A feature in the ASIAir I recently learned about was the ability to do a polar alignment without being able to see Polaris (in the Northern Hemisphere). For me, I was always limited to where I put my telescope in the backyard because there is this one tree that blocks out Polaris for most of my yard. That meant that I had to put my telescope in this one strip of yard that had a view of Polaris.

The “All Sky Polar Alignment” is still an experimental feature in the ASIAir, but it seemed to work for me pretty well! It basically works like this:

  1. Enable the feature in the settings
  2. Point the mount where you think Polaris would be. Try to get close, but the process will help you actually align it later
  3. Point the scope to somewhere you can see stars, as long as it is not due east or west.
  4. The software then takes a series of images at different angles and plate solves them to figure out where it is.
  5. When it completed that, it will tell you how close you are to being aligned.
  6. You can adjust the mount until you get it all lined up.

The whole process only took a few minutes. It is pretty magical. It will open up a whole new world for me!

Here is a YouTube tutorial on it.