Posted by Callum Potter at 12:15 on 2011 Apr 01
Hi Paul,i’m not a supernova patroller, but have been to a few talks on the topic, so here are my thoughts…1. How many galaxies do people search. Is fifty a good number to begin with?I don’t know – you have to think a bit about your ‘pipeline’ – telescope slew, aquire short image, check field right, aquire long image, aquire second image slew to next target How long all this takes will dictate to some extent how many you can image per hour. You and your partner should choose different target lists to maximise your imaging time. You should try to minimise your slewing time – by choosing targets nearto each other in RA or DEC (ie. going in a pattern up-down, or right-left. I suspect up-down is better as new objects will start to appearfrom the east).If you have a very accurate mount, you may not need to check you have got hte right field – but you probably need a paramount for that…2. Is it a good idea to build up a set of reference image’s first. Or can these be sourced on the internet?It is best to use your own references, as you won’t need to worry about image scale & orientation. But you should check your first images against internet (DSS perhaps) frames. If you get a suspect, then check agains internet frames then too.3. What should you do if you think you have a suspect?First check your second image – is the object still there? (avoids hotspots / cosmic rays, other random effects). Get another image some time later, to check if its an asteroid (it will have moved).Then get your partner to check. If that confirms it, then get in touch with Guy Hurst, who’d be able to advise on best next steps.Guy acts as a clearing house, and will be able to get other independent observations, if needed.4. What exposure time’s are we looking at during a patrol. 30s/60s?Depends on how deep you want to go – i think 60s is fairly common amongst the patrolers. Hope this helps, Callum