[BAA Comets] ICQ codes

[Roger Dymock]

Hi Tony,

I did answer but sent my reply to Denis, Jon and Nick rather than to the list which I should have
done. What I said was;

***************************************************************************************************
As to the codes for the CMC catalogue (and any other codes) we do need to stay in sync with COBS. If
we have to adjust our ICQ input to you Jonathan after downloading it from COBS that can easily lead
to mistakes. I am using CMC-15 now as that gives slightly better sky coverage so we would need codes
for both CMC-14 and CMC-15. I see from the COBS database that MA, MB and MD are unused so maybe we
can agree with Jure on which to use for what.
***************************************************************************************************

With respect to filters - there isn't general agreement it would seem. If you follow the CCD
Astrometry and Photometry procedure on the Project Alcock website and send your FoCAS output to the
Spanish Group then no filter is required. However if you use wish to send observations to the CARA
group (see procedure on website) then a red filter is required (and exposure times need to be 3x
longer than for no filter). For the latter, images can be stacked so shorter exposures are possible
whereas FoCAs cannot handle stacks. Professional astronomers do make use of both the Spanish and
CARA data so one assumes it is what they require. 

In addition when using Astrometrica the Aperture Radius in Program Settings/CCD should be set equal
to an actual radius of 5.5 arcsecs (as advised by Richard Miles).

Hope that is of some help.

Regards

Roger Dymock
Email: roger.dymock at ntlworld.com
Tel: 023 92647986
Skype: rogerdymock67 or
Skype: rjvdymock
Project Alcock http://www.britastro.org/projectalcock/


-----Original Message-----
From: Comets-disc [mailto:comets-disc-bounces at britastro.org] On Behalf Of Tony Angel
Sent: 09 February 2015 23:57
To: BAA Comets discussion list
Subject: Re: [BAA Comets] ICQ codes

I held back on this hoping that someone else will raise it :) What about 
CMC-15?

On a similar theme.  I have not submitted any magnitude observations for a 
reason. When I asked a few professionals about my observations, the first 
thing I was asked was whether they were calibrated. At first I 
misunderstood, thinking they were referring to flats, darks and bias :) then 
I realised that they were asking if I had calibrated my photometrical 
filters. The answer to that for me was no, because I do not have any 
photometric filters. I have spent the last few months reading up on 
calibrating filters and what types are used by a number of professional 
observatories. Correct me if I am wrong but it seems that for the 
observations to be of any use to professionals I need to save up for a set 
of Sloan Filters - which will take a year or two. I mention Sloan because 
the professionals seem to be moving away from UBVRI sets.

Comments appreciated.

Tony.
--------------------------------------------------
From: "Shanklin, Jonathan D." <jdsh at bas.ac.uk>
Sent: Sunday, February 01, 2015 10:42 PM
To: "BAA Comets discussion list" <comets-disc at britastro.org>
Subject: [BAA Comets] ICQ codes

> Denis Buczynski has drawn my attention to the fact that some CCD 
> photometry software uses the Carlsberg Meridian Catalogue 14 (CMC14), 
> which was released at the end of 2005.  This is a more recent release than 
> the CMC 4 version of the catalogue (1989) which has ICQ code MC.  A new 
> code should therefore be used and I suggest MD.  I've updated the 
> additional codes list at http://www.ast.cam.ac.uk/~jds/baaicqkeys.htm
>
> Regards,
>
> Jonathan Shanklin
>
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