Bowen staff has been working the past few months with Goto engineers to develop a native AstroFXCommander control system driver set for the new Goto CHRONOS™ projection system.

Final tests on the Commander to CHRONOS™ software and hardware interfacing was performed on April 22 at Young Harris College by Bowen Staff member Mike Grznar and Goto Optical engineers Toshi Yasuda and Akira Yamakoshi. Our special thanks to Rollins Planetarium Director Kent Montgomery for allowing us access to his facility for the testing.

The visit to Young Harris went very well and the projector worked great. The Commander cues for controlling CHRONOS™ are just drag and dropped onto the Commander timelines or can be executed with the push of a touchscreen icon or click of a mouse. We also established that it will be very easy for an operator to go from using our automated control, back to the CHRONOS™ console, so no plugging and unplugging of cables will be needed. The FXCommander drivers are easily custom configured in minutes so that we can customize Commander towards the needs of a particular client.

"After this successful test at Young Harris College, the marriage of 2 systems, ASTRO FX COMMANDER and CHRONOS™, seems very appealing for a person with basic computer knowledge. It is easy for one to click, drag and choose what he/she wants to make happen with CHRONOS. We're happy to be working with quality companies like Bowen Technovation to make this blending of technologies happen."

Toshi Yasuda
GOTO USA LIAISON / GOTO OPTICAL MFG. CO.

New Goto Chronos installations in Los Medanos and Santa Ana, CA will be under control of AstroFXCommander.

Mike also tested our new ECCS interface, things worked well there also. It was a perfect test site as Kent has almost every feature ECCS manufactures. We tested Commander control of cove lights, Barcos, Laser Disks, and basically everything else ECCS with complete success.

Jeff Bowen
President and Creative Director
Bowen Technovation
Indianapolis, IN