The run console

Once you arm, the Eclipse imaging console opens. This is the live instrument panel you watch through the run. It stays on top and remains independent of the main HelioMaker window, so minimizing HelioMaker does not hide the console behind SharpCap or PHD2.

The exposure plan is already fixed The current version does not allow exposure or gain changes after automated imaging starts. The console reports and executes the selected phase recipes; it is not a live exposure editor. Determine the filtered full solar disk exposure, camera gain and effective ND rating of the complete filter stack with the physical rig, then derive, tune and rehearse the plan before opening preflight. Do not tune sequence controlled parameters manually in SharpCap after that point; HelioMaker applies the saved plan again when the run is armed.

Full Eclipse imaging console during a simulation that captures
images to disk, showing the Diamond ring C3 phase, enlarged central timeline, live geometry, filter replacement
cue, paused guiding, phase telemetry, captured image count and controls. — The full console during the C3 diamond ring phase of a capture rehearsal. The red banner gives the Classical mode instruction to prepare to replace the solar filter at the first returning bead. The run type banner states clearly that images are being written to disk.

First confirm the run identity

Run type banner: The largest item in the top row distinguishes LIVE ECLIPSE: this is the real thing, Simulation: images ARE captured to disk, and Simulation: timing only, no images captured. Read it before relying on the run.
Observer local, UTC and Sun alt / az: Both clocks are always visible. The Sun altitude and azimuth are calculated for the run clock and selected observer site. The Time display choice made before the run controls the contact, phase and timeline labels; it does not remove either clock from the console.
Event identity band: The dark strip identifies the eclipse type, date, coordinates, elevation and IANA time zone with its UTC offset. Use it to catch a wrong event or site before the critical phases.

Timeline, phase and live geometry

Timeline: The main rail shows the current time, contacts, totality and the interval in which the filter is planned to be off. Near the central phases it automatically enlarges the thin crescent or diamond ring through C3 window so C2, maximum eclipse and C3 remain readable. A smaller overview rail continues to show the full C1 to C4 event and the position of the enlarged window.
Current phase card: Shows the active phase, its exposure or HDR recipe, camera gain, planned cycle count, completed cycle count, progress bar and a large countdown to the next phase. Between phases it states what HelioMaker is waiting for and counts down to that phase.
Live geometry: A calculated full solar disk view follows the run clock, including a compressed rehearsal clock. It is a stable visual model of eclipse progress, not a live camera image and not proof that the physical Sun is centred.

Run console timeline enlarged around the central phases with C2,
maximum eclipse and C3 labels, the planned filter off interval, current time marker and full event overview
rail. — Near the central phases, the main timeline enlarges the critical interval so the contacts remain readable. The red shaded span is the planned filter off interval, the red marker shows the current time, and the small rail below preserves the position within the full eclipse.

One total eclipse in Safe mode as the run console sees it: contacts C1 to C4, a conservative unfiltered interval inside totality, voice cues before C2 and C3, and the exact exposure capture window around the central phase, with single frames on a timer through the partials. — How a total eclipse plays out in **Safe mode**. Diamond ring (Classical) mode differs; compare both on Safety and eclipse modes. Visual confirmation controls removal, while Safe mode replaces the filter early on its cue.

Live telemetry and capture progress

The telemetry table keeps every planned phase visible and highlights the active row. Its columns are intended to answer both what the plan requested and what the rig is doing:

Column	Meaning
Starts / Ends	The phase boundaries in the time display selected before the run.
Frames / Cycles	Completed versus planned counts. A tilde marks a prediction for a deadline governed phase, so `12/~8` means twelve were captured against an estimate of eight.
Guiding	The plan's state for that phase: on, off or paused. The active cell turns red if PHD2 disagrees with the plan; stalled means PHD2 has stopped reporting reliably.
Capture	The phase's planned SharpCap mode: Live View or Still. The active cell turns red when the camera reports the other mode.
State	active, done, MISSED, FAILED, or -- for a phase still to come.

Live telemetry table with completed partial ingress, thin crescent
C2 and diamond ring C2 rows, active totality, and pending C3 and partial egress rows. — The active phase is highlighted. Tildes mark deadline governed estimates; the Guiding and Capture columns show the planned state for every phase, while State distinguishes completed, active and pending work.

Images captured shows the total confirmed frames against the plan estimate. A separate missed count appears when frames are lost during Hold.

The footer carries buttons only. It used to lead with status text — time remaining, and the progress of post-capture image-set saving — and on a narrow console those growing labels could push Stop run off the end of the row. Nothing that matters was lost: the countdown to the next phase is on the phase card where you are already looking, and image-set saving is reported in the run log and in eclipse_run.log.

In full view, Open capture folder... opens the current run folder. Captured files and eclipse_run.log are stored there, providing the durable record behind the live panel.

Shutter sound feedback

Shutter feedback is enabled by default and follows SharpCap capture telemetry, not merely an HM dispatch request. Short clicks and bursts follow confirmed forward progress. The long-exposure open/close pair is different: it marks SharpCap starting and ending an exposure attempt, and does not prove that the image was accepted or saved. Use the live frame counts, final summary and capture folder as the record of successful images. The sound is adapted to the phase:

Pre-eclipse, partial and post-eclipse single shots use one short shutter click.
Each completed HDR bracket in a thin crescent or the central phase uses a short group of clicks matching the bracket size, up to nine. The central phase used to be silent; it is not any more, for every eclipse type.
The rapid short exposures in the C2 and C3 diamond ring phases use an occasional restrained burst rather than one click for every high-speed frame.
Exposures of one second or longer use distinct shutter-open and shutter-close sounds, in the diamond ring phases and in totality. These are camera-activity cues, not saved-file confirmations.

One cue style per cycle Where a cycle's long exposures narrate themselves with the open and close sounds, that cycle does not also get the completed-bracket click group: the two would fight over the same moment. It is one cue style per cycle rather than one individual sound, so a cycle containing several long exposures still produces an open/close pair for each of them. This only arises on a total eclipse. The long-exposure sounds are tied to the totality and diamond ring phases, so an annular or partial central phase always keeps its click group however long its exposures are.

The diamond ring phases never take the completed-bracket click group. That is deliberate: they last seconds and fall exactly where your hands are on the filter, which is not a moment to add a burst of clicks to. They are not silent, though — their short exposures still produce the restrained burst above, and their long ones still produce the open and close sounds.

Simulated runs make these sounds too. A rehearsal on the built-in eclipse simulator used to be completely silent, which made it a poor rehearsal of what eclipse day sounds like; the clicks now follow the simulator's own file writing, at the plan's real cadence.

The small shutter button beside Open capture folder... is available in both full and compact views. Its tooltip states the current setting: Silent shutter OFF means capture sounds are audible; Silent shutter ON mutes them. This control affects shutter feedback only, not the spoken safety and filter cues, which use their own audio track.

The filter cues: visual confirmation for removal

The most important thing the console does is tell you when to move the filter. The cues are both visual (a large banner) and audio (spoken prompts, if enabled). Filter removal requires the visual confirmation defined by the selected mode. Safe mode replacement is deliberately scheduled early, while the disc is still covered. The countdown is advisory and is displayed separately in large type.

Normal state: Solar filter MUST be ON, or, when the guide scope is also filtered, BOTH filters MUST be ON (main + guide scope). HM cannot sense the physical filters; this wording states the required safe condition rather than claiming that the operator has already fitted them.

Approaching totality: Get ready to REMOVE the filter, ONLY WHEN YOU SEE THE DIAMOND RING (Classical) or … ONLY WHEN THE SUN'S DISC IS FULLY COVERED (Safe).

During totality: Solar filter is OFF (or BOTH filters are OFF (main + guide scope)).

Coming out: Classical Get ready to REPLACE the filter, AT THE FIRST BEAD OF SUNLIGHT; Safe REPLACE the filter NOW, BEFORE THE FIRST BEAD OF SUNLIGHT.

Eyes, not the clock These cues drive the scope's solar filter. Remove it only when you actually see the signal, which is the diamond ring (Classical) or the disc fully covered (Safe), and never just because the countdown reached zero. In Safe mode you're prompted to replace it early, while the disc is still covered. Follow that cue. If the plan guides through the filter off interval with a separate guide scope, the cue names both scope filters; move them together. Your own eye protection is separate: it comes off only during totality itself, in either mode.

Annular and partial eclipses have no filter cues at all Everything above belongs to a total eclipse. On an annular or partial run the filter never comes off, so the banner stays at Solar filter MUST be ON and Eclipse glasses ON for the entire event, there is no filter-off band on the timeline, and no removal countdown ever appears. The single spoken prompt you hear about ninety seconds before annularity or maximum announces the central phase and repeats that the filter stays on. If you have photographed a total eclipse before, this is the habit to unlearn: no cue is coming, and its absence is the correct behaviour.

Guiding, refocus and recovery

Status	Console meaning
Guiding	Green means locked with stable Sun detection and normal drift; blue means an intentional planned pause; amber identifies questionable calibration; red identifies lost or unstable Sun detection, drift above 20 guide-camera pixels, stopped guiding when required, a lost PHD2 link, or a mount that is slewing, parked or not tracking. A mount that is not tracking outranks whatever the plan asked for, so the badge states the mount fact plainly, for example Mount parked, waiting for unpark: guiding cannot run at all until the mount tracks again. A neutral badge means guiding is not required now. When recovery needs a new PHD2 session, the badge offers Reconnect PHD2 in both full and compact views. If the PHD2 camera or mount is disconnected, HelioMaker reconnects the equipment before sending any looping, target-selection or guiding command. Eclipse imaging continues while this guiding path is being repaired.
Automatic refocus	Blue means armed, waiting, or pausing guiding; the near-white badge marks an active focus scan; green means complete; red means failed, unable to run because focus was not confirmed, or that the refocus time window was missed. A neutral badge means refocus is off or is not scheduled for this run. See Focusing.
SharpCap camera and connection	If camera frames stop, the device disconnects, the wrong camera opens, or the SharpCap capture link is lost, capture is held and its recovery state takes priority over ordinary refocus status. The console reports the outage, waiting, relaunching, reconnecting and settings-restoration stages. HelioMaker resumes only after the planned camera is open and its capture folder, mode and image settings have been restored. A brief USB outage may recover inside SharpCap's own grace period; a longer outage can repeat the critical alarm while operator attention is still required.

Critical alarm When Play audio cues during eclipse is enabled, an alarm may sound if HelioMaker detects an unexpected critical PHD2 or SharpCap error. The alarm asks for your attention; read the guiding, SharpCap/refocus badge and incident text immediately. Depending on the failure, HM may relaunch PHD2 or SharpCap, reconnect and attempt to resume eclipse imaging automatically. Do not assume the sound means either failure or recovery is complete—the console reports the current state. The alarm follows the plan's Audio cues checkbox and remains audible when Silent shutter ON has muted camera feedback. It uses a separate audio path from the spoken safety and filter cues, so it cannot interrupt or mute a scheduled spoken instruction; only cosmetic shutter feedback may yield briefly. Stopping the sequence or closing its console stops any spoken eclipse cue that is already playing.

Red operator alerts force the full view A critical alert expands a compact console so it cannot remain hidden. Examples include a capture drive that may fill, camera frames that stop arriving, a camera in the wrong capture mode, loss of the run or timing record, or a SharpCap recovery that needs manual action. Read the instruction in the banner before touching the rig.

Compact console view

Select Switch to compact view to reduce the always on top console to a narrow corner strip. Select Full view to restore the complete panel.

The compact strip retains the calculated geometry, phase and countdown, captured and missed frame counts, guiding and refocus badges, and the complete filter cue with its countdown. Filter instructions are never abbreviated. The footer remains available for Full view, Freeze during rehearsals, and Stop run. The capture-folder and Silent shutter controls remain available; the detailed timeline and telemetry are hidden until Full view is restored.

Beside the calculated geometry, both console sizes show Eclipse glasses ON outside totality. During the fully covered interval it changes to a distinct TOTALITY indicator. Treat it as a prominent reminder, not a substitute for observing the real Sun and following certified eye-safety practice.

Guiding and refocus each occupy a full-width bar carrying its own icon, in both the compact strip and the full console, so the two rig questions read the same way at either size. Both bars are always present: when refocus is not scheduled the bar says so rather than disappearing.

Compact Eclipse imaging console showing calculated geometry, Thin
crescent C3 countdown, captured frame count, paused guiding, no refocus status, solar filter state, time
remaining and protected run controls. — Compact view keeps the phase countdown, capture total, guiding and refocus state, complete filter cue, capture-folder access, Silent shutter toggle and essential controls. Select Full view to restore the timeline and telemetry.

Hold, Freeze and Stop

Hold: Manual Hold is intentionally disabled in this beta release. Do not plan on pausing a live eclipse run: use Stop run only when capturing must end completely. HelioMaker may still place the session on hold automatically if the mount starts slewing or stops tracking; the red console banner states what happened and the session resumes automatically when the mount is tracking again.
Freeze / Unfreeze: A rehearsal only control that stops the rehearsal clock and schedule so you can inspect the panel. Unfreeze continues from the same simulated eclipse instant. Freeze is hidden during the live eclipse and is unavailable while the run is held.
Stop run: Hold Ctrl and click to end capturing. This cannot be undone. Closing an active console with its window close button instead opens a guarded confirmation requiring Yes, stop imaging the eclipse; Enter or Escape cannot confirm the stop.

When the run ends

The console returns to full view automatically. The current phase card becomes Run summary, reports Event ended, and shows the total frames captured, planned and missed. The phase telemetry remains as the final per phase record.

If frame timing data is available, a Timing summary button opens the detailed report in a browser. The summary card itself deliberately carries only the one result you came back for — frames captured against frames planned. The timing verdict is written to the run log and to eclipse_run.log, and the report behind that button holds the detail; a second, smaller line under the headline only competed with it. Hold, Freeze and compact controls disappear, and Stop run becomes Done with no Ctrl key required.

Rehearse the console until it's boring Everything on this page should be familiar before eclipse day: the layout, where the countdown is, what each cue says and sounds like, what compact view retains, and how automatic mount warnings appear. That familiarity is the payoff of the advance preparation: on the day, you glance at the panel, listen for the cue, use the visual rule for your selected mode when removing the filter, follow the Safe mode early replacement cue if applicable, and spend the rest of totality looking up.