solving fields

[Sam]

Hi Dustin,

Thanks for this wonderful piece of software. I'm able to upload and get all the information and images one by one. But this makes life harder as I've got many images to calibrate. I've downloaded the software and all the index files (index-42xx.fits , index-42xx-yy.fits, and also 4100 fits) as instructed in the website. But I keep getting an error "field 1 did not solve (index index-4xxx.fits, field objects xx-xx). before this it also says 'found 55 sources' but 0 solutions. Just to make sure that I've got the correct index files, I downloaded all of them.
I checked one of the log files of an image which was successfully uploaded directly to your website. I can see their index files look different. example, please see below.

Auto-indexing directory "/data1/INDEXES/200-current" ...
Checking file "/data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-201-09.fits"
Index name "/data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-201-09.fits" is readable; assuming singe file.
Checking file "/data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-200-05.fits"
Index name "/data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-200-05.fits" is readable; assuming singe file.
Skipping directory /data1/INDEXES/200-current/..
.......
.......
Trying to add index "/data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-204-01.fits".
Index name "/data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-204-01.fits" is readable; assuming singe file.
Index name "/data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-204-01.fits" is readable; assuming singe file.
Index name "/data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-204-01.fits" is readable; assuming singe file.
Index scale: [8, 11] arcmin, [480, 660] arcsec
Index has 3097598 quads and 1821951 stars
.......
.......
Running blind solver:
blind solver run parameters:
indexes:
  /data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-219.fits
  /data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-218.fits
  /data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-217.fits
  /data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-216.fits
  /data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-215.fits
  /data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-214.fits
  /data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-213.fits
  /data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-212.fits
  /data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-211.fits
  /data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-210.fits
  /data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-209.fits
  /data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-208.fits
  /data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-207.fits
  /data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-206.fits
  /data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-205.fits
  /data1/INDEXES/200-current/index-204-11.fits


I'm wondering where are these index file coming from? Is there a link to download those index files. Are these different from 42xx files? 
Why am I getting this type of error?

Thanks.

[Dustin Lang]

Hi,

The web service uses a different set of index files, the "200-series".  They are built from the USNO-B1 astrometric catalog.  The "4200-series" are built from the 2MASS catalog.  I believe the 4200 series is generally better (fewer artifacts, better precision), though it doesn't go quite as deep, so it's probably not as good at the very small angular scales (below ~ 6 arcmin).

Could you please post an example image, or give a link to one that solved on the web service?  Sometimes there are easy things to try.

Oh, one other big difference is that the web service does "--downsample 2" by default, which often helps get better star detection and measurement.

cheers,
--dustin

[Dustin Lang]

PS, the 200-series files *are* available for download, they just have funny licensing terms so we are trying to move away from them.  If we can't find an easy way to get your images solving, I'll send you the link.

cheers,
--dustin

[Dustin Lang]

I'm posting some off-list follow-up questions here to answer:

Well, I installed partly 4200-4203 series (4203 complete, 4201 & 4202 still getting loaded). The command gave a solution. But I'm unable to
display it as an image or the header information.

Field 1 did not solve (index index-4203-15.fits, field objects 11-20).
  log-odds ratio 50.4877 (8.44323e+21), 8 match, 0 conflict, 21 distractors, 12 index.
  RA,Dec = (326.172,38.3139), pixel scale 0.796654 arcsec/pix.
  Hit/miss:   Hit/miss: ++++----+-+--+--------------+(best)----------------------++++
Field 1: solved with index index-4203-14.fits.
Field 1 solved: writing to file /home/spremach/Downloads/sn1999x2_000611_1_out.solved to indicate this.
Field: /home/spremach/Downloads/sn1999x2_000611_1_out.fit
Field center: (RA,Dec) = (326.2, 38.31) deg.
Field center: (RA H:M:S, Dec D:M:S) = (21:44:41.173, +38:18:49.778).
Field size: 6.63563 x 6.63832 arcminutes
Field rotation angle: up is 179.914 degrees E of N
Creating new FITS file "/home/spremach/Downloads/sn1999x2_000611_1_out.new"...
solve-field.c:336:plot_source_overlay Plotting command was cancelled
 solve-field.c:142:run_command Command was: "/usr/local/astrometry/bin/plotxy -I /tmp/tmp.ppm.wW9fd5 -i
/home/spremach/Downloads/sn1999x2_000611_1_out.axy -C red -w 2 -N 50 -x 1 -y 1 -P | /usr/local/astrometry/bin/plotxy -i
/home/spremach/Downloads/sn1999x2_000611_1_out.axy -I - -w 2 -r 3 -C red -n 50 -N 200 -x 1 -y 1 >
/home/spremach/Downloads/sn1999x2_000611_1_out-objs.png"

 solve-field.c:141:run_command Command exited with exit status 134

Here, the new fits file which is ending with .new has the same information(image positions,etc) as the original image. I'm unable to open solved
image, that is .solved and .wcs and .png as well. I want to display the image in ds9 and also extract header information on the solve images.
Also can you tell me why the plotting command was cancelled?


Before starting to solve the field I get the following errors.

Reading input file 1 of 1: "/home/spremach/Downloads/sn1999x2_000611_1_out.fit"...
Header has 58 cards
/usr/local/astrometry/lib/python/astrometry/util/fits2fits.py:49: DeprecationWarning: The ascard function is deprecated and may be removed in a
future version.
        Use the `.cards` attribute instead.
  for c in hdr.ascard:
/usr/local/lib/python2.6/dist-packages/pyfits-3.2-py2.6-linux-i686.egg/pyfits/card.py:66: DeprecationWarning: The CardList class has been
deprecated; all its former functionality has been subsumed by the Header class, so CardList objects should not be directly created.  See the
PyFITS 3.1.0 CHANGELOG for more details.
  DeprecationWarning)
Found an existing WCS header, will try to verify it.
Extracting sources...
simplexy: found 55 sources.
cairoutils.c:728:cairoutils_read_ppm_stream: Netpbm is not available; can't read PPM imagescairoutils.c:728:cairoutils_read_ppm_stream:
Netpbm is not available; can't read PPM images
cairoutils.c:728:cairoutils_read_ppm_stream: Netpbm is not available; can't read PPM images
cairoutils.c:728:cairoutils_read_ppm_stream: Netpbm is not available; can't read PPM images
libpng warning: Image width is zero in IHDR
libpng warning: Image height is zero in IHDR
libpng error: Invalid IHDR data
Aborted
Solving...
Reading file "/home/spremach/Downloads/sn1999x2_000611_1_out.axy"...
Verifying WCS using indices with quads of size [0, 0] arcmin
Got 0 solutions.
Field 1 did not solve (index index-4203-47.fits, field objects 1-10).

The .new file contains your original image pixels and the newly-solved WCS header.  If you load it in ds9 you should get the new RA,Dec coords.

The plotting program is failing because netpbm wasn't found -- "Netpbm is not available".  To fix that, see:
  http://astrometry.net/doc/build.html#auto-config

Hope that helps,
--dustin

[gnthibault]

Sorry to bring this back on the table. I have recently experienced issue with astrometry.net with 4200 file series. It was quite frustrating as the online version is working perfectly and reporting :Field 1: solved with index index-206.fits.

 Where the index-206 is absolutely impossible to find on the internet.

I would appreciate any help to find where this set of fits can possibly be.

Thank you in advance for your help

[Dustin Lang]

Hi,

As discussed here, the 200-series index files have weird licensing terms from their source catalogs, so we cannot distribute them.

https://groups.google.com/g/astrometry/c/BKQcnPoKhvs/m/yVz6w3yqCQAJ

I would recommend trying the "5200-series", here,

https://portal.nersc.gov/project/cosmo/temp/dstn/index-5200/

you would want the index-5206-*  (all 48 of them...) files.

cheers,

--dustin

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[Neha Sharma]

Hi,

     I am having a similar problem, the astrometry works fine using the Astrometry.net website but failed using the solve-field command.

     I have downloaded all the index-5200 series files but the solve-field command is still not able to perform astrometry (showing "field did not solve") 

Here is my solve-field code:

subprocess.call('solve-field --continue --downsample 2 --no-plots --scale-low ' + PIX_l + ' --scale-high '
+ PIX_u + ' --scale-units app --config '+DIR_DOC+'Astrometry.cfg --ra ' + str(ra) + ' --dec ' +
str(dec) + ' --radius 50 ' + filename, timeout=500, shell=True)

I have tried with different radii as well as giving the ra, dec as found from the Astrometry.net website.

Here is the error message which I get:

Reading input file 1 of 1: "new.fits"...
Extracting sources...
Downsampling by 2...
simplexy: found 131 sources.
Solving...
Reading file "./new.axy"...
Only searching for solutions within 10 degrees of RA,Dec (185.017,5.3428)
Field 1 did not solve (index index-5200-24.fits).
Field: new.fits
Did not solve (or no WCS file was written).

Could you please let me know how I can solve this problem?

Thanks and regards,  
Neha

[Gaetano Zarcone]

Hi,

First of all, I suggest you to compare your command line "'solve-field --continue --downsample 2 --no-plots --scale-low ' + PIX_l + ' --scale-high ' + PIX_u + ' --scale-units app --config '+DIR_DOC+'Astrometry.cfg --ra ' + str(ra) + ' --dec ' + str(dec) + ' --radius 50 ' + filename" with the Astrometry.net one. You can find it in Log page (Log file 2). Here you can find the options used, the index used to solve and so on by Astrometry.net website.

Previously I solved my similar issues in this way.

Cheers

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[Dustin Lang]

Hi,

Could you please send a link to one of your solved images on nova.astrometry.net?  Depending on the image scale, you will need index files of different scales (5201-*, 5202-*, etc).  What are PIX_l and PIX_u set to?

cheers,

dustin

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[Neha Sharma]

Hi,

I attached the fits file and here is the link to the solved image (https://nova.astrometry.net/user_images/6027265#annotated).

I have downloaded all the index files of the 5200 series. 

In my solve-field code, the values are as around following:

PIX_l =1.4602
PIX_u= 1.5198

Thanks,
Neha

[Dustin Lang]

Hi,

The nova solved image gives a pixel scale of 0.925 arcseconds per pixel, which is outside the PIX_L, PIX_U range you have set.

cheers,

dustin

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[Neha Sharma]

Hi,

     Thank you so much. Yes, this was the error of pixel scale. 

Could you please also let me know how I can see the Logfile2 on the Astrometry.net website? When I am opening this it showing Server Error 500.

I would like to use the same solve_field command that is being used in Astrometry.net.

Thanks,

Neha

[Dustin Lang]

logfile2 links for new submissions should now work.

[Neha Sharma]

Yes, it is working fine now. Thank you so much.

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