My Nikon D5100 works fine using the relay shutter release for long exposures, but now I want to do some flats and it just doesn't. Basically, I try to do 1/500, 1/1000, 1/2000, etc. and it always takes about 1 second. This is true whether I disable Force Bulb Mode or not.

I disconnected the relay, both ends, and now it won't take pictures at all, looking for /dev/ttyUSB0.

I have tried both the Nikon and gphoto drivers to no avail.

Thoughts?

I am having exactly the same problem with a D90 and a KMtronics relay. The shutter is always controlled by the relay. It doesnt matter if you set multi or sub-second exposures or 'Force Bulb' is on or off.
The only workaround I found is:
In INDI, delete the relay port (set the text entry empty).
Save the configuration (same page were the 'force bulb' is). Then, in EKOS, disconnect and stop, then start again (I do this to be sure the port settings are saved. I am not sure how it works but it seems to work)
After this, you gain shutter control from your camera. The problem is that you can not make exposures longer than 30 s. For this you have to set again the port, etc etc

Let me know if this helps.

So the camera is connected directly via USB as well?

Hi Jasem,
I already answered you on stellarmate support.
Yes, both connectors/cables are needed for full range of exposition speeds.

A) The USB-USB connector is in charge of transferring data between camera and the software.
Through this cable there is capability to trigger the camera shutter at speeds up to 30 s.

B ) For longer expositions it needs another additional cable to trigger the shutter in Bulb mode.
If I’m not wrong, this cable is a dead (no data transfer cable) It is just an open/close contact that triggers the shutter and let it open (acquiring image) until the contact is opened again.
This open/close contact is done by the relay in the KMtronics device which is itself controlled by RS232 commands send by the software (INDI/EKOS) through a USB port.

Thanks !

Joaquin

Hello,

Was there any resolution to this? I came across this thread as I was attempting to troubleshoot an issue I was experiencing last night with my Nikon D7000 and Stellarmate 1.5.2.

When I was doing focus and alignment, all actions using the camera were under 30 seconds, which appears to have resulted to the commands being sent over the USB cable instead of the shutter release port (using KMTronics as well). When this happens, the camera goes into "PC Mode" on the display and will no longer acknowledge the shutter release port firing. It will only release from "PC Mode" and acknowledge the shutter release port again if I reset everything and take an image over 30 seconds, which does result in a command being sent to the shutter port.

Ideally, I would like all shutter commands to be sent over the shutter release port instead of sometimes via USB if they are under 30 seconds.

Any help that you can provide would be greatly appreciated!

Just a note. I switched from the stable StellarMate channel to beta this evening and this behavior appears to be resolved in the gphoto 3.0 driver that comes with StellarMate 1.5.3.