]]
* Once you have the IP Address, open VLC on your Pi, Mac or Windows machine, and from the "Media" menu, select "Open Network Stream".

* Enter the following into the address box, replacing '''1.2.3.4''' with the address you got in the previous step

<blockquote>rtsp://'''1.2.3.4''':554/user=admin&password=&channel=1&stream=0.sdp</blockquote>

* After a second or two, you should get a view through the camera. If nothing comes up, check you have got the right IP address, and that the cables are secure.

* You can now double-check that you installed the camera the right way up. If the image is upside down in VLC, turn it through 180 degrees in the housing.

* If the image is upside down, do '''not''' be tempted to use firmware settings to flip or mirror the image. These cameras have a 'rolling' shutter and to work out precise timings of meteors, the RMS software compensates for the shutter. If the camera is upside down and the image then flipped, the shutter is working in the opposite direction to that expected by RMS and timings will be wrong. You '''must''' physically rotate the camera.

* Note that its entirely normal for the image to be very red and overexposed in daylight. We've removed the IR Block filter, so the camera picks up a lot of red light. This is exactly what we want.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Checking for Obstructions ==
[[File:vlcview.jpg|thumb|right|Obstructions]]
* Temporarily close the housing case up and check if it can be seen obstructing the view anywhere.

* Move the camera around on the mount to minimise the obstructions, and if necessary bend or tilt the bracket to angle the camera down a bit.

* However, don't worry if you can't eliminate all obstructions. Later on you will create a software mask to prevent these areas causing false detections.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Focusing the Camera ==

There's a whole separate section of the Wiki on [[Focusing_your_camera|focusing]], but here's the short version !!
* connect the camera to your network as above.
* Open VLC.
* Aim the camera at something at around 30-50 metres away.
* Screw the lens in and out slowly to get best focus.

Note that there's a short lag due to the network, so you should wait a second or two after each adjustment to allow the change to be reflected in VLC.

Important note: if your camera came with an electronic filter, and you have left the 'daytime' filter in place, you MUST finalise focus at night. The filters slightly alter focus, so the daytime view is not focused when the nighttime view is!.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Setting Camera Parameters ==
To operate at night, the camera must be reset to the correct gain, colour mode and video mode. There are two ways you can do this:

=== Using the CMS Software ===
CMS is a security camera software package you can [https://learncctv.com/download-cms-software/ download] from the internet. You can use the CMS software as explained in [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2sq1hBwcAA this] video by Denis Vida.
Note however that you should reset the network as the LAST thing you do. The video does it a bit soon.

=== Using the RMS software (only for Pi4 systems) ===
[[File:Ping-camera.JPG|thumb|right|Making sure the Pi can see the Camera]]

* If not using the pre-built image, install RMS on the Pi as explained [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#RMS_Software_Installation here].

* Open a Terminal window on the Pi and, using the address of your camera, first make sure the Pi can ping the camera:
<pre>ping a.b.c.d</pre>

* Run this script to reset the camera IP address. You will lose connection to the camera and see a bunch of error messages. Thats normal. Once you see a timeout message, unplug the power and network from the camera.
<pre> python -m Utils.SetCameraAddress a.b.c.d 192.168.42.10</pre>

* Now plug the camera directly into the Pi's ethernet port and run the following script to update the camera gain, video mode, and other settings.
[[File:Setting-camer-params.JPG|thumb|right|Setting Camera Params]]
<pre>Scripts/RMS_SetCameraParams.sh</pre>

* Note: If you have RMS installed on your PC, you can change the camera address from your PC instead, then connect it to the Pi and run the 2nd script.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

= Final Steps =
== Sealing the Housing ==
[[File:sealedhousing.jpg|thumb|right|Sealing the Housing]]
Depending on your climate, its usually advisable to seal up the camera housing against rain and snow.

From the outside, carefully go round the edge of the glass with silicone sealant. Also squirt sealant into any screw holes visible on the front of the camera housing, where it will be most exposed to rain.

But DONT seal up the hinged door because you will occasionally need to maintain the camera, and you don't want to have to prise it open with a chisel!

If there are any cable connections outside the casing, you should also seal these up thoroughhly. This writer can attest to the damage caused by water ingress into a PoE connector! Tape up or seal the connections tightly with some sort of waterproof product (I used electrical tape), but remember you may need to change the cable, so don't seal it irreversibly.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>
== Mounting Outside ==
Mount the camera somewhere with a good view of the sky and without too many 'terrestrial' obstructions such as trees, hills and buildings. Take special care to angle well away from security lights. These lights emit infrared and without the IR Block filter, the IMX cameras are extremely sensitive to this.

When locating the camera, bear in mind that you will need to be able to get to the camera to maintain it. The cameras do not need to be high up as long as they have a good view of the sky. Mine are at eye-level on my observatory shed.

As before, don't worry if its not practical to eliminate all obstructions as you can mask off any that can't be avoided.

=== Aiming the Camera ===
[[file:cameraview.jpg|thumb|right|Aiming the Camera]]
The cameras have a field of about 40-45 degrees vertically and 90 degrees horizontally so angle the camera upwards at between 35-45 degrees, higher if you have lots of nearby hills or trees. This should maximise meteor detection.

If you can arrange so that the camera view overlaps with other RMS users, thats even better. Check with the network to get an idea of a good direction.

In this photo, the camera is aimed up at about 40 degrees, just above the top of the hill behind the camera location. The parts of the hill that are visible will be masked off in the software to avoid 'meteor-wrongs' due to dog-walkers with head torches!
</td></tr></table>

= Thats it! =
Once the camera is installed, connect up the PoE adapter, attach a long network cable and run it to wherever you are going to keep the Raspberry Pi. Remember to ask permission before drilling holes in the walls... :)

= Now install the Software =
Now you can finish configuring the Raspberry Pi by installing a prebuilt image. This is covered in a separate guide [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#RMS_Software_Installation here].

File:Rtc.jpg

2021-11-12T14:13:09Z

Dvida:

Build A Camera

2021-11-12T14:06:32Z

Dvida: /* Power Over Ethernet Injector */

= Parts and Tools needed =
[[File:01_annotated.jpg|thumb|right|Annotated Parts List]]

Click on the image to the right to see a larger version with the parts labelled

# IMX291 sensor board
# Lens with the lens holder - 4mm, 6mm are M16 mount as pictured, while other lenses might be CS which have a different holder
# 2x M2 screws
# Camera housing
# Small cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Large cable gland (supplied with the housing)
# Camera Power over Ethernet (PoE) cable (sometimes called a network cable by the sellers)
# Camera board holder (supplied with the housing)
# Holder metal plate (supplied with the housing)
# 3x M2 screws, 12 mm long
# 1x M3-.50 screws, 6mm long
# Metal plate screws (supplied with the housing)
# Transparent weatherproof silicone
# Housing mounting bracket (supplied with the housing)
# Waterproof ethernet cable protector
# PoE injector to supply 48v to the camera (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi 4 Model B 2GB (or at least a 3B+ with 2GB) with official power supply (not shown)
# Raspberry Pi housing (not shown)
# 128 GB or greater microSD card (not shown)
# Self-amalgamating tape (not shown)

== Purchasing Parts ==
For consistency across the network and to make collaborative support possible, it is recommended that the camera and lenses listed below are used in preference to random handy bits that are cobbled together. The selected components are proven and known to work well. Other components can be sourced from any convenient seller.

Many components such as the Pi and microSD cards are are readily available in most locations. For other items such as lens, camera and housing, AliExpress - the Chinese equivalent of eBay - is the preferred online source as it serves most of the globe and has been reliably suppling parts to date.

NB: Links are given to current sellers, but stock levels vary and if the link is dead or the seller is out of stock, you should be able to find an equivalent from another seller on AliExpress.

=== Sensor ===
The bare IP security camera featuring a Sony IMX291 has been selected for the RMS system. This is available from many sellers on AliExpress. Out of the options offered, choose "With 48V POE cable" and "No lens":
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002315913099.html IVG-HP203Y-AE]
Always buy a lens separately from the list in the following section.

=== Lens ===
Most cameras available on Aliexpress come with a choice of lenses. The preferred lens is a 4mm f/0.95 M16 lens providing ~88x45° field of view, which can also be bought separately for example via this link.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32876034491.html 4mm f/0.95 M16]

If you live in an area with heavy light pollution, other options are available. We wholeheartedly recommend only using lenses from the following list, as others might not be as sensitive or might have large distortion. See [[Lens Options|this page]] for more lens options.

=== Housing ===
A security camera housing is used, providing weather-tight protection without distortion introduced by plastic domes. From the options offered, select "Plate and Bracket" to get a plate for mounting a 38x38mm bare IP camera module, and an L-shaped mounting bracket.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32355130687.html IP66 CCTV Camera Housing with Plate and Bracket] This will also provide a pair of cable glands and some essential screws.

=== Power Over Ethernet Injector ===
This connects by network cables to both the Raspberry Pi and the camera sensor, and injects 48V DC onto the network cable to the camera to supply it with power. Pick a suitable plug style for your location from the options offered. An example unit is:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32787153455.html PoE Injector 48V 0.5A]

Note that over short lengths of up to about 5m you can also use plain PoE connectors. These simply feed 12V from a power supply into the ethernet and extract it at the other end. Over short distances this will supply the camera with adequate power without the need for 48V injectors.

Finally, if you are operating several cameras, you can use a PoE switch instead of a PoE injector.

=== Cooled Housing for Raspberry Pi ===
This is one of the rare cases that fulfills our needs. It has a fan which is relatively quiet, it’s sturdy, and it can fit the RTC with the addition of riser pins. '''Please buy this case''', we have tried many others, but they are not as good. From the options offered, make sure you select one that says "for Pi 4" if you are using a Raspberry Pi 4, or "for Pi 3B Plus" if you are using a Raspbery Pi 3B+. Additionally there is a case variation that is fully enclosed and has no fans; do not select this option.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32959825297.html Raspberry Pi Aluminium Enclosure with fans]

=== Real Time Clock for Raspberry Pi ===
Very precise timing is essential to processing the meteor data, so unless you are confident in your internet connection an RTC module ensures the Raspberry Pi always has the precise time, even when power or internet is unreliable. AliExpress sells a pack of 10 but they are inexpensive - maybe share the extras among other camera constructors in your area.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32770348851.html DS3231 RTC]

=== Pin Headers ===
Required to raise the height of the Raspberry GPIO bins to allow the RTC to sit proud of the Raspberry Pi case. You only need 1 but the pack of 20 is available for only a dollar or so.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32549850046.html Tall header pins]

=== Network cabling ===
You will need two lengths of network cabling, one (probably quite short) between the Raspberry Pi and the PoE injector and the other between the PoE injector and the camera. You can purchase suitable lengths locally or on AliExpress. Some people have found the following thin flat network cable to be useful for sneaking the wire through a window or door to avoid drilling holes in walls or eaves, although it will require some extra attention to seal the cable at the camera's PoE connector:
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002311509668.html Cat6 Flat Ethernet Cable]

=== Waterproof Cable Connector ===
One end of the network cable will be outside, connected into the PoE cable from the camera. This is not only carrying data but 48V DC power and needs to be kept sealed. This waterproof connector is fitted over the end of the network cable connector then after the network cable is plugged into the camera's PoE cable, the connector is locked into the end of the PoE cable. For extra weatherproofing, wrap in self-amalgamating tape.
* [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32834472563.html RJ45 Waterproof Connector Cap]

=== 128GB Micro SD Card ===
You need at least a 64GB card but a 128GB is recommended as 20+ GB of data is collected every night. Make sure it is a fast card eg Class 10 UHS-1 or better. A card can either be purchased locally or [https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32676225311.html from AliExpress]. Be warned that there is an [https://photographylife.com/fake-memory-cards ongoing problem with the production and sale of fraudulent memory cards misreporting the available storage] and even supplies from a reputable outlet can be affected - test the card you purchase. The AliExpress link has been used successfully to obtain suitable micro SD cards. If you live in North America, buy your SD cards at Costco.

=== Raspberry Pi 4 ===
These are likely to be available to be purchased locally or from a domestic online source. You need at least a 2GB RAM model. The Raspberry Pi Model 3B+ is the minimum specification, and a Raspberry Pi Model 4B is preferred. Purchase the official 5.1V 3A 15.3W power supply to go with it - most problems with Raspberry Pi units are due to inadequate power supplies being used instead of purchasing the official power pack. Note: to connect a RPi 4B to a monitor you will also need a micro-HDMI cable, so that might be necessary to add to the shopping cart also.

=== Additional items and tools ===
* If the camera lens does not arrive with two small screws to mount the lens to the camera, you will need to locate two suitable small screws.
* A tube of silicone sealant is used to seal the glass window for the housing and the front screws in the housing.
* Self-amalgamating tape can be used to wrap and seal the cable connector(s) to ensure they remain weathertight in all conditions.
* Tools such as small wire cutters or a sharp knife, various sized screwdrivers, a drill and screws to mount the camera bracket will be required.

Deprecated shopping list: [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1XBSdrkwrOGPONIn5PBJ7YzH2vr7pUIxW3l8S62BQXEQ/edit LINK]

Some cameras come with a slightly different cable with a separate 12v socket for power input as shown [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/images/d/dc/Alternatecable.jpg here]. If you have this cable you will need a pair of PoE adapters (seen in that picture in the background). If your camera has a single cable as shown in the main picture, you will need a PoE injector or single adapter.

To test and focus the camera you will need VLC. This software is preinstalled on the Pi but is also available for Mac, Windows or Linux from [https://www.videolan.org/vlc/ here].

= Assembly =
[Note: there's a longer version of the camera assembly section of this page available on Google Docs. Please refer to [https://docs.google.com/document/d/18TT-Jm7z9kYskl5ua07jQWD91OiyBemBnOosiNdW6nY/edit?usp=sharing this] if you need more information.]

<table><tr><td>
== Preparing the Lens ==
[[File:Irblock.jpg|thumb|right|Punching out the filter]]
* Start by removing protective covers from the sensor and lens. Take care not to touch the sensor after this is removed.

* The cameras come with an IR Block filter in the lens holder. We don't want this.
* If you have a lens like the one shown, unscrew the lens from the holder and using a screwdriver, carefully punch out the filter from the front as shown in the image on the right. If it shatters, make sure there are no shards left.

* Some lenses come with two filters, one for day and one for night. You'll be able to tell because the lens holder will have a small cable to plug into the camera board. If your lens is like this DO NOT try to punch out the filter. Instead remove the cover from the lens holder and carefully remove the clear filter. You can leave the other, reddish, daylight filter.

* Next look on the underside of the lens holder where you will see two plastic nubbins. These get in the way, so using the wire cutters snip them off. Make sure you get the base completely flat.

* Then screw the lens back into the lens holder.
</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Attaching the Lens to the Camera ==
[[File:lensattaching.jpg|thumb|right|Attaching the Lens]]

* Carefully unclip the circuit board from the plastic holder but do not detach the ribbon cable.

* Using the supplied screws, attach the lens to the sensor.

* Replace the circuit board in the plastic holder.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

= Preparing the Camera Housing =
[[File:glands.jpg|thumb|right|Glands in Place]]
* Fit the small cable gland to the housing and pass the loose ends of the Camera PoE cable up through, but don't tighten it up yet. Remember to slip the cap over the cable first!

* Fit the large cable gland in the other opening, and push a piece of plastic packing foam into it. Don't seal it up completely though this is to keep insects from getting in, but allow moisture out.
</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>
== Attaching the Camera ==
[[File:camerafitted.jpg|thumb|right|Camera In Mount]]

* Connect the metal camera holder to the metal plate using one 6mm M3 screw. Note the orientation of the plate as shown in the photo.

* Using three 12 mm M2 screws, connect the camera board to the metal holder passing the lens through the square hole from the back.

* Note that on some camera models, the writing on the camera board must be UPSIDE DOWN to get the correct orientation of the camera. In this orientation, the sockets for power and networking will be at the bottom of the rear of the camera board. To be sure you have it the right way up, see advice in the section on Testing and Focusing.

* Finally, remove the plastic cap on the lens.
See image for the proper camera board orientation, so the video is not sideways or upside down.
</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Installing the Camera in the Housing ==
[[File:camerainhousing.jpg|thumb|right|Camera In Housing]]

* Remove the plastic plate from inside the housing and discard it.

* Fit the camera on its metal plate into the housing, as close to the front glass as you can get it without actually touching. A few millimetres away should be good.

* Looking at the camera from the rear, attach the largest connector (often with blue/green wires) to the right hand socket.

* Attach the power connector to the left hand socket. This connector has several pins but only two are connected (red/black).

* The third connector (two pins, red/black) is for a powered lens and is not used so tape it back out of the way.

* Once you've secured the camera in position, you can tighten up the cable glands.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

= Testing and Focusing =
At this point, your camera must be tested and focused. There's no point sealing up the housing and screwing it to the wall if its not working or isn't focused !

== Testing the Camera ==
* If your camera came with a single PoE cable, connect this to a netork cable and plug the other end of the network cable into your PoE injector.

* if your camera came with a cable with separate network and power sockets, plug the "output" PoE adapter into the camera cable and plug a network cable into the PoE adapter, then connect the other end of the network cable into the other PoE adapter.
*. Connect the PoE adapter or injector into a spare socket on your home router and connect the camera power supply to it.

The Camera PoE cable lights should come on, indicating traffic is flowing. After a few seconds, it should steady down to irregular flashing. If you don't see flashing lights then check the cable connections to make sure everything is plugged in properly.

=== Find its IP Address ===
[[File:ip-scan.jpg|thumb|right|Finding the Camera Address]]
The camera should now appear as a device on your network and to test it properly you will need to find its IP Address. The easiest way to do this is using a free piece of software called [[https://www.advanced-ip-scanner.com/|Advanced IP Scanner]]. Download and run it (no need to install). Click "Scan" and wait till it finishes. The camera can usually be identified by Manufacturer 'ICP Internet Communications' or 'Motion Control Systems', though other vendor names are possible (see screenshot - i have five cameras!). If none of the names look right you may need to experiment by trying to connect.

=== Checking the Connection ===
[[File:vlcconfig.jpg|thumb|right|VLC Network Stream]]
* Once you have the IP Address, open VLC on your Pi, Mac or Windows machine, and from the "Media" menu, select "Open Network Stream".

* Enter the following into the address box, replacing '''1.2.3.4''' with the address you got in the previous step

<blockquote>rtsp://'''1.2.3.4''':554/user=admin&password=&channel=1&stream=0.sdp</blockquote>

* After a second or two, you should get a view through the camera. If nothing comes up, check you have got the right IP address, and that the cables are secure.

* You can now double-check that you installed the camera the right way up. If the image is upside down in VLC, turn it through 180 degrees in the housing.

* If the image is upside down, do '''not''' be tempted to use firmware settings to flip or mirror the image. These cameras have a 'rolling' shutter and to work out precise timings of meteors, the RMS software compensates for the shutter. If the camera is upside down and the image then flipped, the shutter is working in the opposite direction to that expected by RMS and timings will be wrong. You '''must''' physically rotate the camera.

* Note that its entirely normal for the image to be very red and overexposed in daylight. We've removed the IR Block filter, so the camera picks up a lot of red light. This is exactly what we want.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Checking for Obstructions ==
[[File:vlcview.jpg|thumb|right|Obstructions]]
* Temporarily close the housing case up and check if it can be seen obstructing the view anywhere.

* Move the camera around on the mount to minimise the obstructions, and if necessary bend or tilt the bracket to angle the camera down a bit.

* However, don't worry if you can't eliminate all obstructions. Later on you will create a software mask to prevent these areas causing false detections.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Focusing the Camera ==

There's a whole separate section of the Wiki on [[Focusing_your_camera|focusing]], but here's the short version !!
* connect the camera to your network as above.
* Open VLC.
* Aim the camera at something at around 30-50 metres away.
* Screw the lens in and out slowly to get best focus.

Note that there's a short lag due to the network, so you should wait a second or two after each adjustment to allow the change to be reflected in VLC.

Important note: if your camera came with an electronic filter, and you have left the 'daytime' filter in place, you MUST finalise focus at night. The filters slightly alter focus, so the daytime view is not focused when the nighttime view is!.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

== Setting Camera Parameters ==
To operate at night, the camera must be reset to the correct gain, colour mode and video mode. There are two ways you can do this:

=== Using the CMS Software ===
CMS is a security camera software package you can [https://learncctv.com/download-cms-software/ download] from the internet. You can use the CMS software as explained in [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2sq1hBwcAA this] video by Denis Vida.
Note however that you should reset the network as the LAST thing you do. The video does it a bit soon.

=== Using the RMS software (only for Pi4 systems) ===
[[File:Ping-camera.JPG|thumb|right|Making sure the Pi can see the Camera]]

* If not using the pre-built image, install RMS on the Pi as explained [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#RMS_Software_Installation here].

* Open a Terminal window on the Pi and, using the address of your camera, first make sure the Pi can ping the camera:
<pre>ping a.b.c.d</pre>

* Run this script to reset the camera IP address. You will lose connection to the camera and see a bunch of error messages. Thats normal. Once you see a timeout message, unplug the power and network from the camera.
<pre> python -m Utils.SetCameraAddress a.b.c.d 192.168.42.10</pre>

* Now plug the camera directly into the Pi's ethernet port and run the following script to update the camera gain, video mode, and other settings.
[[File:Setting-camer-params.JPG|thumb|right|Setting Camera Params]]
<pre>Scripts/RMS_SetCameraParams.sh</pre>

* Note: If you have RMS installed on your PC, you can change the camera address from your PC instead, then connect it to the Pi and run the 2nd script.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>

= Final Steps =
== Sealing the Housing ==
[[File:sealedhousing.jpg|thumb|right|Sealing the Housing]]
Depending on your climate, its usually advisable to seal up the camera housing against rain and snow.

From the outside, carefully go round the edge of the glass with silicone sealant. Also squirt sealant into any screw holes visible on the front of the camera housing, where it will be most exposed to rain.

But DONT seal up the hinged door because you will occasionally need to maintain the camera, and you don't want to have to prise it open with a chisel!

If there are any cable connections outside the casing, you should also seal these up thoroughhly. This writer can attest to the damage caused by water ingress into a PoE connector! Tape up or seal the connections tightly with some sort of waterproof product (I used electrical tape), but remember you may need to change the cable, so don't seal it irreversibly.

</td></tr></table>

<table><tr><td>
== Mounting Outside ==
Mount the camera somewhere with a good view of the sky and without too many 'terrestrial' obstructions such as trees, hills and buildings. Take special care to angle well away from security lights. These lights emit infrared and without the IR Block filter, the IMX cameras are extremely sensitive to this.

When locating the camera, bear in mind that you will need to be able to get to the camera to maintain it. The cameras do not need to be high up as long as they have a good view of the sky. Mine are at eye-level on my observatory shed.

As before, don't worry if its not practical to eliminate all obstructions as you can mask off any that can't be avoided.

=== Aiming the Camera ===
[[file:cameraview.jpg|thumb|right|Aiming the Camera]]
The cameras have a field of about 40-45 degrees vertically and 90 degrees horizontally so angle the camera upwards at between 35-45 degrees, higher if you have lots of nearby hills or trees. This should maximise meteor detection.

If you can arrange so that the camera view overlaps with other RMS users, thats even better. Check with the network to get an idea of a good direction.

In this photo, the camera is aimed up at about 40 degrees, just above the top of the hill behind the camera location. The parts of the hill that are visible will be masked off in the software to avoid 'meteor-wrongs' due to dog-walkers with head torches!
</td></tr></table>

= Thats it! =
Once the camera is installed, connect up the PoE adapter, attach a long network cable and run it to wherever you are going to keep the Raspberry Pi. Remember to ask permission before drilling holes in the walls... :)

= Now install the Software =
Now you can finish configuring the Raspberry Pi by installing a prebuilt image. This is covered in a separate guide [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#RMS_Software_Installation here].

Main Page

2021-10-11T13:50:07Z

Dvida: /* IstraStream */

Welcome to the Global Meteor Network's wiki page!

The Global Meteor Network (GMN) is a world wide organization of amateur and professional astronomers alike, whose goal is to observe the night sky using low-light video cameras and produce meteor trajectories in a coordinated manner. Here you will find information on the purpose and structure of the GMN, assembling and operating your own meteor camera, contributing to the development of RMS the GMN software, as well as information on how your observations as a citizen scientist can contribute to the further understanding of our solar system's formation and evolution.

'''<span style="color:red">If you have come here to find out how to build and setup a camera from scratch, jump ahead to [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#How_do_I_obtain_a_camera.3F this] section !</span>'''

== Global Meteor Network Overview ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=141 Our mission] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=363 A brief history of the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Video introduction - Overview of the Global Meteor Network (IMC2020)] ===

=== [https://youtu.be/oM7lfQ4nmyw Video overview - Meteor tracking and the GMN from Astro Imaging Channel presentation] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ Some 'live' GMN data products] ===

== Meteor Detection Station ==

=== What is an RMS GMN station? ===
: A RMS-based GMN station that is the subject of this Wiki consists of a Raspberry Pi (RPi) single board computer, a low light level security video camera, and the RMS software package. The camera is securely mounted in a weatherproof housing, pointed at the sky, and connected to the RPi with a POE (Power Over Ethernet) cable. The RPi is connected to the Internet via WiFi, and to be a part of GMN network, you’ll need a fairly powerful Raspberry Pi (RPi 3B+, RPi 4 or better) and a reasonably fast Internet connection. The internet connection is primarily required to enable data upload to a central server each morning as well as provide automatic updates for the RMS software.

: Nightly, the RPi starts recording video from the camera shortly after local sunset continuously compressing and storing the video data locally. Each morning before sunrise, after capture is complete, the RPi analyzes the video and extracts your nightly station’s meteor observations. These extracted video “clips” of detected meteors are then archived and uploaded to a server. The clips can total hundreds of megabytes on a “busy” night (e.g., in a heavy meteor shower, or a night with a lot of false detections--progress is being made on the detection software). The server finds meteors which were observed with more than one station and this enables the server to triangulate the meteor trails in 3D and calculate the orbits of the meteors.

===[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS/blob/master/README.md What do I need?] ===

You'll need a Raspberry Pi with the software on, and a camera kit. We strongly recommend the Pi4 model. The software will run on a Pi3 but it is much slower.

=== How do I obtain a camera? ===
There are two options:

==== Buy a Camera ====
You can buy a camera and Pi prebuilt and ready to install. These are available from a couple of suppliers. The Croatian Meteor Network sell prebuilt cameras as explained on [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=136 this page]. Alternatively, if you're in the UK, you can obtain cameras from the [https://ukmeteornetwork.co.uk/ UK Meteor Network]

==== Build your own from scratch ====
This requires some basic DIY skills and some familiarity with the Raspberry PI, but don't be put off. The instructions are comprehensive and if you get stuck, you can ask for advice in the [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork groups.io] forum.

Click on this link if you want to '''[[Build_A_Camera|build a camera from scratch]]'''.

Once you've built the camera, You can '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#Flash_a_pre-built_image flash a Prebuilt image]''' onto an SD card to set up the Pi with the software required to capture meteors and upload data to the network.

=== Can I use a commercial all-sky camera? ===

: Generally no due to the lack of sensitivity. [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=163 But see this recent experiment]

== Operating and maintaining your GMN station ==

=== Overview ===

: Please note that GMS is a nascent operation and you may share some growing pains if you choose to be involved -- we're still working out some bugs and making improvements here, which may be an opportunity to help if you have programming skills! ;-) So note that the workload of day-to-day operation can be non-zero, and might take a little bit of your time.

: Ideally, you'll want to monitor your RMS RPi system(s) daily to look for freezes or glitches or other problems... like birds nesting or soiling the camera window, people accidentally unplugging the power cord, mice (or cats or dogs!) chewing on the camera Ethernet cable, etc.

: Although we are getting close, this is not a "power up and forget about it" system yet.
: However, by its very nature, the GMS network is inhabited by a lot of people who are willing to help newcomers getting started. So, here are some clues for daily operation of your RMS camera.

=== So what does the meteor camera do over the course of 24 hours? ===

: The RMS Python based system calculates the sundown to sunrise interval and schedules video camera capture all night long. Depending on the video camera and capabilities of the RPi, the camera captures 25 or more frames per second between evening and morning twilight. During the continuous image capture, the station begins processing captured image data, doing a pre-screening to target frames with a suitable number of stars (usually around 20) that makes it worth looking for meteor detections. Once data capture has finished, the station switches into processing all the promising frames for detections, then refining the astrometric accuracy of every positive detection. Using the station platepar (plate parameters) calibration file, processing iterates to find the best astrometry and photometry solution for each detected meteor. Once this process has analyzed each detection, summary files are created.
: These summary files include text file data presentation in several widely accepted formats (CAMS and UFOorbit), as well as graphic plots of detection frequencies throughout the night, a set of thumbnail images of detections, a set of thumbnail images of data captured throughout the night, a single image with all detections stacked together, plots of photometry, astrometry, and camera pointing drift in arc minutes throughout the course of the night as the mount or building flexes, a flat file for correcting images, and a plot of all detections showing any identified radiants. Finally all results are combined into a single compressed archive, which is automatically uploaded each morning to the central server. Optionally, you can create a mp4 movie showing a time lapse of the night’s captured images.
: Each morning you can review the result files on the RPi, and copy anything you want to your computer or tablet.

===Archiving data and backing up configuration ===

: Your primary scientific data is automatically uploaded to the central server every morning when data processing is done. However once it has done this, RMS will purge out the oldest data to free up space for the next night's run.

: So, you may want to copy some of the data to a PC, NAS or cloud for further analysis of your own. The data you should consider backing up are the contents of '''~/RMS_data/ArchivedFiles''', which holds the individual files and data that RMS determined were probably meteors. Full detail on how to nbare beyond the scope of the GMN Wiki, but tools such as robocopy (for Windows) and rsync(for Linux/MacOS) are ideal. These tools can 'mirror' data across a network. If you want help configuring these, ask in the Globalmeteornetwork group on groups.io.

: We've also built some automated tools that can help to back up any additional data to a thumb drive inserted into the RPi. Please ask in the group about these.

=== Viewing the data ===

: To view the data, you can use CMN_binViewer software[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer] which is already installed in the RMS SD image.
: There is also a Windows version[https://www.dropbox.com/s/4eutahlxojrkvsa/CMN_binViewer-setup64.exe?dl=1] you can install.

: '''Important note''' : You can also open the images in astronomical FITS viewers such as FITS Liberator or Pixinsight, though the results may be surprising. For example in FITS Liberator, the image will be '''upside down'''. This is an artefact of how the software reads the image. In space, there's no 'up' or 'down' and so the FITS specification does not dictate whether the pixel (0,0) is at the bottom left or top left, or indeed one of the other corners. Some software, notably FITS Liberator, treats the top left as the origin and so terrestrial images will be displayed mirrored vertically.

=== Tools and Utilities ===

* [https://www.realvnc.com/en/connect/download/viewer/ RealVNC] or [https://anydesk.com/en AnyDesk] remote connect tool allows station access from anywhere. Access from outside your network is enabled by use of an OpenVPN connection address available to meteor stations. Alternatively, with VNC and Teamviewer, you can create an account and team on their websites, and then remotely access your station.
* Samba data directory access, allows you to copy data results directly from your RPi to your computer or tablet.
* [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer CMN_binViewer] can be used to view standard fits image files containing meteor detections. It runs on the RPi, and is also available under Windows.
* [https://sonotaco.com/soft/e_index.html UFO Orbit] allows you to process data from multiple stations and generate unified radiants of two or more stations seeing the same meteor. It can plot the shared object ground path, orbital characteristics, and can output a summary file of all objects seen by more than one station, which can be used for further analysis.
* RMS software can be installed under Windows to allow much of the RMS python-based code to be executed on your computer, so it can be run against meteor station data you have transferred to your computer from the RPi.
* You can run RMS Python jobs on the RPi to sample the image files captured all night long and condense them into a mp4 movie. This creates a sometimes mesmerizing summary that can run for over 2 minutes in length for winter time data.

== Configuring and installing your camera ==

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick start guide] ===

=== [[Focusing_your_camera | Focusing your IP camera]] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2sq1hBwcAA Video tutorial - Configuring your IMX291 IP camera] ===

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1TPotXcRstHz-XWIQYIW71xkRYy7Ca1UCoEiZsqdk9zw/edit?usp=sharing Different ways of connecting the camera] ===

== What can I do with my GMN station? ==

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOjb3qxDlX4 Video Tutorial - Using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration + Manually reducing observations of fireballs and computing their trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=310 Generating a Google Earth KML file to show your station's field of view] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=253 Using UFO Orbit program to estimate meteor trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=221 Urban meteor observing] ===

== RMS Software Installation ==

=== Flash a pre-built image ===

Pre-built Images are available with the RMS software pre-installed on Raspbian. Raspbian is the operating system typically used on the Raspberry Pi.

A 128 GB microSD card is preferred, although smaller 64 GB cards will also work. The image is flashed to the microSD card using the Etcher utility for Windows (32 or 64-bit), MacOS or Linux (64-bit), which can be found [https://www.balena.io/etcher/ here]

When you first boot up the Pi make sure you have a keyboard, monitor and mouse attached as you will be taken through a setup process by the RMS software.

The current publicly released images of RMS are:
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/sa9csd4m3jr1vqo/RMS_image_20191203.zip?dl=1 RPi3B+ ]
and
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/3pwwenty43dazq4/RMS_RPi4_image_20210626.zip?dl=1 RPi4 ].

Please see the [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick Start Guide] about how to flash them to an SD card.

Notes:
* The earlier versions of the Raspberry Pi, the 1 and 2, are not powerful enough to run RMS software.

* the pre-installed RMS software images incorporate an auto-updating feature, so that the RMS software is updated to the current release whenever your Raspberry Pi RMS is booted. This way, your station is always running the most recent set of updates.

* For installations into other Linux or windows environments, executing the command ''git pull'' will update to the most recent RMS release.

* The code was designed to run on a RPi, but it will also run an some Linux distributions. We have tested it on Linux Mint 18 and Ubuntu 16. For information on installing into other Linux releases, check portions of the section listed below for installing on RPi, and also check installation instructions found on [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS GitHub]

== Install the software from scratch ==

'''Note: if you're setting up a Rspberry Pi you should use the prebuilt image as this comes with all necessary software installed and is ready to use.'''. If you really do want to install on the RPi from scratch, you can follow the instructions below:

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 4 ===

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/19ImeNqBTD1ml2iisp5y7CjDrRV33wBeF9rtx3mIVjh4/edit?usp=sharing here]

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 3 ===

'''We no longer recommend the Pi3, as it doesn't have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers. '''

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ChaXx6WkuGfcQ_f5yRbwUOOMxEgIJrjq932UZE6cRjE/edit here].

=== Install for Linux ===

Detailed instructions [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Installation_for_Linux here]

=== Installation for Windows ===
Data capture does not work under windows. However you can use the other tools on your PC, where its much quicker to run SkyFit2 to calibrate your camera to the sky, or you want to use BatchFFToImage to convert data to jpeg format to share on Social Media.

Click '''[[Windows_Installation|here]]''' for detailed instructions. The instructions were tested on Windows 10 64-bit, but should work on any Windows version where git and Anaconda are available.

Aside: If you are a Windows whizz, please feel free to investigate why data capture doesn't work!

=== Installation for MacOS ===
As with Windows, installation for MacOS is useful if you want to analyse the data offline. If you do want to install it, please follow the instructions '''[[MacOS_Install | here]]'''.

== FAQ ==

=== What should I back up when re-flashing an SD card? ===

: The .config, platepar and mask files that are in the RMS source directory, plus the whole contents of the hidden directory /home/pi/.ssh.

If your SD card fails or becomes corrupted, the config files can be fetched from the server as they are uploaded every day together with the data. However the contents of .ssh are essential for connection to the server, so you must also save these. Once you set up a new SD card, return the files in their original location.

=== What are the values in FTPdetectinfo_* file designated as hnr mle bin Pix/fm Rho Phi? ===

: Some of these values are not used in RMS (hnr mle bin), but they are in CAMS, so they are here to conform to the standard. Thus they are all zeros. The others are:

: - Pix/fm - Average angular speed of the meteor in pixels per frame.

: - Rho, Phi - Parameters that define the line of the meteor in polar coordinates, see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hough_transform#Theory here] for more details. Rho is the distance of the line from the centre of the image, and phi is the angle of the line as measured from the positive direction of the Y axis (basically a line going from the center of the image to the top of the image), the positive angles are measured clockwise (I think, the CAMS standard might define these parameters a bit differently, the Y axis is flipped).

: The intensity is the sum of all pixel intensities of the meteor on a given frame. Let's say I represent an area around the meteor on a given frame like this, where the numbers are pixel intensities on an 8-bit image (so they can range from 0 to 255):

: [[File:Intensity_sum.png |Intensity_sum.png ]]

: and the pixels values inside the red boundary represent the meteor blob on the frame, the intensity would be the sum of all numbers inside the red boundary.
: This value is later used to compute the magnitude. The magnitude is computed as: mag = -2.5*log10(intensity sum) + photometric_offset. The photometric offset is estimated in SkyFit by fitting the line with slope -2.5 through pairs of known magnitudes of stars and logartihms of their pixel intensity sum. The photometric offset is basically the intercept of that line. The constant slope of -2.5 comes from the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apparent_magnitude#Calculations definition of stellar magnitudes.]

== GMN data policy ==

The Global Meteor Network produces several levles of data products:
* Level 1 - The lowest level data (i.e. as close to "raw" as possible) are the FF image and FR video files saved to the RPi by the capture code and the fireball detector.
* Level 2 - The meteor detector uses these data to extract positional and brightness information of individual meteors (FTPdetectinfo file), and images are also used for astrometric and photometric calibration (platepar file). Meteor and star detections are used to generate a range of plots suchs as the single-station shower association graph, camera drift graph, etc. The calibrated meteors measurements get uploaded to the GMN server together with the raw images of individual meteors.
* Level 3 - The software on the server correlates individual observations and computes multi-station meteor trajectories which are published daily on the GMN [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ data website]. This data is made public under the [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ CC BY 4.0 license].

Operators of individual GMN stations exclusivery own the Level 1 and Level 2 data their stations produce. In practice, this means that they are free to share this data with other meteor networks if they wish to do so. The data that gets uploaded to the GMN server will not be shared publicly nor with other parties without the operator's consent, but may be used internally by the GMN coordinators to manually produce other data products (e.g. trajectory of a meteorite dropping fireball, analysis of a meteor shower). All station operators will be credited for their data in all GMN publications.

== IstraStream ==

=== [http://istrastream.com/rms-gmn/ IstraStream GMN status website] ===

: The IstraStream.com is an independent hosting site which is part of our world wide GMN. It is primarily a host for data from cameras sold by IstraStream, but other station operators can request that their data be included.
To enable the IstraStream upload, the <b>external_script_run</b>, <b>external_script_path</b>, and <b>reboot_after_processing</b> parameters have to be changed. This is how the config file should look:

<pre>
; External script
; An external script will be run after RMS finishes the processing for the night, it will be passed three arguments:
; captured_night_dir, archived_night_dir, config - captured_night dir is the full path to the captured folder of the night
; the second one is the archived, and config is an object holding the values in this config file.
; ---------------
; Enable running an external script at the end of every night of processing
external_script_run: true
; Run the external script after auto reprocess. "auto_reprocess" needs to be turned on for this to work.
auto_reprocess_external_script_run: false
; Full path to the external script
external_script_path: /home/pi/source/RMS/iStream/iStream.py
; Name of the function in the external script which will be called
external_function_name: rmsExternal

; Daily reboot
; ---------------
; Reboot the computer daily after the processing and upload is done
reboot_after_processing: false
</pre>

Then, send an e-mail to [mailto:info@istrastream.com info@istrastream.com] with your:
* Station_ID
* Location or Name (if not secret)
* Lens type/size

For example, "CA0001; Elginfield Observatory, Ontario, Canada; 4mm". The IstraStream crew will enable the weblog page within a few days.

Finally, this document explains what every plot on the IstraStream weblog means:

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/132aHGn0QPzhpVN2s2n6FT6rJn39LAsPkchWJqXQb8Qk/edit?usp=sharing IstraStream Plots Explanation] ===

== For More Information ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=43 Contact the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork Join the Global Meteor Network Forum] ===

=== [https://github.com/markmac99/ukmon-pitools/wiki UK Meteor Network Wiki]===
This wiki has numerous FAQs and tips on maintaining, monitoring and managing your system, and several explainers such as how to calibrate and create a mask, how to copy data and so forth.

=== GMN talks ===

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6x9_WCVphY GMN talk at the European Space Agency's Fireball Workshop (June, 2021)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXBTLPnPDWs GMN Workshop (February, 2021)] - [https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ia9vagug5lxm8k9/AAB_i_1jcWThUdAHO_2gF_Ksa?dl=0 Link to slides]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Overview of the GMN - IMC2020 (September, 2020)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oM7lfQ4nmyw Overview of the GMN, Astro Imaging Channel presentation (May, 2020)]

=== GMN related publications ===

: [https://academic.oup.com/mnras/advance-article/doi/10.1093/mnras/stab2557/6368869 Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T., & Vida, D. (2021). Meteor shower radiant dispersions in Global Meteor Network data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2107.12335 Vida, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P. S., Brown, P. G., McIntyre, M. J., Dijkema, T. J., Pavletić, L., Kukić, P., Mazur, M.J., Eschman, P., Roggemans, P., Merlak, A., & Zubović, D. (2021). The Global Meteor Network–Methodology and first results. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 506(4), 5046-5074.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.05458/ Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T. D., & Vida, D. (2020). Realistic gravitational focusing of meteoroid streams. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 494(2), 2982-2994.]

: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Kukic-et-al-2018-Rolling-shutter.pdf Kukić, P., Gural, P., Vida, D., Šegon, D. & Merlak, A. (2018) Correction for meteor centroids observed using rolling shutter cameras. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46:5, 154-118.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_sun_skirter_final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Kukić, P., & Merlak, A. (2018). Compressive strength of a skirting Daytime Arietid-first science results from low-cost Raspberry Pi-based meteor stations. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 113-118.]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.02979.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - I. Theory. arXiv:1911.02979v4 [astro-ph.EP] 21 Apr 2020]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.11734.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - II. Results. arXiv:1911.11734v1 [astro-ph.EP] 26 Novr 2019]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_first_results-final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Zubović, D., Kukić, P., Parag, F., & Macan, A. (2018). First results of a Raspberry Pi based meteor camera system. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 71-78.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Vida_IMC2016_proceedings_final.pdf Vida, D., Zubović, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P., & Cupec, R. (2016). Open-source meteor detection software for low-cost single-board computers. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference (IMC2016), Egmond, The Netherlands (pp. 2-5).]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Zubovic_IMC2015_priceedings_final.pdf Zubović, D., Vida, D., Gural, P., & Šegon, D. (2015). Advances in the development of a low-cost video meteor station. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference, Mistelbach, Austria (pp. 27-30).]

Windows Installation

2021-10-08T13:18:05Z

Dvida: /* Download RMS and Set it Up */

= Basic Instructions =
There are more detailed instructions, with pictures, [[Detailed_Windows_Installation|here]] but the below should work for most users.

'''Note: you will need about 2.5GB of space on your hard disk for the support tools. '''

== Install Required Tools ==
=== install MS Visual Studio Build Tools ===
* Download Microsoft Build Tools for Visual Studio 2019.
https://visualstudio.microsoft.com/downloads/#build-tools-for-visual-studio-2019

* Run the installer.
* In the left panel, under Desktop & Mobile ensure C++ Build tools are selected.

* On the right panel ensure the latest versions of MSVCv142 - VS 2019 C++ x64/x86 build tools and Windows 10 SDK are selected.
* Click install. Its a 1.5GB package so it'll take a while.

=== Install Anaconda for Windows ===
* Download Anaconda from here https://www.anaconda.com/products/individual
* Run the installer.
* Unless you intend to use Anaconda for other python development, you can select the default options at every stage.
* Its a 500MB download and installation may take 20-30 minutes.

=== Install Git for Windows ===
* Download Git from here https://git-scm.com/download/win
* Again, select the default options unless you have some specific requirement.

== Download RMS and Set it Up ==
=== Clone the RMS code to your PC ===
* From the Start Menu, open an Anaconda Powershell prompt and change directory to the place you want to keep the code.
* Run this command:
<pre> git clone https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS.git</pre>
*This will create a new folder "RMS" containing the code.

=== Create an Anaconda virtual environment ===
* Still in the anaconda powershell window, type the following:
<pre>conda create -n RMS python=3.8</pre>
* This will create a python virtual environment named "RMS" containing python 3.8

=== Install the required Python packages ===
* Still in the anaconda powershell window type the following to activate the virtual environment:
<pre>conda activate RMS</pre>
* the prompt should change to "(RMS) c:\source\" or something similar
* change directory into the RMS folder.
* Now install the required Python modules by running these commands:
<pre>
pip install -r requirements.txt
pip install PyQt5
pip install opencv_python
pip install rawpy
</pre>

== Test RMS worked ==
* To test that RMS worked, type the following in the same Window:
<pre> python -m Utils.SkyFit2 </pre>
* The first time you run RMS it will compile various code modules, but at the end of the process you should see this message:
<pre>
usage: SkyFit2.py [-h] [-c CONFIG_PATH] [-r] [-t TIME] [-f FPS]
[-g CAMERA_GAMMA] [-p GEO_POINTS_PATH]
INPUT_PATH
SkyFit2.py: error: the following arguments are required: INPUT_PATH </pre>
* This indicates that RMS is installed properly.

== Setting RMS up for your Cameras ==
RMS reads its settings from a hidden file '''.config''' which is in the folder /home/pi/source/RMS on each Pi, and is also copied to the ArchivedFiles/ folder containing the night's data. You can copy this file to the RMS folder on your PC if you want.

== Update Regularly!!! ==
The RMS code is FREQUENTLY updated and so its important that you update it too. On the Pi, this is automatic but on your PC you need to do it yourself.

To update the code, open an Anaconda Powershell window, activate the RMS environment and then type:
<pre>
git stash
git pull
git stash apply
</pre>
This will 'stash' your local changes such as the config file, pull the latest code, and then reapply your local changes.

== Thats It ==
That's it! Any time you want to run RMS you just
* open an Anaconda Powershell prompt
* change directory to the RMS folder
* activate the virtual environment
<pre> conda activate RMS</pre>
* and then run the module you want to use.

Main Page

2021-09-22T15:53:47Z

Dvida: /* For More Information */

Welcome to the Global Meteor Network's wiki page!

The Global Meteor Network (GMN) is a world wide organization of amateur and professional astronomers alike, whose goal is to observe the night sky using low-light video cameras and produce meteor trajectories in a coordinated manner. Here you will find information on the purpose and structure of the GMN, assembling and operating your own meteor camera, contributing to the development of RMS the GMN software, as well as information on how your observations as a citizen scientist can contribute to the further understanding of our solar system's formation and evolution.

'''<span style="color:red">If you have come here to find out how to build and setup a camera from scratch, jump ahead to [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#How_do_I_obtain_a_camera.3F this] section !</span>'''

== Global Meteor Network Overview ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=141 Our mission] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=363 A brief history of the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Video introduction - Overview of the Global Meteor Network (IMC2020)] ===

=== [https://youtu.be/oM7lfQ4nmyw Video overview - Meteor tracking and the GMN from Astro Imaging Channel presentation] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ Some 'live' GMN data products] ===

== Meteor Detection Station ==

=== What is an RMS GMN station? ===
: A RMS-based GMN station that is the subject of this Wiki consists of a Raspberry Pi (RPi) single board computer, a low light level security video camera, and the RMS software package. The camera is securely mounted in a weatherproof housing, pointed at the sky, and connected to the RPi with a POE (Power Over Ethernet) cable. The RPi is connected to the Internet via WiFi, and to be a part of GMN network, you’ll need a fairly powerful Raspberry Pi (RPi 3B+, RPi 4 or better) and a reasonably fast Internet connection. The internet connection is primarily required to enable data upload to a central server each morning as well as provide automatic updates for the RMS software.

: Nightly, the RPi starts recording video from the camera shortly after local sunset continuously compressing and storing the video data locally. Each morning before sunrise, after capture is complete, the RPi analyzes the video and extracts your nightly station’s meteor observations. These extracted video “clips” of detected meteors are then archived and uploaded to a server. The clips can total hundreds of megabytes on a “busy” night (e.g., in a heavy meteor shower, or a night with a lot of false detections--progress is being made on the detection software). The server finds meteors which were observed with more than one station and this enables the server to triangulate the meteor trails in 3D and calculate the orbits of the meteors.

===[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS/blob/master/README.md What do I need?] ===

You'll need a Raspberry Pi with the software on, and a camera kit. We strongly recommend the Pi4 model. The software will run on a Pi3 but it is much slower.

=== How do I obtain a camera? ===
There are two options:

==== Buy a Camera ====
You can buy a camera and Pi prebuilt and ready to install. These are available from a couple of suppliers. The Croatian Meteor Network sell prebuilt cameras as explained on [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=136 this page]. Alternatively, if you're in the UK, you can obtain cameras from the [https://ukmeteornetwork.co.uk/ UK Meteor Network]

==== Build your own from scratch ====
This requires some basic DIY skills and some familiarity with the Raspberry PI, but don't be put off. The instructions are comprehensive and if you get stuck, you can ask for advice in the [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork groups.io] forum.

Click on this link if you want to '''[[Build_A_Camera|build a camera from scratch]]'''.

Once you've built the camera, You can '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#Flash_a_pre-built_image flash a Prebuilt image]''' onto an SD card to set up the Pi with the software required to capture meteors and upload data to the network.

=== Can I use a commercial all-sky camera? ===

: Generally no due to the lack of sensitivity. [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=163 But see this recent experiment]

== Operating and maintaining your GMN station ==

=== Overview ===

: Please note that GMS is a nascent operation and you may share some growing pains if you choose to be involved -- we're still working out some bugs and making improvements here, which may be an opportunity to help if you have programming skills! ;-) So note that the workload of day-to-day operation can be non-zero, and might take a little bit of your time.

: Ideally, you'll want to monitor your RMS RPi system(s) daily to look for freezes or glitches or other problems... like birds nesting or soiling the camera window, people accidentally unplugging the power cord, mice (or cats or dogs!) chewing on the camera Ethernet cable, etc.

: Although we are getting close, this is not a "power up and forget about it" system yet.
: However, by its very nature, the GMS network is inhabited by a lot of people who are willing to help newcomers getting started. So, here are some clues for daily operation of your RMS camera.

=== So what does the meteor camera do over the course of 24 hours? ===

: The RMS Python based system calculates the sundown to sunrise interval and schedules video camera capture all night long. Depending on the video camera and capabilities of the RPi, the camera captures 25 or more frames per second between evening and morning twilight. During the continuous image capture, the station begins processing captured image data, doing a pre-screening to target frames with a suitable number of stars (usually around 20) that makes it worth looking for meteor detections. Once data capture has finished, the station switches into processing all the promising frames for detections, then refining the astrometric accuracy of every positive detection. Using the station platepar (plate parameters) calibration file, processing iterates to find the best astrometry and photometry solution for each detected meteor. Once this process has analyzed each detection, summary files are created.
: These summary files include text file data presentation in several widely accepted formats (CAMS and UFOorbit), as well as graphic plots of detection frequencies throughout the night, a set of thumbnail images of detections, a set of thumbnail images of data captured throughout the night, a single image with all detections stacked together, plots of photometry, astrometry, and camera pointing drift in arc minutes throughout the course of the night as the mount or building flexes, a flat file for correcting images, and a plot of all detections showing any identified radiants. Finally all results are combined into a single compressed archive, which is automatically uploaded each morning to the central server. Optionally, you can create a mp4 movie showing a time lapse of the night’s captured images.
: Each morning you can review the result files on the RPi, and copy anything you want to your computer or tablet.

===Archiving data and backing up configuration ===

: Data backup is as much or as little as you like. Your primary data is automatically uploaded to the central server every morning when data processing is done. We've built some automated tools that can help to back up any additional data to a thumb drive inserted into the RPi.

=== Viewing the data ===

: To view the data, you can use CMN_binViewer software[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer] which is already installed in the RMS SD image.
: There is also a Windows version[https://www.dropbox.com/s/44u5r9nso81wa56/CMN_binViewer_setup_x64.exe?dl=1] you can install.

=== Tools and Utilities ===

* [https://www.realvnc.com/en/connect/download/viewer/ RealVNC] or [https://anydesk.com/en AnyDesk] remote connect tool allows station access from anywhere. Access from outside your network is enabled by use of an OpenVPN connection address available to meteor stations. Alternatively, with VNC and Teamviewer, you can create an account and team on their websites, and then remotely access your station.
* Samba data directory access, allows you to copy data results directly from your RPi to your computer or tablet.
* [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer CMN_binViewer] can be used to view standard fits image files containing meteor detections. It runs on the RPi, and is also available under Windows.
* [https://sonotaco.com/soft/e_index.html UFO Orbit] allows you to process data from multiple stations and generate unified radiants of two or more stations seeing the same meteor. It can plot the shared object ground path, orbital characteristics, and can output a summary file of all objects seen by more than one station, which can be used for further analysis.
* RMS software can be installed under Windows to allow much of the RMS python-based code to be executed on your computer, so it can be run against meteor station data you have transferred to your computer from the RPi.
* You can run RMS Python jobs on the RPi to sample the image files captured all night long and condense them into a mp4 movie. This creates a sometimes mesmerizing summary that can run for over 2 minutes in length for winter time data.

== Configuring and installing your camera ==

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick start guide] ===

=== [[Focusing_your_camera | Focusing your IP camera]] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2sq1hBwcAA Video tutorial - Configuring your IMX291 IP camera] ===

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1TPotXcRstHz-XWIQYIW71xkRYy7Ca1UCoEiZsqdk9zw/edit?usp=sharing Different ways of connecting the camera] ===

== What can I do with my GMN station? ==

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOjb3qxDlX4 Video Tutorial - Using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration + Manually reducing observations of fireballs and computing their trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=310 Generating a Google Earth KML file to show your station's field of view] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=253 Using UFO Orbit program to estimate meteor trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=221 Urban meteor observing] ===

== RMS Software Installation ==

=== Flash a pre-built image ===

Pre-built Images are available with the RMS software pre-installed on Raspbian. Raspbian is the operating system typically used on the Raspberry Pi.

A 128 GB microSD card is preferred, although smaller 64 GB cards will also work. The image is flashed to the microSD card using the Etcher utility for Windows (32 or 64-bit), MacOS or Linux (64-bit), which can be found [https://www.balena.io/etcher/ here]

When you first boot up the Pi make sure you have a keyboard, monitor and mouse attached as you will be taken through a setup process by the RMS software.

The current publicly released images of RMS are:
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/sa9csd4m3jr1vqo/RMS_image_20191203.zip?dl=1 RPi3B+ ]
and
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/3pwwenty43dazq4/RMS_RPi4_image_20210626.zip?dl=1 RPi4 ].

Please see the [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick Start Guide] about how to flash them to an SD card.

Notes:
* The earlier versions of the Raspberry Pi, the 1 and 2, are not powerful enough to run RMS software.

* the pre-installed RMS software images incorporate an auto-updating feature, so that the RMS software is updated to the current release whenever your Raspberry Pi RMS is booted. This way, your station is always running the most recent set of updates.

* For installations into other Linux or windows environments, executing the command ''git pull'' will update to the most recent RMS release.

* The code was designed to run on a RPi, but it will also run an some Linux distributions. We have tested it on Linux Mint 18 and Ubuntu 16. For information on installing into other Linux releases, check portions of the section listed below for installing on RPi, and also check installation instructions found on [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS GitHub]

== Install the software from scratch ==

'''Note: if you're setting up a Rspberry Pi you should use the prebuilt image as this comes with all necessary software installed and is ready to use.'''. If you really do want to install on the RPi from scratch, you can follow the instructions below:

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 4 ===

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/19ImeNqBTD1ml2iisp5y7CjDrRV33wBeF9rtx3mIVjh4/edit?usp=sharing here]

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 3 ===

'''We no longer recommend the Pi3, as it doesn't have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers. '''

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ChaXx6WkuGfcQ_f5yRbwUOOMxEgIJrjq932UZE6cRjE/edit here].

=== Install for Linux ===

Detailed instructions [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Installation_for_Linux here]

=== Installation for Windows ===
Data capture does not work under windows. However you can use the other tools on your PC, where its much quicker to run SkyFit2 to calibrate your camera to the sky, or you want to use BatchFFToImage to convert data to jpeg format to share on Social Media.

Click '''[[Windows_Installation|here]]''' for detailed instructions. The instructions were tested on Windows 10 64-bit, but should work on any Windows version where git and Anaconda are available.

Aside: If you are a Windows whizz, please feel free to investigate why data capture doesn't work!

=== Installation for MacOS ===
As with Windows, installation for MacOS is useful if you want to analyse the data offline. If you do want to install it, please follow the instructions '''[[MacOS_Install | here]]'''.

== FAQ ==

=== What should I back up when re-flashing an SD card? ===

: The .config, platepar and mask files that are in the RMS source directory, plus the whole contents of the hidden directory /home/pi/.ssh.

If your SD card fails or becomes corrupted, the config files can be fetched from the server as they are uploaded every day together with the data. However the contents of .ssh are essential for connection to the server, so you must also save these. Once you set up a new SD card, return the files in their original location.

=== What are the values in FTPdetectinfo_* file designated as hnr mle bin Pix/fm Rho Phi? ===

: Some of these values are not used in RMS (hnr mle bin), but they are in CAMS, so they are here to conform to the standard. Thus they are all zeros. The others are:

: - Pix/fm - Average angular speed of the meteor in pixels per frame.

: - Rho, Phi - Parameters that define the line of the meteor in polar coordinates, see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hough_transform#Theory here] for more details. Rho is the distance of the line from the centre of the image, and phi is the angle of the line as measured from the positive direction of the Y axis (basically a line going from the center of the image to the top of the image), the positive angles are measured clockwise (I think, the CAMS standard might define these parameters a bit differently, the Y axis is flipped).

: The intensity is the sum of all pixel intensities of the meteor on a given frame. Let's say I represent an area around the meteor on a given frame like this, where the numbers are pixel intensities on an 8-bit image (so they can range from 0 to 255):

: [[File:Intensity_sum.png |Intensity_sum.png ]]

: and the pixels values inside the red boundary represent the meteor blob on the frame, the intensity would be the sum of all numbers inside the red boundary.
: This value is later used to compute the magnitude. The magnitude is computed as: mag = -2.5*log10(intensity sum) + photometric_offset. The photometric offset is estimated in SkyFit by fitting the line with slope -2.5 through pairs of known magnitudes of stars and logartihms of their pixel intensity sum. The photometric offset is basically the intercept of that line. The constant slope of -2.5 comes from the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apparent_magnitude#Calculations definition of stellar magnitudes.]

== GMN data policy ==

The Global Meteor Network produces several levles of data products:
* Level 1 - The lowest level data (i.e. as close to "raw" as possible) are the FF image and FR video files saved to the RPi by the capture code and the fireball detector.
* Level 2 - The meteor detector uses these data to extract positional and brightness information of individual meteors (FTPdetectinfo file), and images are also used for astrometric and photometric calibration (platepar file). Meteor and star detections are used to generate a range of plots suchs as the single-station shower association graph, camera drift graph, etc. The calibrated meteors measurements get uploaded to the GMN server together with the raw images of individual meteors.
* Level 3 - The software on the server correlates individual observations and computes multi-station meteor trajectories which are published daily on the GMN [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ data website]. This data is made public under the [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ CC BY 4.0 license].

Operators of individual GMN stations exclusivery own the Level 1 and Level 2 data their stations produce. In practice, this means that they are free to share this data with other meteor networks if they wish to do so. The data that gets uploaded to the GMN server will not be shared publicly nor with other parties without the operator's consent, but may be used internally by the GMN coordinators to manually produce other data products (e.g. trajectory of a meteorite dropping fireball, analysis of a meteor shower). All station operators will be credited for their data in all GMN publications.

== IstraStream ==

=== [http://istrastream.com/rms-gmn/ IstraStream GMN status website] ===

: The IstraStream.com is an independent hosting site which is part of our world wide GMN. It is primarily a host for data from cameras sold by IstraStream, but other station operators can request that their data be included.
To enable the IstraStream upload, simply change the config file as follows:

<pre>
; External script
; An external script will be run after RMS finishes the processing for the night, it will be passed three arguments:
; captured_night_dir, archived_night_dir, config - captured_night dir is the full path to the captured folder of the night
; the second one is the archived, and config is an object holding the values in this config file.
; ---------------
; Enable running an external script at the end of every night of processing
external_script_run: true ; <--- CHANGE
; Run the external script after auto reprocess. "auto_reprocess" needs to be turned on for this to work.
auto_reprocess_external_script_run: false
; Full path to the external script
external_script_path: /home/pi/source/RMS/iStream/iStream.py ; <--- CHANGE
; Name of the function in the external script which will be called
external_function_name: rmsExternal

; Daily reboot
; ---------------
; Reboot the computer daily after the processing and upload is done
reboot_after_processing: false ; <--- CHANGE
</pre>

Then, send an e-mail to [mailto:info@istrastream.com info@istrastream.com] with your:
* Station_ID
* Location or Name (if not secret)
* Lens type/size

For example, "CA0001; Elginfield Observatory, Ontario, Canada; 4mm". The IstraStream crew will enable the weblog page within a few days.

Finally, this document explains what every plot on the IstraStream weblog means:

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/132aHGn0QPzhpVN2s2n6FT6rJn39LAsPkchWJqXQb8Qk/edit?usp=sharing IstraStream Plots Explanation] ===

== For More Information ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=43 Contact the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork Join the Global Meteor Network Forum] ===

=== GMN talks ===

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6x9_WCVphY GMN talk at the European Space Agency's Fireball Workshop (June, 2021)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXBTLPnPDWs GMN Workshop (February, 2021)] - [https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ia9vagug5lxm8k9/AAB_i_1jcWThUdAHO_2gF_Ksa?dl=0 Link to slides]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Overview of the GMN - IMC2020 (September, 2020)]

: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oM7lfQ4nmyw Overview of the GMN, Astro Imaging Channel presentation (May, 2020)]

=== GMN related publications ===

: [https://academic.oup.com/mnras/advance-article/doi/10.1093/mnras/stab2557/6368869 Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T., & Vida, D. (2021). Meteor shower radiant dispersions in Global Meteor Network data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2107.12335 Vida, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P. S., Brown, P. G., McIntyre, M. J., Dijkema, T. J., Pavletić, L., Kukić, P., Mazur, M.J., Eschman, P., Roggemans, P., Merlak, A., & Zubović, D. (2021). The Global Meteor Network–Methodology and first results. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 506(4), 5046-5074.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.05458/ Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T. D., & Vida, D. (2020). Realistic gravitational focusing of meteoroid streams. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 494(2), 2982-2994.]

: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Kukic-et-al-2018-Rolling-shutter.pdf Kukić, P., Gural, P., Vida, D., Šegon, D. & Merlak, A. (2018) Correction for meteor centroids observed using rolling shutter cameras. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46:5, 154-118.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_sun_skirter_final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Kukić, P., & Merlak, A. (2018). Compressive strength of a skirting Daytime Arietid-first science results from low-cost Raspberry Pi-based meteor stations. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 113-118.]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.02979.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - I. Theory. arXiv:1911.02979v4 [astro-ph.EP] 21 Apr 2020]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.11734.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - II. Results. arXiv:1911.11734v1 [astro-ph.EP] 26 Novr 2019]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_first_results-final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Zubović, D., Kukić, P., Parag, F., & Macan, A. (2018). First results of a Raspberry Pi based meteor camera system. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 71-78.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Vida_IMC2016_proceedings_final.pdf Vida, D., Zubović, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P., & Cupec, R. (2016). Open-source meteor detection software for low-cost single-board computers. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference (IMC2016), Egmond, The Netherlands (pp. 2-5).]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Zubovic_IMC2015_priceedings_final.pdf Zubović, D., Vida, D., Gural, P., & Šegon, D. (2015). Advances in the development of a low-cost video meteor station. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference, Mistelbach, Austria (pp. 27-30).]

Main Page

2021-09-22T15:49:59Z

Dvida: /* Global Meteor Network Overview */

Welcome to the Global Meteor Network's wiki page!

The Global Meteor Network (GMN) is a world wide organization of amateur and professional astronomers alike, whose goal is to observe the night sky using low-light video cameras and produce meteor trajectories in a coordinated manner. Here you will find information on the purpose and structure of the GMN, assembling and operating your own meteor camera, contributing to the development of RMS the GMN software, as well as information on how your observations as a citizen scientist can contribute to the further understanding of our solar system's formation and evolution.

'''<span style="color:red">If you have come here to find out how to build and setup a camera from scratch, jump ahead to [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#How_do_I_obtain_a_camera.3F this] section !</span>'''

== Global Meteor Network Overview ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=141 Our mission] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=363 A brief history of the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Video introduction - Overview of the Global Meteor Network (IMC2020)] ===

=== [https://youtu.be/oM7lfQ4nmyw Video overview - Meteor tracking and the GMN from Astro Imaging Channel presentation] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ Some 'live' GMN data products] ===

== Meteor Detection Station ==

=== What is an RMS GMN station? ===
: A RMS-based GMN station that is the subject of this Wiki consists of a Raspberry Pi (RPi) single board computer, a low light level security video camera, and the RMS software package. The camera is securely mounted in a weatherproof housing, pointed at the sky, and connected to the RPi with a POE (Power Over Ethernet) cable. The RPi is connected to the Internet via WiFi, and to be a part of GMN network, you’ll need a fairly powerful Raspberry Pi (RPi 3B+, RPi 4 or better) and a reasonably fast Internet connection. The internet connection is primarily required to enable data upload to a central server each morning as well as provide automatic updates for the RMS software.

: Nightly, the RPi starts recording video from the camera shortly after local sunset continuously compressing and storing the video data locally. Each morning before sunrise, after capture is complete, the RPi analyzes the video and extracts your nightly station’s meteor observations. These extracted video “clips” of detected meteors are then archived and uploaded to a server. The clips can total hundreds of megabytes on a “busy” night (e.g., in a heavy meteor shower, or a night with a lot of false detections--progress is being made on the detection software). The server finds meteors which were observed with more than one station and this enables the server to triangulate the meteor trails in 3D and calculate the orbits of the meteors.

===[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS/blob/master/README.md What do I need?] ===

You'll need a Raspberry Pi with the software on, and a camera kit. We strongly recommend the Pi4 model. The software will run on a Pi3 but it is much slower.

=== How do I obtain a camera? ===
There are two options:

==== Buy a Camera ====
You can buy a camera and Pi prebuilt and ready to install. These are available from a couple of suppliers. The Croatian Meteor Network sell prebuilt cameras as explained on [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=136 this page]. Alternatively, if you're in the UK, you can obtain cameras from the [https://ukmeteornetwork.co.uk/ UK Meteor Network]

==== Build your own from scratch ====
This requires some basic DIY skills and some familiarity with the Raspberry PI, but don't be put off. The instructions are comprehensive and if you get stuck, you can ask for advice in the [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork groups.io] forum.

Click on this link if you want to '''[[Build_A_Camera|build a camera from scratch]]'''.

Once you've built the camera, You can '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#Flash_a_pre-built_image flash a Prebuilt image]''' onto an SD card to set up the Pi with the software required to capture meteors and upload data to the network.

=== Can I use a commercial all-sky camera? ===

: Generally no due to the lack of sensitivity. [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=163 But see this recent experiment]

== Operating and maintaining your GMN station ==

=== Overview ===

: Please note that GMS is a nascent operation and you may share some growing pains if you choose to be involved -- we're still working out some bugs and making improvements here, which may be an opportunity to help if you have programming skills! ;-) So note that the workload of day-to-day operation can be non-zero, and might take a little bit of your time.

: Ideally, you'll want to monitor your RMS RPi system(s) daily to look for freezes or glitches or other problems... like birds nesting or soiling the camera window, people accidentally unplugging the power cord, mice (or cats or dogs!) chewing on the camera Ethernet cable, etc.

: Although we are getting close, this is not a "power up and forget about it" system yet.
: However, by its very nature, the GMS network is inhabited by a lot of people who are willing to help newcomers getting started. So, here are some clues for daily operation of your RMS camera.

=== So what does the meteor camera do over the course of 24 hours? ===

: The RMS Python based system calculates the sundown to sunrise interval and schedules video camera capture all night long. Depending on the video camera and capabilities of the RPi, the camera captures 25 or more frames per second between evening and morning twilight. During the continuous image capture, the station begins processing captured image data, doing a pre-screening to target frames with a suitable number of stars (usually around 20) that makes it worth looking for meteor detections. Once data capture has finished, the station switches into processing all the promising frames for detections, then refining the astrometric accuracy of every positive detection. Using the station platepar (plate parameters) calibration file, processing iterates to find the best astrometry and photometry solution for each detected meteor. Once this process has analyzed each detection, summary files are created.
: These summary files include text file data presentation in several widely accepted formats (CAMS and UFOorbit), as well as graphic plots of detection frequencies throughout the night, a set of thumbnail images of detections, a set of thumbnail images of data captured throughout the night, a single image with all detections stacked together, plots of photometry, astrometry, and camera pointing drift in arc minutes throughout the course of the night as the mount or building flexes, a flat file for correcting images, and a plot of all detections showing any identified radiants. Finally all results are combined into a single compressed archive, which is automatically uploaded each morning to the central server. Optionally, you can create a mp4 movie showing a time lapse of the night’s captured images.
: Each morning you can review the result files on the RPi, and copy anything you want to your computer or tablet.

===Archiving data and backing up configuration ===

: Data backup is as much or as little as you like. Your primary data is automatically uploaded to the central server every morning when data processing is done. We've built some automated tools that can help to back up any additional data to a thumb drive inserted into the RPi.

=== Viewing the data ===

: To view the data, you can use CMN_binViewer software[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer] which is already installed in the RMS SD image.
: There is also a Windows version[https://www.dropbox.com/s/44u5r9nso81wa56/CMN_binViewer_setup_x64.exe?dl=1] you can install.

=== Tools and Utilities ===

* [https://www.realvnc.com/en/connect/download/viewer/ RealVNC] or [https://anydesk.com/en AnyDesk] remote connect tool allows station access from anywhere. Access from outside your network is enabled by use of an OpenVPN connection address available to meteor stations. Alternatively, with VNC and Teamviewer, you can create an account and team on their websites, and then remotely access your station.
* Samba data directory access, allows you to copy data results directly from your RPi to your computer or tablet.
* [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer CMN_binViewer] can be used to view standard fits image files containing meteor detections. It runs on the RPi, and is also available under Windows.
* [https://sonotaco.com/soft/e_index.html UFO Orbit] allows you to process data from multiple stations and generate unified radiants of two or more stations seeing the same meteor. It can plot the shared object ground path, orbital characteristics, and can output a summary file of all objects seen by more than one station, which can be used for further analysis.
* RMS software can be installed under Windows to allow much of the RMS python-based code to be executed on your computer, so it can be run against meteor station data you have transferred to your computer from the RPi.
* You can run RMS Python jobs on the RPi to sample the image files captured all night long and condense them into a mp4 movie. This creates a sometimes mesmerizing summary that can run for over 2 minutes in length for winter time data.

== Configuring and installing your camera ==

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick start guide] ===

=== [[Focusing_your_camera | Focusing your IP camera]] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2sq1hBwcAA Video tutorial - Configuring your IMX291 IP camera] ===

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1TPotXcRstHz-XWIQYIW71xkRYy7Ca1UCoEiZsqdk9zw/edit?usp=sharing Different ways of connecting the camera] ===

== What can I do with my GMN station? ==

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOjb3qxDlX4 Video Tutorial - Using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration + Manually reducing observations of fireballs and computing their trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=310 Generating a Google Earth KML file to show your station's field of view] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=253 Using UFO Orbit program to estimate meteor trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=221 Urban meteor observing] ===

== RMS Software Installation ==

=== Flash a pre-built image ===

Pre-built Images are available with the RMS software pre-installed on Raspbian. Raspbian is the operating system typically used on the Raspberry Pi.

A 128 GB microSD card is preferred, although smaller 64 GB cards will also work. The image is flashed to the microSD card using the Etcher utility for Windows (32 or 64-bit), MacOS or Linux (64-bit), which can be found [https://www.balena.io/etcher/ here]

When you first boot up the Pi make sure you have a keyboard, monitor and mouse attached as you will be taken through a setup process by the RMS software.

The current publicly released images of RMS are:
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/sa9csd4m3jr1vqo/RMS_image_20191203.zip?dl=1 RPi3B+ ]
and
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/3pwwenty43dazq4/RMS_RPi4_image_20210626.zip?dl=1 RPi4 ].

Please see the [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick Start Guide] about how to flash them to an SD card.

Notes:
* The earlier versions of the Raspberry Pi, the 1 and 2, are not powerful enough to run RMS software.

* the pre-installed RMS software images incorporate an auto-updating feature, so that the RMS software is updated to the current release whenever your Raspberry Pi RMS is booted. This way, your station is always running the most recent set of updates.

* For installations into other Linux or windows environments, executing the command ''git pull'' will update to the most recent RMS release.

* The code was designed to run on a RPi, but it will also run an some Linux distributions. We have tested it on Linux Mint 18 and Ubuntu 16. For information on installing into other Linux releases, check portions of the section listed below for installing on RPi, and also check installation instructions found on [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS GitHub]

== Install the software from scratch ==

'''Note: if you're setting up a Rspberry Pi you should use the prebuilt image as this comes with all necessary software installed and is ready to use.'''. If you really do want to install on the RPi from scratch, you can follow the instructions below:

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 4 ===

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/19ImeNqBTD1ml2iisp5y7CjDrRV33wBeF9rtx3mIVjh4/edit?usp=sharing here]

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 3 ===

'''We no longer recommend the Pi3, as it doesn't have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers. '''

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ChaXx6WkuGfcQ_f5yRbwUOOMxEgIJrjq932UZE6cRjE/edit here].

=== Install for Linux ===

Detailed instructions [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Installation_for_Linux here]

=== Installation for Windows ===
Data capture does not work under windows. However you can use the other tools on your PC, where its much quicker to run SkyFit2 to calibrate your camera to the sky, or you want to use BatchFFToImage to convert data to jpeg format to share on Social Media.

Click '''[[Windows_Installation|here]]''' for detailed instructions. The instructions were tested on Windows 10 64-bit, but should work on any Windows version where git and Anaconda are available.

Aside: If you are a Windows whizz, please feel free to investigate why data capture doesn't work!

=== Installation for MacOS ===
As with Windows, installation for MacOS is useful if you want to analyse the data offline. If you do want to install it, please follow the instructions '''[[MacOS_Install | here]]'''.

== FAQ ==

=== What should I back up when re-flashing an SD card? ===

: The .config, platepar and mask files that are in the RMS source directory, plus the whole contents of the hidden directory /home/pi/.ssh.

If your SD card fails or becomes corrupted, the config files can be fetched from the server as they are uploaded every day together with the data. However the contents of .ssh are essential for connection to the server, so you must also save these. Once you set up a new SD card, return the files in their original location.

=== What are the values in FTPdetectinfo_* file designated as hnr mle bin Pix/fm Rho Phi? ===

: Some of these values are not used in RMS (hnr mle bin), but they are in CAMS, so they are here to conform to the standard. Thus they are all zeros. The others are:

: - Pix/fm - Average angular speed of the meteor in pixels per frame.

: - Rho, Phi - Parameters that define the line of the meteor in polar coordinates, see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hough_transform#Theory here] for more details. Rho is the distance of the line from the centre of the image, and phi is the angle of the line as measured from the positive direction of the Y axis (basically a line going from the center of the image to the top of the image), the positive angles are measured clockwise (I think, the CAMS standard might define these parameters a bit differently, the Y axis is flipped).

: The intensity is the sum of all pixel intensities of the meteor on a given frame. Let's say I represent an area around the meteor on a given frame like this, where the numbers are pixel intensities on an 8-bit image (so they can range from 0 to 255):

: [[File:Intensity_sum.png |Intensity_sum.png ]]

: and the pixels values inside the red boundary represent the meteor blob on the frame, the intensity would be the sum of all numbers inside the red boundary.
: This value is later used to compute the magnitude. The magnitude is computed as: mag = -2.5*log10(intensity sum) + photometric_offset. The photometric offset is estimated in SkyFit by fitting the line with slope -2.5 through pairs of known magnitudes of stars and logartihms of their pixel intensity sum. The photometric offset is basically the intercept of that line. The constant slope of -2.5 comes from the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apparent_magnitude#Calculations definition of stellar magnitudes.]

== GMN data policy ==

The Global Meteor Network produces several levles of data products:
* Level 1 - The lowest level data (i.e. as close to "raw" as possible) are the FF image and FR video files saved to the RPi by the capture code and the fireball detector.
* Level 2 - The meteor detector uses these data to extract positional and brightness information of individual meteors (FTPdetectinfo file), and images are also used for astrometric and photometric calibration (platepar file). Meteor and star detections are used to generate a range of plots suchs as the single-station shower association graph, camera drift graph, etc. The calibrated meteors measurements get uploaded to the GMN server together with the raw images of individual meteors.
* Level 3 - The software on the server correlates individual observations and computes multi-station meteor trajectories which are published daily on the GMN [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ data website]. This data is made public under the [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ CC BY 4.0 license].

Operators of individual GMN stations exclusivery own the Level 1 and Level 2 data their stations produce. In practice, this means that they are free to share this data with other meteor networks if they wish to do so. The data that gets uploaded to the GMN server will not be shared publicly nor with other parties without the operator's consent, but may be used internally by the GMN coordinators to manually produce other data products (e.g. trajectory of a meteorite dropping fireball, analysis of a meteor shower). All station operators will be credited for their data in all GMN publications.

== IstraStream ==

=== [http://istrastream.com/rms-gmn/ IstraStream GMN status website] ===

: The IstraStream.com is an independent hosting site which is part of our world wide GMN. It is primarily a host for data from cameras sold by IstraStream, but other station operators can request that their data be included.
To enable the IstraStream upload, simply change the config file as follows:

<pre>
; External script
; An external script will be run after RMS finishes the processing for the night, it will be passed three arguments:
; captured_night_dir, archived_night_dir, config - captured_night dir is the full path to the captured folder of the night
; the second one is the archived, and config is an object holding the values in this config file.
; ---------------
; Enable running an external script at the end of every night of processing
external_script_run: true ; <--- CHANGE
; Run the external script after auto reprocess. "auto_reprocess" needs to be turned on for this to work.
auto_reprocess_external_script_run: false
; Full path to the external script
external_script_path: /home/pi/source/RMS/iStream/iStream.py ; <--- CHANGE
; Name of the function in the external script which will be called
external_function_name: rmsExternal

; Daily reboot
; ---------------
; Reboot the computer daily after the processing and upload is done
reboot_after_processing: false ; <--- CHANGE
</pre>

Then, send an e-mail to [mailto:info@istrastream.com info@istrastream.com] with your:
* Station_ID
* Location or Name (if not secret)
* Lens type/size

For example, "CA0001; Elginfield Observatory, Ontario, Canada; 4mm". The IstraStream crew will enable the weblog page within a few days.

Finally, this document explains what every plot on the IstraStream weblog means:

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/132aHGn0QPzhpVN2s2n6FT6rJn39LAsPkchWJqXQb8Qk/edit?usp=sharing IstraStream Plots Explanation] ===

== For More Information ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=43 Contact the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork Join the Global Meteor Network Forum] ===

=== GMN related publications ===

: [https://academic.oup.com/mnras/advance-article/doi/10.1093/mnras/stab2557/6368869 Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T., & Vida, D. (2021). Meteor shower radiant dispersions in Global Meteor Network data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2107.12335 Vida, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P. S., Brown, P. G., McIntyre, M. J., Dijkema, T. J., Pavletić, L., Kukić, P., Mazur, M.J., Eschman, P., Roggemans, P., Merlak, A., & Zubović, D. (2021). The Global Meteor Network–Methodology and first results. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 506(4), 5046-5074.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.05458/ Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T. D., & Vida, D. (2020). Realistic gravitational focusing of meteoroid streams. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 494(2), 2982-2994.]

: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Kukic-et-al-2018-Rolling-shutter.pdf Kukić, P., Gural, P., Vida, D., Šegon, D. & Merlak, A. (2018) Correction for meteor centroids observed using rolling shutter cameras. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46:5, 154-118.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_sun_skirter_final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Kukić, P., & Merlak, A. (2018). Compressive strength of a skirting Daytime Arietid-first science results from low-cost Raspberry Pi-based meteor stations. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 113-118.]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.02979.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - I. Theory. arXiv:1911.02979v4 [astro-ph.EP] 21 Apr 2020]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.11734.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - II. Results. arXiv:1911.11734v1 [astro-ph.EP] 26 Novr 2019]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_first_results-final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Zubović, D., Kukić, P., Parag, F., & Macan, A. (2018). First results of a Raspberry Pi based meteor camera system. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 71-78.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Vida_IMC2016_proceedings_final.pdf Vida, D., Zubović, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P., & Cupec, R. (2016). Open-source meteor detection software for low-cost single-board computers. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference (IMC2016), Egmond, The Netherlands (pp. 2-5).]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Zubovic_IMC2015_priceedings_final.pdf Zubović, D., Vida, D., Gural, P., & Šegon, D. (2015). Advances in the development of a low-cost video meteor station. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference, Mistelbach, Austria (pp. 27-30).]

Main Page

2021-09-22T15:49:40Z

Dvida: /* Global Meteor Network Overview */

Welcome to the Global Meteor Network's wiki page!

The Global Meteor Network (GMN) is a world wide organization of amateur and professional astronomers alike, whose goal is to observe the night sky using low-light video cameras and produce meteor trajectories in a coordinated manner. Here you will find information on the purpose and structure of the GMN, assembling and operating your own meteor camera, contributing to the development of RMS the GMN software, as well as information on how your observations as a citizen scientist can contribute to the further understanding of our solar system's formation and evolution.

'''<span style="color:red">If you have come here to find out how to build and setup a camera from scratch, jump ahead to [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#How_do_I_obtain_a_camera.3F this] section !</span>'''

== Global Meteor Network Overview ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=141 Our mission] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=363 A brief history of the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAGq-XqD5Po Video introduction - Overview of the Global Meteor Network (IMC2020)]

=== [https://youtu.be/oM7lfQ4nmyw Video overview - Meteor tracking and the GMN from Astro Imaging Channel presentation] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ Some 'live' GMN data products] ===

== Meteor Detection Station ==

=== What is an RMS GMN station? ===
: A RMS-based GMN station that is the subject of this Wiki consists of a Raspberry Pi (RPi) single board computer, a low light level security video camera, and the RMS software package. The camera is securely mounted in a weatherproof housing, pointed at the sky, and connected to the RPi with a POE (Power Over Ethernet) cable. The RPi is connected to the Internet via WiFi, and to be a part of GMN network, you’ll need a fairly powerful Raspberry Pi (RPi 3B+, RPi 4 or better) and a reasonably fast Internet connection. The internet connection is primarily required to enable data upload to a central server each morning as well as provide automatic updates for the RMS software.

: Nightly, the RPi starts recording video from the camera shortly after local sunset continuously compressing and storing the video data locally. Each morning before sunrise, after capture is complete, the RPi analyzes the video and extracts your nightly station’s meteor observations. These extracted video “clips” of detected meteors are then archived and uploaded to a server. The clips can total hundreds of megabytes on a “busy” night (e.g., in a heavy meteor shower, or a night with a lot of false detections--progress is being made on the detection software). The server finds meteors which were observed with more than one station and this enables the server to triangulate the meteor trails in 3D and calculate the orbits of the meteors.

===[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS/blob/master/README.md What do I need?] ===

You'll need a Raspberry Pi with the software on, and a camera kit. We strongly recommend the Pi4 model. The software will run on a Pi3 but it is much slower.

=== How do I obtain a camera? ===
There are two options:

==== Buy a Camera ====
You can buy a camera and Pi prebuilt and ready to install. These are available from a couple of suppliers. The Croatian Meteor Network sell prebuilt cameras as explained on [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=136 this page]. Alternatively, if you're in the UK, you can obtain cameras from the [https://ukmeteornetwork.co.uk/ UK Meteor Network]

==== Build your own from scratch ====
This requires some basic DIY skills and some familiarity with the Raspberry PI, but don't be put off. The instructions are comprehensive and if you get stuck, you can ask for advice in the [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork groups.io] forum.

Click on this link if you want to '''[[Build_A_Camera|build a camera from scratch]]'''.

Once you've built the camera, You can '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#Flash_a_pre-built_image flash a Prebuilt image]''' onto an SD card to set up the Pi with the software required to capture meteors and upload data to the network.

=== Can I use a commercial all-sky camera? ===

: Generally no due to the lack of sensitivity. [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=163 But see this recent experiment]

== Operating and maintaining your GMN station ==

=== Overview ===

: Please note that GMS is a nascent operation and you may share some growing pains if you choose to be involved -- we're still working out some bugs and making improvements here, which may be an opportunity to help if you have programming skills! ;-) So note that the workload of day-to-day operation can be non-zero, and might take a little bit of your time.

: Ideally, you'll want to monitor your RMS RPi system(s) daily to look for freezes or glitches or other problems... like birds nesting or soiling the camera window, people accidentally unplugging the power cord, mice (or cats or dogs!) chewing on the camera Ethernet cable, etc.

: Although we are getting close, this is not a "power up and forget about it" system yet.
: However, by its very nature, the GMS network is inhabited by a lot of people who are willing to help newcomers getting started. So, here are some clues for daily operation of your RMS camera.

=== So what does the meteor camera do over the course of 24 hours? ===

: The RMS Python based system calculates the sundown to sunrise interval and schedules video camera capture all night long. Depending on the video camera and capabilities of the RPi, the camera captures 25 or more frames per second between evening and morning twilight. During the continuous image capture, the station begins processing captured image data, doing a pre-screening to target frames with a suitable number of stars (usually around 20) that makes it worth looking for meteor detections. Once data capture has finished, the station switches into processing all the promising frames for detections, then refining the astrometric accuracy of every positive detection. Using the station platepar (plate parameters) calibration file, processing iterates to find the best astrometry and photometry solution for each detected meteor. Once this process has analyzed each detection, summary files are created.
: These summary files include text file data presentation in several widely accepted formats (CAMS and UFOorbit), as well as graphic plots of detection frequencies throughout the night, a set of thumbnail images of detections, a set of thumbnail images of data captured throughout the night, a single image with all detections stacked together, plots of photometry, astrometry, and camera pointing drift in arc minutes throughout the course of the night as the mount or building flexes, a flat file for correcting images, and a plot of all detections showing any identified radiants. Finally all results are combined into a single compressed archive, which is automatically uploaded each morning to the central server. Optionally, you can create a mp4 movie showing a time lapse of the night’s captured images.
: Each morning you can review the result files on the RPi, and copy anything you want to your computer or tablet.

===Archiving data and backing up configuration ===

: Data backup is as much or as little as you like. Your primary data is automatically uploaded to the central server every morning when data processing is done. We've built some automated tools that can help to back up any additional data to a thumb drive inserted into the RPi.

=== Viewing the data ===

: To view the data, you can use CMN_binViewer software[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer] which is already installed in the RMS SD image.
: There is also a Windows version[https://www.dropbox.com/s/44u5r9nso81wa56/CMN_binViewer_setup_x64.exe?dl=1] you can install.

=== Tools and Utilities ===

* [https://www.realvnc.com/en/connect/download/viewer/ RealVNC] or [https://anydesk.com/en AnyDesk] remote connect tool allows station access from anywhere. Access from outside your network is enabled by use of an OpenVPN connection address available to meteor stations. Alternatively, with VNC and Teamviewer, you can create an account and team on their websites, and then remotely access your station.
* Samba data directory access, allows you to copy data results directly from your RPi to your computer or tablet.
* [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer CMN_binViewer] can be used to view standard fits image files containing meteor detections. It runs on the RPi, and is also available under Windows.
* [https://sonotaco.com/soft/e_index.html UFO Orbit] allows you to process data from multiple stations and generate unified radiants of two or more stations seeing the same meteor. It can plot the shared object ground path, orbital characteristics, and can output a summary file of all objects seen by more than one station, which can be used for further analysis.
* RMS software can be installed under Windows to allow much of the RMS python-based code to be executed on your computer, so it can be run against meteor station data you have transferred to your computer from the RPi.
* You can run RMS Python jobs on the RPi to sample the image files captured all night long and condense them into a mp4 movie. This creates a sometimes mesmerizing summary that can run for over 2 minutes in length for winter time data.

== Configuring and installing your camera ==

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick start guide] ===

=== [[Focusing_your_camera | Focusing your IP camera]] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2sq1hBwcAA Video tutorial - Configuring your IMX291 IP camera] ===

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1TPotXcRstHz-XWIQYIW71xkRYy7Ca1UCoEiZsqdk9zw/edit?usp=sharing Different ways of connecting the camera] ===

== What can I do with my GMN station? ==

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOjb3qxDlX4 Video Tutorial - Using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration + Manually reducing observations of fireballs and computing their trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=310 Generating a Google Earth KML file to show your station's field of view] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=253 Using UFO Orbit program to estimate meteor trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=221 Urban meteor observing] ===

== RMS Software Installation ==

=== Flash a pre-built image ===

Pre-built Images are available with the RMS software pre-installed on Raspbian. Raspbian is the operating system typically used on the Raspberry Pi.

A 128 GB microSD card is preferred, although smaller 64 GB cards will also work. The image is flashed to the microSD card using the Etcher utility for Windows (32 or 64-bit), MacOS or Linux (64-bit), which can be found [https://www.balena.io/etcher/ here]

When you first boot up the Pi make sure you have a keyboard, monitor and mouse attached as you will be taken through a setup process by the RMS software.

The current publicly released images of RMS are:
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/sa9csd4m3jr1vqo/RMS_image_20191203.zip?dl=1 RPi3B+ ]
and
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/3pwwenty43dazq4/RMS_RPi4_image_20210626.zip?dl=1 RPi4 ].

Please see the [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick Start Guide] about how to flash them to an SD card.

Notes:
* The earlier versions of the Raspberry Pi, the 1 and 2, are not powerful enough to run RMS software.

* the pre-installed RMS software images incorporate an auto-updating feature, so that the RMS software is updated to the current release whenever your Raspberry Pi RMS is booted. This way, your station is always running the most recent set of updates.

* For installations into other Linux or windows environments, executing the command ''git pull'' will update to the most recent RMS release.

* The code was designed to run on a RPi, but it will also run an some Linux distributions. We have tested it on Linux Mint 18 and Ubuntu 16. For information on installing into other Linux releases, check portions of the section listed below for installing on RPi, and also check installation instructions found on [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS GitHub]

== Install the software from scratch ==

'''Note: if you're setting up a Rspberry Pi you should use the prebuilt image as this comes with all necessary software installed and is ready to use.'''. If you really do want to install on the RPi from scratch, you can follow the instructions below:

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 4 ===

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/19ImeNqBTD1ml2iisp5y7CjDrRV33wBeF9rtx3mIVjh4/edit?usp=sharing here]

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 3 ===

'''We no longer recommend the Pi3, as it doesn't have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers. '''

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ChaXx6WkuGfcQ_f5yRbwUOOMxEgIJrjq932UZE6cRjE/edit here].

=== Install for Linux ===

Detailed instructions [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Installation_for_Linux here]

=== Installation for Windows ===
Data capture does not work under windows. However you can use the other tools on your PC, where its much quicker to run SkyFit2 to calibrate your camera to the sky, or you want to use BatchFFToImage to convert data to jpeg format to share on Social Media.

Click '''[[Windows_Installation|here]]''' for detailed instructions. The instructions were tested on Windows 10 64-bit, but should work on any Windows version where git and Anaconda are available.

Aside: If you are a Windows whizz, please feel free to investigate why data capture doesn't work!

=== Installation for MacOS ===
As with Windows, installation for MacOS is useful if you want to analyse the data offline. If you do want to install it, please follow the instructions '''[[MacOS_Install | here]]'''.

== FAQ ==

=== What should I back up when re-flashing an SD card? ===

: The .config, platepar and mask files that are in the RMS source directory, plus the whole contents of the hidden directory /home/pi/.ssh.

If your SD card fails or becomes corrupted, the config files can be fetched from the server as they are uploaded every day together with the data. However the contents of .ssh are essential for connection to the server, so you must also save these. Once you set up a new SD card, return the files in their original location.

=== What are the values in FTPdetectinfo_* file designated as hnr mle bin Pix/fm Rho Phi? ===

: Some of these values are not used in RMS (hnr mle bin), but they are in CAMS, so they are here to conform to the standard. Thus they are all zeros. The others are:

: - Pix/fm - Average angular speed of the meteor in pixels per frame.

: - Rho, Phi - Parameters that define the line of the meteor in polar coordinates, see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hough_transform#Theory here] for more details. Rho is the distance of the line from the centre of the image, and phi is the angle of the line as measured from the positive direction of the Y axis (basically a line going from the center of the image to the top of the image), the positive angles are measured clockwise (I think, the CAMS standard might define these parameters a bit differently, the Y axis is flipped).

: The intensity is the sum of all pixel intensities of the meteor on a given frame. Let's say I represent an area around the meteor on a given frame like this, where the numbers are pixel intensities on an 8-bit image (so they can range from 0 to 255):

: [[File:Intensity_sum.png |Intensity_sum.png ]]

: and the pixels values inside the red boundary represent the meteor blob on the frame, the intensity would be the sum of all numbers inside the red boundary.
: This value is later used to compute the magnitude. The magnitude is computed as: mag = -2.5*log10(intensity sum) + photometric_offset. The photometric offset is estimated in SkyFit by fitting the line with slope -2.5 through pairs of known magnitudes of stars and logartihms of their pixel intensity sum. The photometric offset is basically the intercept of that line. The constant slope of -2.5 comes from the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apparent_magnitude#Calculations definition of stellar magnitudes.]

== GMN data policy ==

The Global Meteor Network produces several levles of data products:
* Level 1 - The lowest level data (i.e. as close to "raw" as possible) are the FF image and FR video files saved to the RPi by the capture code and the fireball detector.
* Level 2 - The meteor detector uses these data to extract positional and brightness information of individual meteors (FTPdetectinfo file), and images are also used for astrometric and photometric calibration (platepar file). Meteor and star detections are used to generate a range of plots suchs as the single-station shower association graph, camera drift graph, etc. The calibrated meteors measurements get uploaded to the GMN server together with the raw images of individual meteors.
* Level 3 - The software on the server correlates individual observations and computes multi-station meteor trajectories which are published daily on the GMN [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ data website]. This data is made public under the [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ CC BY 4.0 license].

Operators of individual GMN stations exclusivery own the Level 1 and Level 2 data their stations produce. In practice, this means that they are free to share this data with other meteor networks if they wish to do so. The data that gets uploaded to the GMN server will not be shared publicly nor with other parties without the operator's consent, but may be used internally by the GMN coordinators to manually produce other data products (e.g. trajectory of a meteorite dropping fireball, analysis of a meteor shower). All station operators will be credited for their data in all GMN publications.

== IstraStream ==

=== [http://istrastream.com/rms-gmn/ IstraStream GMN status website] ===

: The IstraStream.com is an independent hosting site which is part of our world wide GMN. It is primarily a host for data from cameras sold by IstraStream, but other station operators can request that their data be included.
To enable the IstraStream upload, simply change the config file as follows:

<pre>
; External script
; An external script will be run after RMS finishes the processing for the night, it will be passed three arguments:
; captured_night_dir, archived_night_dir, config - captured_night dir is the full path to the captured folder of the night
; the second one is the archived, and config is an object holding the values in this config file.
; ---------------
; Enable running an external script at the end of every night of processing
external_script_run: true ; <--- CHANGE
; Run the external script after auto reprocess. "auto_reprocess" needs to be turned on for this to work.
auto_reprocess_external_script_run: false
; Full path to the external script
external_script_path: /home/pi/source/RMS/iStream/iStream.py ; <--- CHANGE
; Name of the function in the external script which will be called
external_function_name: rmsExternal

; Daily reboot
; ---------------
; Reboot the computer daily after the processing and upload is done
reboot_after_processing: false ; <--- CHANGE
</pre>

Then, send an e-mail to [mailto:info@istrastream.com info@istrastream.com] with your:
* Station_ID
* Location or Name (if not secret)
* Lens type/size

For example, "CA0001; Elginfield Observatory, Ontario, Canada; 4mm". The IstraStream crew will enable the weblog page within a few days.

Finally, this document explains what every plot on the IstraStream weblog means:

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/132aHGn0QPzhpVN2s2n6FT6rJn39LAsPkchWJqXQb8Qk/edit?usp=sharing IstraStream Plots Explanation] ===

== For More Information ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=43 Contact the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork Join the Global Meteor Network Forum] ===

=== GMN related publications ===

: [https://academic.oup.com/mnras/advance-article/doi/10.1093/mnras/stab2557/6368869 Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T., & Vida, D. (2021). Meteor shower radiant dispersions in Global Meteor Network data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2107.12335 Vida, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P. S., Brown, P. G., McIntyre, M. J., Dijkema, T. J., Pavletić, L., Kukić, P., Mazur, M.J., Eschman, P., Roggemans, P., Merlak, A., & Zubović, D. (2021). The Global Meteor Network–Methodology and first results. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 506(4), 5046-5074.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.05458/ Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T. D., & Vida, D. (2020). Realistic gravitational focusing of meteoroid streams. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 494(2), 2982-2994.]

: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Kukic-et-al-2018-Rolling-shutter.pdf Kukić, P., Gural, P., Vida, D., Šegon, D. & Merlak, A. (2018) Correction for meteor centroids observed using rolling shutter cameras. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46:5, 154-118.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_sun_skirter_final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Kukić, P., & Merlak, A. (2018). Compressive strength of a skirting Daytime Arietid-first science results from low-cost Raspberry Pi-based meteor stations. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 113-118.]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.02979.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - I. Theory. arXiv:1911.02979v4 [astro-ph.EP] 21 Apr 2020]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.11734.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - II. Results. arXiv:1911.11734v1 [astro-ph.EP] 26 Novr 2019]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_first_results-final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Zubović, D., Kukić, P., Parag, F., & Macan, A. (2018). First results of a Raspberry Pi based meteor camera system. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 71-78.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Vida_IMC2016_proceedings_final.pdf Vida, D., Zubović, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P., & Cupec, R. (2016). Open-source meteor detection software for low-cost single-board computers. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference (IMC2016), Egmond, The Netherlands (pp. 2-5).]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Zubovic_IMC2015_priceedings_final.pdf Zubović, D., Vida, D., Gural, P., & Šegon, D. (2015). Advances in the development of a low-cost video meteor station. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference, Mistelbach, Austria (pp. 27-30).]

Main Page

2021-09-22T15:42:15Z

Dvida: /* GMN related publications */

Welcome to the Global Meteor Network's wiki page!

The Global Meteor Network (GMN) is a world wide organization of amateur and professional astronomers alike, whose goal is to observe the night sky using low-light video cameras and produce meteor trajectories in a coordinated manner. Here you will find information on the purpose and structure of the GMN, assembling and operating your own meteor camera, contributing to the development of RMS the GMN software, as well as information on how your observations as a citizen scientist can contribute to the further understanding of our solar system's formation and evolution.

'''<span style="color:red">If you have come here to find out how to build and setup a camera from scratch, jump ahead to [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#How_do_I_obtain_a_camera.3F this] section !</span>'''

== Global Meteor Network Overview ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=141 Our mission] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=363 A brief history of the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://youtu.be/oM7lfQ4nmyw Video overview - Meteor tracking and the GMN from Astro Imaging Channel presentation] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ Some 'live' GMN data products] ===

== Meteor Detection Station ==

=== What is an RMS GMN station? ===
: A RMS-based GMN station that is the subject of this Wiki consists of a Raspberry Pi (RPi) single board computer, a low light level security video camera, and the RMS software package. The camera is securely mounted in a weatherproof housing, pointed at the sky, and connected to the RPi with a POE (Power Over Ethernet) cable. The RPi is connected to the Internet via WiFi, and to be a part of GMN network, you’ll need a fairly powerful Raspberry Pi (RPi 3B+, RPi 4 or better) and a reasonably fast Internet connection. The internet connection is primarily required to enable data upload to a central server each morning as well as provide automatic updates for the RMS software.

: Nightly, the RPi starts recording video from the camera shortly after local sunset continuously compressing and storing the video data locally. Each morning before sunrise, after capture is complete, the RPi analyzes the video and extracts your nightly station’s meteor observations. These extracted video “clips” of detected meteors are then archived and uploaded to a server. The clips can total hundreds of megabytes on a “busy” night (e.g., in a heavy meteor shower, or a night with a lot of false detections--progress is being made on the detection software). The server finds meteors which were observed with more than one station and this enables the server to triangulate the meteor trails in 3D and calculate the orbits of the meteors.

===[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS/blob/master/README.md What do I need?] ===

You'll need a Raspberry Pi with the software on, and a camera kit. We strongly recommend the Pi4 model. The software will run on a Pi3 but it is much slower.

=== How do I obtain a camera? ===
There are two options:

==== Buy a Camera ====
You can buy a camera and Pi prebuilt and ready to install. These are available from a couple of suppliers. The Croatian Meteor Network sell prebuilt cameras as explained on [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=136 this page]. Alternatively, if you're in the UK, you can obtain cameras from the [https://ukmeteornetwork.co.uk/ UK Meteor Network]

==== Build your own from scratch ====
This requires some basic DIY skills and some familiarity with the Raspberry PI, but don't be put off. The instructions are comprehensive and if you get stuck, you can ask for advice in the [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork groups.io] forum.

Click on this link if you want to '''[[Build_A_Camera|build a camera from scratch]]'''.

Once you've built the camera, You can '''[https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#Flash_a_pre-built_image flash a Prebuilt image]''' onto an SD card to set up the Pi with the software required to capture meteors and upload data to the network.

=== Can I use a commercial all-sky camera? ===

: Generally no due to the lack of sensitivity. [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=163 But see this recent experiment]

== Operating and maintaining your GMN station ==

=== Overview ===

: Please note that GMS is a nascent operation and you may share some growing pains if you choose to be involved -- we're still working out some bugs and making improvements here, which may be an opportunity to help if you have programming skills! ;-) So note that the workload of day-to-day operation can be non-zero, and might take a little bit of your time.

: Ideally, you'll want to monitor your RMS RPi system(s) daily to look for freezes or glitches or other problems... like birds nesting or soiling the camera window, people accidentally unplugging the power cord, mice (or cats or dogs!) chewing on the camera Ethernet cable, etc.

: Although we are getting close, this is not a "power up and forget about it" system yet.
: However, by its very nature, the GMS network is inhabited by a lot of people who are willing to help newcomers getting started. So, here are some clues for daily operation of your RMS camera.

=== So what does the meteor camera do over the course of 24 hours? ===

: The RMS Python based system calculates the sundown to sunrise interval and schedules video camera capture all night long. Depending on the video camera and capabilities of the RPi, the camera captures 25 or more frames per second between evening and morning twilight. During the continuous image capture, the station begins processing captured image data, doing a pre-screening to target frames with a suitable number of stars (usually around 20) that makes it worth looking for meteor detections. Once data capture has finished, the station switches into processing all the promising frames for detections, then refining the astrometric accuracy of every positive detection. Using the station platepar (plate parameters) calibration file, processing iterates to find the best astrometry and photometry solution for each detected meteor. Once this process has analyzed each detection, summary files are created.
: These summary files include text file data presentation in several widely accepted formats (CAMS and UFOorbit), as well as graphic plots of detection frequencies throughout the night, a set of thumbnail images of detections, a set of thumbnail images of data captured throughout the night, a single image with all detections stacked together, plots of photometry, astrometry, and camera pointing drift in arc minutes throughout the course of the night as the mount or building flexes, a flat file for correcting images, and a plot of all detections showing any identified radiants. Finally all results are combined into a single compressed archive, which is automatically uploaded each morning to the central server. Optionally, you can create a mp4 movie showing a time lapse of the night’s captured images.
: Each morning you can review the result files on the RPi, and copy anything you want to your computer or tablet.

===Archiving data and backing up configuration ===

: Data backup is as much or as little as you like. Your primary data is automatically uploaded to the central server every morning when data processing is done. We've built some automated tools that can help to back up any additional data to a thumb drive inserted into the RPi.

=== Viewing the data ===

: To view the data, you can use CMN_binViewer software[https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer] which is already installed in the RMS SD image.
: There is also a Windows version[https://www.dropbox.com/s/44u5r9nso81wa56/CMN_binViewer_setup_x64.exe?dl=1] you can install.

=== Tools and Utilities ===

* [https://www.realvnc.com/en/connect/download/viewer/ RealVNC] or [https://anydesk.com/en AnyDesk] remote connect tool allows station access from anywhere. Access from outside your network is enabled by use of an OpenVPN connection address available to meteor stations. Alternatively, with VNC and Teamviewer, you can create an account and team on their websites, and then remotely access your station.
* Samba data directory access, allows you to copy data results directly from your RPi to your computer or tablet.
* [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/cmn_binviewer CMN_binViewer] can be used to view standard fits image files containing meteor detections. It runs on the RPi, and is also available under Windows.
* [https://sonotaco.com/soft/e_index.html UFO Orbit] allows you to process data from multiple stations and generate unified radiants of two or more stations seeing the same meteor. It can plot the shared object ground path, orbital characteristics, and can output a summary file of all objects seen by more than one station, which can be used for further analysis.
* RMS software can be installed under Windows to allow much of the RMS python-based code to be executed on your computer, so it can be run against meteor station data you have transferred to your computer from the RPi.
* You can run RMS Python jobs on the RPi to sample the image files captured all night long and condense them into a mp4 movie. This creates a sometimes mesmerizing summary that can run for over 2 minutes in length for winter time data.

== Configuring and installing your camera ==

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick start guide] ===

=== [[Focusing_your_camera | Focusing your IP camera]] ===

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2sq1hBwcAA Video tutorial - Configuring your IMX291 IP camera] ===

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1TPotXcRstHz-XWIQYIW71xkRYy7Ca1UCoEiZsqdk9zw/edit?usp=sharing Different ways of connecting the camera] ===

== What can I do with my GMN station? ==

=== [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOjb3qxDlX4 Video Tutorial - Using SkyFit2 to perform astrometric and photometric calibration + Manually reducing observations of fireballs and computing their trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=310 Generating a Google Earth KML file to show your station's field of view] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=253 Using UFO Orbit program to estimate meteor trajectories] ===

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?p=221 Urban meteor observing] ===

== RMS Software Installation ==

=== Flash a pre-built image ===

Pre-built Images are available with the RMS software pre-installed on Raspbian. Raspbian is the operating system typically used on the Raspberry Pi.

A 128 GB microSD card is preferred, although smaller 64 GB cards will also work. The image is flashed to the microSD card using the Etcher utility for Windows (32 or 64-bit), MacOS or Linux (64-bit), which can be found [https://www.balena.io/etcher/ here]

When you first boot up the Pi make sure you have a keyboard, monitor and mouse attached as you will be taken through a setup process by the RMS software.

The current publicly released images of RMS are:
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/sa9csd4m3jr1vqo/RMS_image_20191203.zip?dl=1 RPi3B+ ]
and
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/3pwwenty43dazq4/RMS_RPi4_image_20210626.zip?dl=1 RPi4 ].

Please see the [https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1MTL85YMYH33u8OZ9Tl0JjSZXcLn8mOmNrCOC0I28Drw/edit Quick Start Guide] about how to flash them to an SD card.

Notes:
* The earlier versions of the Raspberry Pi, the 1 and 2, are not powerful enough to run RMS software.

* the pre-installed RMS software images incorporate an auto-updating feature, so that the RMS software is updated to the current release whenever your Raspberry Pi RMS is booted. This way, your station is always running the most recent set of updates.

* For installations into other Linux or windows environments, executing the command ''git pull'' will update to the most recent RMS release.

* The code was designed to run on a RPi, but it will also run an some Linux distributions. We have tested it on Linux Mint 18 and Ubuntu 16. For information on installing into other Linux releases, check portions of the section listed below for installing on RPi, and also check installation instructions found on [https://github.com/CroatianMeteorNetwork/RMS GitHub]

== Install the software from scratch ==

'''Note: if you're setting up a Rspberry Pi you should use the prebuilt image as this comes with all necessary software installed and is ready to use.'''. If you really do want to install on the RPi from scratch, you can follow the instructions below:

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 4 ===

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/19ImeNqBTD1ml2iisp5y7CjDrRV33wBeF9rtx3mIVjh4/edit?usp=sharing here]

=== Install for Raspberry Pi 3 ===

'''We no longer recommend the Pi3, as it doesn't have the performance or memory to handle busy meteor showers. '''

Detailed instructions [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ChaXx6WkuGfcQ_f5yRbwUOOMxEgIJrjq932UZE6cRjE/edit here].

=== Install for Linux ===

Detailed instructions [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wiki/index.php?title=Installation_for_Linux here]

=== Installation for Windows ===
Data capture does not work under windows. However you can use the other tools on your PC, where its much quicker to run SkyFit2 to calibrate your camera to the sky, or you want to use BatchFFToImage to convert data to jpeg format to share on Social Media.

Click '''[[Windows_Installation|here]]''' for detailed instructions. The instructions were tested on Windows 10 64-bit, but should work on any Windows version where git and Anaconda are available.

Aside: If you are a Windows whizz, please feel free to investigate why data capture doesn't work!

=== Installation for MacOS ===
As with Windows, installation for MacOS is useful if you want to analyse the data offline. If you do want to install it, please follow the instructions '''[[MacOS_Install | here]]'''.

== FAQ ==

=== What should I back up when re-flashing an SD card? ===

: The .config, platepar and mask files that are in the RMS source directory, plus the whole contents of the hidden directory /home/pi/.ssh.

If your SD card fails or becomes corrupted, the config files can be fetched from the server as they are uploaded every day together with the data. However the contents of .ssh are essential for connection to the server, so you must also save these. Once you set up a new SD card, return the files in their original location.

=== What are the values in FTPdetectinfo_* file designated as hnr mle bin Pix/fm Rho Phi? ===

: Some of these values are not used in RMS (hnr mle bin), but they are in CAMS, so they are here to conform to the standard. Thus they are all zeros. The others are:

: - Pix/fm - Average angular speed of the meteor in pixels per frame.

: - Rho, Phi - Parameters that define the line of the meteor in polar coordinates, see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hough_transform#Theory here] for more details. Rho is the distance of the line from the centre of the image, and phi is the angle of the line as measured from the positive direction of the Y axis (basically a line going from the center of the image to the top of the image), the positive angles are measured clockwise (I think, the CAMS standard might define these parameters a bit differently, the Y axis is flipped).

: The intensity is the sum of all pixel intensities of the meteor on a given frame. Let's say I represent an area around the meteor on a given frame like this, where the numbers are pixel intensities on an 8-bit image (so they can range from 0 to 255):

: [[File:Intensity_sum.png |Intensity_sum.png ]]

: and the pixels values inside the red boundary represent the meteor blob on the frame, the intensity would be the sum of all numbers inside the red boundary.
: This value is later used to compute the magnitude. The magnitude is computed as: mag = -2.5*log10(intensity sum) + photometric_offset. The photometric offset is estimated in SkyFit by fitting the line with slope -2.5 through pairs of known magnitudes of stars and logartihms of their pixel intensity sum. The photometric offset is basically the intercept of that line. The constant slope of -2.5 comes from the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apparent_magnitude#Calculations definition of stellar magnitudes.]

== GMN data policy ==

The Global Meteor Network produces several levles of data products:
* Level 1 - The lowest level data (i.e. as close to "raw" as possible) are the FF image and FR video files saved to the RPi by the capture code and the fireball detector.
* Level 2 - The meteor detector uses these data to extract positional and brightness information of individual meteors (FTPdetectinfo file), and images are also used for astrometric and photometric calibration (platepar file). Meteor and star detections are used to generate a range of plots suchs as the single-station shower association graph, camera drift graph, etc. The calibrated meteors measurements get uploaded to the GMN server together with the raw images of individual meteors.
* Level 3 - The software on the server correlates individual observations and computes multi-station meteor trajectories which are published daily on the GMN [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/data/ data website]. This data is made public under the [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ CC BY 4.0 license].

Operators of individual GMN stations exclusivery own the Level 1 and Level 2 data their stations produce. In practice, this means that they are free to share this data with other meteor networks if they wish to do so. The data that gets uploaded to the GMN server will not be shared publicly nor with other parties without the operator's consent, but may be used internally by the GMN coordinators to manually produce other data products (e.g. trajectory of a meteorite dropping fireball, analysis of a meteor shower). All station operators will be credited for their data in all GMN publications.

== IstraStream ==

=== [http://istrastream.com/rms-gmn/ IstraStream GMN status website] ===

: The IstraStream.com is an independent hosting site which is part of our world wide GMN. It is primarily a host for data from cameras sold by IstraStream, but other station operators can request that their data be included.
To enable the IstraStream upload, simply change the config file as follows:

<pre>
; External script
; An external script will be run after RMS finishes the processing for the night, it will be passed three arguments:
; captured_night_dir, archived_night_dir, config - captured_night dir is the full path to the captured folder of the night
; the second one is the archived, and config is an object holding the values in this config file.
; ---------------
; Enable running an external script at the end of every night of processing
external_script_run: true ; <--- CHANGE
; Run the external script after auto reprocess. "auto_reprocess" needs to be turned on for this to work.
auto_reprocess_external_script_run: false
; Full path to the external script
external_script_path: /home/pi/source/RMS/iStream/iStream.py ; <--- CHANGE
; Name of the function in the external script which will be called
external_function_name: rmsExternal

; Daily reboot
; ---------------
; Reboot the computer daily after the processing and upload is done
reboot_after_processing: false ; <--- CHANGE
</pre>

Then, send an e-mail to [mailto:info@istrastream.com info@istrastream.com] with your:
* Station_ID
* Location or Name (if not secret)
* Lens type/size

For example, "CA0001; Elginfield Observatory, Ontario, Canada; 4mm". The IstraStream crew will enable the weblog page within a few days.

Finally, this document explains what every plot on the IstraStream weblog means:

=== [https://docs.google.com/document/d/132aHGn0QPzhpVN2s2n6FT6rJn39LAsPkchWJqXQb8Qk/edit?usp=sharing IstraStream Plots Explanation] ===

== For More Information ==

=== [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/?page_id=43 Contact the Global Meteor Network] ===

=== [https://groups.io/g/globalmeteornetwork Join the Global Meteor Network Forum] ===

=== GMN related publications ===

: [https://academic.oup.com/mnras/advance-article/doi/10.1093/mnras/stab2557/6368869 Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T., & Vida, D. (2021). Meteor shower radiant dispersions in Global Meteor Network data. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2107.12335 Vida, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P. S., Brown, P. G., McIntyre, M. J., Dijkema, T. J., Pavletić, L., Kukić, P., Mazur, M.J., Eschman, P., Roggemans, P., Merlak, A., & Zubović, D. (2021). The Global Meteor Network–Methodology and first results. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 506(4), 5046-5074.]

: [https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.05458/ Moorhead, A. V., Clements, T. D., & Vida, D. (2020). Realistic gravitational focusing of meteoroid streams. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 494(2), 2982-2994.]

: [https://globalmeteornetwork.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Kukic-et-al-2018-Rolling-shutter.pdf Kukić, P., Gural, P., Vida, D., Šegon, D. & Merlak, A. (2018) Correction for meteor centroids observed using rolling shutter cameras. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46:5, 154-118.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_sun_skirter_final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Kukić, P., & Merlak, A. (2018). Compressive strength of a skirting Daytime Arietid-first science results from low-cost Raspberry Pi-based meteor stations. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 113-118.]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.02979.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - I. Theory. arXiv:1911.02979v4 [astro-ph.EP] 21 Apr 2020]

: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.11734.pdf Vida, D., Gural, P., Brown, P., Campbell-Brown, M., Wiegert, P. (2019) Estimating trajectories of meteors: an observational Monte Carlo approach - II. Results. arXiv:1911.11734v1 [astro-ph.EP] 26 Novr 2019]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018_WGN___RMS_first_results-final.pdf Vida, D., Mazur, M. J., Šegon, D., Zubović, D., Kukić, P., Parag, F., & Macan, A. (2018). First results of a Raspberry Pi based meteor camera system. WGN, Journal of the International Meteor Organization, 46, 71-78.]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Vida_IMC2016_proceedings_final.pdf Vida, D., Zubović, D., Šegon, D., Gural, P., & Cupec, R. (2016). Open-source meteor detection software for low-cost single-board computers. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference (IMC2016), Egmond, The Netherlands (pp. 2-5).]

: [https://gmn.duckdns.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Zubovic_IMC2015_priceedings_final.pdf Zubović, D., Vida, D., Gural, P., & Šegon, D. (2015). Advances in the development of a low-cost video meteor station. In Proceedings of the International Meteor Conference, Mistelbach, Austria (pp. 27-30).]