New scope with 3.2 giga pixel camera

No it's not mine drat!.

http://www.lsst.org/lsst_home.shtml

With more of these sorts of survey scopes coming on line, the days of amateur
comet discovery are rapidly drawing to a close. On the plus side if I read
their site info correctly their raw data will be publically available.

Klazmon.

Llanzlan Klazmon wrote:

No it's not mine drat!.

http://www.lsst.org/lsst_home.shtml

With more of these sorts of survey scopes coming on line, the days of amateur
comet discovery are rapidly drawing to a close.

Not at all. They can't possibly build enough such telescopes to cover
the amount of sky covered by amateur comet hunters. That 'scope will be
sitting inactive in daylight one day while an amateur on the other side
of the world is discovering a comet with a somewhat more modest
instrument.

On the plus side if I read
their site info correctly their raw data will be publically available.

Decent of them and all, but /their/ raw data is not /my/ raw data. /My/
raw data comes from /my/ /own/ humble little 'scopes. It may be out of
focus, under/over exposed, poorly guided, what-have-you, but it is my
data and I learn from it and try to do improve.

My view of amateur astronomy, and perhaps especially astrophotography,
is that it is a difficult undertaking with a significant learning
curve. I count myself as being pretty low on the curve. The thing I
enjoy most about the hobby is learning new things, both technical and
about the objects I see. When I "discover" a new NGC object in an image
of mine I make it a point to learn as much about it as I can from my
books and Internet sources. And if the image is poor, that's OK, too,
because that gives me something else to learn.

I very much hope that it will be quite a few years before I am reduced
to doing astronomy vicariously!

Didn't mean for this to be a rant, and I'm certainly not flaming
Llanzlan Klazmon for posting that interesting link -- just an
observation!

Davoud

--
usenet *at* davidillig dawt com

On Thu, 25 May 2006 23:10:01 -0400, Davoud wrote:

Not at all. They can't possibly build enough such telescopes to cover
the amount of sky covered by amateur comet hunters. That 'scope will be
sitting inactive in daylight one day while an amateur on the other side
of the world is discovering a comet with a somewhat more modest
instrument.

Just one of these can cover the entire sky accessible at a given
latitude and time of year, and it can do it multiple times each night.
While it is possible that a lone observer will get lucky and beat it to
a discovery by a few hours, the odds are against it. Already, the vast
majority of comets are discovered by automated instruments like Linear.
That number will just increase as advanced survey instruments like this
come on line (and more than one is planned).


On the plus side if I read
their site info correctly their raw data will be publically available.

Decent of them and all, but /their/ raw data is not /my/ raw data. /My/
raw data comes from /my/ /own/ humble little 'scopes. It may be out of
focus, under/over exposed, poorly guided, what-have-you, but it is my
data and I learn from it and try to do improve.

Of course, collecting and processing one's own data is part of the fun.
And there will always be scientific and aesthetic opportunities for
amateurs. But hunting for comets and asteroids from the backyard
probably isn't going to be one of them for much longer.


I very much hope that it will be quite a few years before I am reduced
to doing astronomy vicariously!

I wouldn't say "reduced". It is just another aspect of astronomy, one
that opens new doors for amateurs. Already, amateurs have discovered
comets using SOHO data. And of course, many fine images have been
produced that relied on collaboratively collected data. Such projects in
no way conflict with entirely personal projects, carried out with your
own data.

_________________________________________________

Chris L Peterson
Cloudbait Observatory
http://www.cloudbait.com

Davoud wrote in :

Llanzlan Klazmon wrote:

No it's not mine drat!.

http://www.lsst.org/lsst_home.shtml

With more of these sorts of survey scopes coming on line, the days of
amateur comet discovery are rapidly drawing to a close.

Not at all. They can't possibly build enough such telescopes to cover
the amount of sky covered by amateur comet hunters. That 'scope will be
sitting inactive in daylight one day while an amateur on the other side
of the world is discovering a comet with a somewhat more modest
instrument.

The LINEAR scope which is very modest compared to the LSST already has
its' name attached to a large proportion of new comets. The LSST covers the
entire Southern Hemisphere and when it is operating will photograph the
entire sky visible from its' latitude three times per night down to 24th
magnitude. As Chris said. This will be just the first of a number of scopes
like this. Of course capturing such a vast quantity of data is a different
issue to actually processing the data to detect anything. That is probably
why they are keen to have the data generally available.


On the plus side if I read
their site info correctly their raw data will be publically available.

Decent of them and all, but /their/ raw data is not /my/ raw data. /My/
raw data comes from /my/ /own/ humble little 'scopes. It may be out of
focus, under/over exposed, poorly guided, what-have-you, but it is my
data and I learn from it and try to do improve.

Hey. I am not running down your work. There is still much that amateurs can
contribute to apart from just enjoying the night sky. Some members of our
local society were credited with co-discovering an extra solar system
planet using micro lensing technique. This entailed taking repeated images
of the same area of the sky over several hours to plot the progress of the
event. A professional scope in Chile detected the onset of the event and
then handed it over to other groups to plot its' progress.


My view of amateur astronomy, and perhaps especially astrophotography,
is that it is a difficult undertaking with a significant learning
curve. I count myself as being pretty low on the curve. The thing I
enjoy most about the hobby is learning new things, both technical and
about the objects I see. When I "discover" a new NGC object in an image
of mine I make it a point to learn as much about it as I can from my
books and Internet sources. And if the image is poor, that's OK, too,
because that gives me something else to learn.

I very much hope that it will be quite a few years before I am reduced
to doing astronomy vicariously!

I think it is horses for courses. Some people get a great thrill out of
discovering a comet for example using the SOHO data. You don't have to have
your own astro photography gear to participate and I think the LSST type of
scope will give oportunity for amatuers too.


Didn't mean for this to be a rant, and I'm certainly not flaming
Llanzlan Klazmon for posting that interesting link -- just an
observation!

Davoud

I understand your point of view. Thank you for the observation.

Klazmon.