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Description
Evolution and Transitions of An Automated Home Observatory
Jerome Yesavage
My Observatory has been in operation for a bit over ten years now and has evolved through four telescopes but still uses the same system backbone. The automated system centers on the use of Expert Scheduler and ACP (DC3 Dreams) software. Highlights are this is a roll of roof 6’ cube sitting on my own Eichler roof on the Stanford Campus.
The scopes used in the system have been in order chronologically: C8, Takahashi 180 ED, Stellarvue 130 SVX and C11 Edge. Another major transition has been from CCD to CMOS along the way. One other evolution was the upgrading of my image processing build to the latest Ryzen 7950 processor: https://pcpartpicker.com/b/CQDcCJ#cx4156803
A video of the system will be shown and a few screen shots of how processing integrates with Pixinsight via OneDrive. Images from the journey are in: https://www.astrobin.com/users/jerryyyyy/. A major effort fitting of our light pollution was a complete collection of the 313 Sharpless2 Hydrogen Alpha objects: https://www.astrobin.com/users/jerryyyyy/collections/1559/
A
B
C
So
what
the
title
of
a
talk
is
this
an
urban,
automated
Observatory,
the
evolution
and
I
gave
the
same
talk
not
the
same
thought,
but
a
kind
of
of
the
beginning
of
this
talk
I
guess
now
three
years
ago,
and
so
we're
talking
about
you
know,
because
it
makes
sense
to
update
the
talk
and
say:
what's
happened.
Yes,.
D
C
I
I
didn't
think
it
was
to
tell
you
the
truth.
Initially
I
thought
wow,
it's
all
the
same,
but
then
suddenly
I
realized
how
much
the
field
has
changed
in
just
three
years
and
how
much
things
have
changed
in
this
Observatory
and
I.
Think
a
lot
of
you
are
living
through
these
some
of
these
same
changes,
so
I
thought
it
might
be
interesting
and
since
I've
been
so
heavily
involved
in
the
actual
mechanics
of
the
observatory,
those
technical
issues,
I
think
become
interesting
to
a
lot
of
you.
C
C
So
if
you
kind
of
have
the
list
of
them,
you're
gonna
hit
pretty
much
every
notable
narrow
band
object.
If
you
look
in
so
anyway,
this
is
one
target
that
you
can
go
after
the
other
Target
that
you
can
go
after
in
the
urban
environment
are
planetary,
nebula
and
these
may
not
may
or
may
not
be
narrow
banned,
but
they're
bright
and
they'll
burn
their
way
through
the
light
pollution.
C
So
on
top
of
that
312,
13,
sharpless
objects,
I
went
after
the
able
objects
and
I
think
there's
83
of
those
I
can't
remember
right
now,
but
these
are
all
kind
of
like
this
and
they're
cool,
looking
and
so
they're
also
eminently
eligible
eligible.
But
the
problem
is
they're,
pretty
small,
so
you
can't
you
know
you
can't
image
them
unless
you
have
a
long
focal
length
scope.
C
So
the
outline
of
the
talk
is
I've
presented
the
problem.
Now
then
I'll
present
a
little
bit
of
the
history
of
what
I've
been
up
to
I'll.
Give
you
the
system
overview,
as
kind
of
like
as
a
systems
engineer,
would
look
at
it
and
then
I'll
talk
about
the
hardware,
the
software
that's
involved
and
the
image
processing.
C
So
here's
some
history
now
Rob
will
remember
this
picture
so
in
over
10
years
ago.
I
started
with
a
gift
need
refractor,
my
wife's.
My
mother-in-law
got
sick,
my
wife
is
French,
so
she
went
off
to
France
to
take
care
of
her
mother
for
six
months
and
I
was
left
to
my
own
devices,
and
a
friend
of
mine
gave
me
this
telescope
that
couldn't
work
so
being
somewhat
mechanically
oriented.
I
finally,
got
it
to
work
and
I
stuck
an
iPhone
on
the
end
of
it
and
I
could
take
a
picture
of
the
moon.
C
D
C
Really
top
end,
it's
a
good
scope,
but
it's
not.
You
know
what
I
wanted
and
I
said.
I
was
into
this
I
decide.
I
was
going
to
go
after
the
sharpless
objects
at
that
point,
so
I
bought
a
used.
Takahashi,
180,
Ed
and
I'll
show
you
a
picture
of
that.
That's
an
astrograph,
it's
F,
2.8
Rob,
has
heard
the
the
horror
stories
of
collimating
this
thing
over
the
years,
but
it's
a
very
narrow.
It's
a
very
fast
scope.
C
So
it's
very
good
from
that,
but
it's
a
wide
focal
length
about
500
millimeters.
So
it's
wide
angle,
so
it
can
only
take
pictures
of
big
objects,
so
I
had
core
visibility.
Due
to
my
trees
in
my
backyard,
I
had
put
this
attack
onto
a
a
pier
a
little
bit
like
what
Hyde
has
set
up
is
like
in
his
back
Garden.
Like
you
showed
me
a
picture
but
I
have
so
many
trees.
C
C
So
without
an
engineering
degree,
I
decided
I
was
going
to
try
to
mount
The
Takahashi
to
the
top
of
the
roof
support
on
the
roof,
because
you
see
one
of
the
big
problems
with
putting
an
observatory
on
the
roof
is
that
the
roof
shakes
so
you're
screwed
you're
never
going
to
get
a
stable
image.
However,
if
it's
the
main
support,
then
it
might
work
and
what
people
have
done.
What
the
architect
has
suggested
was
that
you
pour
concrete
around
the
support,
so
you
make
kind
of
appear,
but
that
goes
up.
C
That's
got
to
be
big
and
heavy
and
it
didn't
pass
the
Aesthetics
committee
review.
So
that
was
not
going
to
happen
so
we'll
see
what
happened
then
I
got
this.
This
stable
Mount,
Rob
came
down,
took
pity
on
Rob
was
I,
know
Rob
for
a
while.
He
took
pity
on
me
when
I
tried
to
process
some
of
my
images
at
one
point
and
show
me
what
to
do
and
he
had
an
rc10
which
you
can
see
a
picture
on
there.
C
C
C
C
C
That's
this
year,
as
far
as
I
can
tell
I
noticed
that
I
had
a
do
problem
with
with
the
Stellar
View
that
screwed
up
the
lenses
and
I'll
explain
that
to
you
in
a
second
and
so
I
said
what
am
I
going
to
do
now,
but
they
took
pity
on
me:
I
Stellar
viewer.
One
of
the
reasons
why
I
bought
this
scope
from
Stellar
view
is
that
they're
on
Highway,
80.
C
C
And
he
said
yes,
I
am
so
I
said:
okay,
I,
plucked
down
the
money,
and
while
the
star
review
was
in
the
shop,
I
bought
the
C11
I
think
it
was
Christmas
or
something
like
that.
I
had
an
excuse,
so
I
got
to
see
11..
So
this
is
part
of
me.
Those
of
you
don't
know
what
I
do
for
a
living,
I'm
a
psychiatrist
at
Stanford
and
I'm.
C
The
geriatric
psychiatrist
there,
okay,
so
I
run
the
state
of
California
Alzheimer's,
Disease
Center
on
the
campus
and
so
part
of
the
thing
about
cognitive
aging
is
to
remain
agile,
cognitively,
agile.
So
this
is
my
mental
agility
program,
my
astronomy
program,
so
the
C11
fit
right
in
and
I
could
take
it.
I
could
take
a
prescription
for
it
and
justify
the
cost
so
anyway,
so
here's
the
talk.
It's
a
it's
a
cute
scope.
C
Isn't
it
I
mean
you
can
tell
these
things
from
about
100
yards
away,
and
so
it's
it's
the
same
design
that
they've
had
now
for
20
30
years,
so
there's
a
mirror
down
at
the
base
and
it
comes
in
the
front
end
bound
to
the
base
and
there's
a
secondary
mirror
that
bounces
it
up
to
the
camera
and
on
the
secondary
mirror,
there's
a
big
lens
as
a
focal
reducer.
So
the
combination
of
all
of
that
results
in
F
2.8,
which
is
very
fast
and
results
in
a
critical
focus
zone
of
17
microns.
C
C
Those
bolts
are
driven
down
into
the
main
support
for
the
roof
and
I
figured
that
I
needed
some
inertia,
so
I
poured
100
pounds
of
concrete
around
it,
so
you
can
see
it's
a
foam
roof,
so
that
was
like,
and
so
it's
like
a
rock
and
I
put
on
this
thing.
The
pier
is
made
by
pure
Tech,
which
raises
and
lowers
the
scope,
so
you'll
see
the
roof,
the
roll-off
roof
that
this
is
attached
to
in
a
few
seconds.
C
But
I
put
this
up
there
and
I
was
just
saying
my
prayers,
because
I
had
no
idea
whether
this
thing
was
going
to
work
or
not
and
you'll
see
in
the
background.
How
do
you
get
to
the
roof
when
you're,
seven
years
old?
You
need
a
hatch.
You
need
a
white
way
to
get
up
there.
So
I
saw
that
thing
in
Australia
one
day
and
I
said
oh
boy.
C
This
is
the
way
to
get
to
the
roof
without
a
ladder
Okay
so
waterproofing,
the
roof
is
not
easy.
I
have
a
friend
who's
in
the
roofing
business.
Who
showed
me
the
thing
how
to
do
it
and
I'll
explain
that
to
you.
If
anyone
wants
to
know
about
how
to
waterproof
these
things,
it's
not
easy
but
we'll
get
into
it.
So
here's
what
the
roof
looked
like.
C
Tech
roll-off
roof
and
peer-to-peer
right,
starting
with
the
peers,
I
guess,
and
then
they
moved
to
the
roofs,
but
the
two
are
together
and
it's
a
big
company,
so
these
are
professional
grade
observatories.
This
one
here
is
exactly
I
believe
it's
six
feet
by
six
feet
by
six
and
a
half
feet
and
code
is
six
feet
by
six
feet
by
seven
feet:
to
need
a
permit.
C
Okay,
if
you
follow
that,
so
I
never
had
to
make
a
get
a
permit.
To
put
this
thing
up,
there,
I
can
adjust
seeing
getting
a
permit
on
the
Stanford
campus
right.
I'd
still
be
trying
to
put
the
thing
up
there.
So
as
we
say
it's
easier
to
ask
forgiveness
than
to
ask
permission
so
I
just
put
it
up
there,
okay,
and
so
my
handyman
who's
heart
is
made
of
gold.
Help
me
with
this
thing,
and
we
put
it
together.
So
I
told
you
about
the
stable
now,
so
they
get.
C
How
do
you
get
to
the
room
this
this
hash?
In
the
back?
We're
going
to
show
you
this
to
waterproof
it?
The
roof
has
to
sit
inside
a
skill,
a
sill.
So
it's
like
a
metal
thing
that
the
roof
sits
into
we.
It
was
not
done
that
way.
At
this
point,
we
had
to
lift
the
roof
up
and
put
it
inside
a
sill
to
get
it
to
be
waterproof.
C
C
The
the
Dutch
use
these
they're
small
houses
and
they
use
this
to
get
to
their
roofs
and
decks
to
expand
their
living
space.
So
that
was
the
concept.
So
if
you
have
a
flat
roof
your
house
like
an
Eichler,
this
is
made
for
it,
because
then
you
can
get
up
to
your
roof
without
any
problem,
and
you
know
you're
all
set.
C
So
now,
here's
the
you
see
the
roof.
So
here's
the
this
thing
now
and
you'll
notice
down
at
the
bottom
of
the
thing
you
see
this
this
air
here
air
gap
is
at
the
bottom
of
this
thing.
You
didn't
see
that
before
in
the
previous
picture.
Well,
what
my
friend
the
roofer
said
was
the
only
way
to
make
this
thing
fully.
C
C
A
A
C
C
C
C
So
that's
into
the
concrete
into
the
bolts
into
the
roof
support.
And
then
this
thing
is
rigid.
The
Little
D
is
down
all
right,
so
you
want
to
make
sure
that
it's
down
low
enough
so
that
it
doesn't
get
hit
by
the
roof
when
you
close
it
and
the
I.
Don't
know
why
I'm
looking
at
that,
but
it
gives
you
some
idea
of
how
heavy
it's
built
and.
C
C
C
So
let
me
just
stop
for
a
second
here
and
show
you
the
way
the
system
works,
then
so
you've
seen
a
picture
of
it.
So
what
the
heart
of
the
system
electronically
computer-wise,
is
this
stuff
in
bold
here
this
astronomy
control
program
ACP,
which
is
made
by
this
guy
Bob
Denny
who's,
really
very
nice.
Guy
he's
in
Mesa,
Arizona
and
Bob
is
the
person
who
developed,
ascom
or
astronomy
communication.
C
So
that
is
the
language
that
allows
various
astronomy
software
programs
to
talk
to
each
other
so
that
they
can
communicate
and
go
back
and
forth
and
send
data
back
and
forth
so
that
a
focuser
is
going
to
know
what
the
camera
is
doing
and
the
camera
is
going
to
know
what
the
focuser
is
going
to
know
is
doing
and
both
are
going
to
know
what
the
mouse
is
doing.
So
they
can
query
each
other
and
get
information
from
each
one
and
then
take
appropriate
action.
C
C
Rob
had
the
same
camera
and
then
I
moved
to
an
ASI
6200
on
the
advice
of
various
people,
go
go
CMOS
and
I
haven't
looked
back
and
the
6200
if
you're
not
familiar
with
it,
is
a
very
large
sensor,
camera
that
is
about
9000
by
6
000..
It's
a
big
one.
It's
the
same
as
the
2600,
except
twice
the
size
of
the
sensor.
C
So
Maxim
controls
the
camera.
Then
you
go
down
to
focus
Max
that
does
the
focusing
on
the
Stellar
view.
I
had
a
night
crawler,
Focus
or
rotator
on
the
C11
I
switched
over.
I
went
over
to
the
dark
side
and
I
bought
a
Zoe,
cheap,
focuser
and
I.
Don't
look
back
on
that?
That
is
where
it
turned
out
to
work
and
then
finally,
the
astrophysics
control
center
controls
the
mount
the
Mach
1
mount.
C
C
Is
this
thing
expert
scheduler,
so
I
told
Bob
Denny
that
he
should
call
Expert
scheduler
AI
and
at
the
next
time
he
gave
a
lecture
at
AIC.
He
called
it.
Ai
I
thought
that
was
cute,
because
what
it
is
is
it's
not
really
artificial
intelligence,
but
it
is
a
flexible
algorithm
for
scheduling
and
it
uses
it
learns
what
the
best.
So
it
is
in
a
sense
machine
learning
it
optimizes
on
the
basis
of
your
past
performance.
C
What
would
be
the
best
targets
for
you
to
use
during
your
individual
Imaging
session,
and
that
is
done
by
a
thing
called
expert
scheduler.
So
an
expert
scheduler,
you
schedule
the
odd
the
objects
you
want
to
look
at.
Like
those
sharpless
objects,
you
set
the
minimum
Horizon
for
them.
You
set
the
minimum
Moon
exposure
and
things
like
that,
so
that,
if
the
object
is
nowhere
is
not
in
that
window,
it's
skipped
and
it
goes
on
to
another
object.
C
If
that's
not
in
that
window,
it's
skipped
and
it
waits
till
the
best
object
shows
up
so
it
optimized,
but
it
optimizes
the
objects
every
night
for
your
observing
list
on
the
basis
of
those
parameters.
So
every
night
you
get
a
new
observing
list
and
in
the
middle
of
the
night
it
changes
its
mind
because
some
object
may
be
missed
all
right,
so
it
says:
okay,
I
couldn't
get
that
one,
so
I'm
going
to
go
on
and
try
this
one.
C
It's
very
help
very
it's
smart,
and
so
it
also
does
the
startup
and
shutdown
so
right
now.
What
is
it?
It
started
up.
I
hope
and
it
starts
up
two
hours
ahead
so
that
the
observatory
gets
temperature
equilibrated
to
the
ambient
temperature.
Then
down
below
you
see
the
observing
list
and
then
it
sets
up
its
priorities.
A
A
C
Just
okay
much
better
than
having
the
thing
closed
down,
because
that
can
be
like
a
hot
house
sure
and
you
now,
if
you
noticed
it
but
I,
have
it
insulated
on
the
inside,
I
have
ventilation
in
it
all
the
little
toys
and
and
and
by
the
way
you
know,
I
had
an
electric
train
set
when
I
was
a
child.
I
can
assure
you
that
if
I
had
not
had
an
electric
train
set,
there's
no
way
that
I
could
have
put
this
Observatory
together.
C
So
now
the
evolution
of
the
system,
okay,
so
the
Dew
damage,
I,
think
Rob
and
Mark
have
seen
the
do
damage.
So
what
happened
was
in
the
parking
of
the
scope,
the
Stellar
View?
It
was
facing
upward,
there's
different
Parks
positions
in
astrophysics,
and
so
I
was
May.
I
parked
it
in
a
position
that
made
a
perfect
cup
for
collecting
Dew
at
the
bottom
of
the
lens.
C
Well,
you
know
I
thought
that
was
a
nice
place
to
park.
It
was
pointing
out
at
the
pole,
star
and
but
there's
a
flat
down
parking
when
you
looked
at
that
C11.
That
was
in
there
that's
in
the
parking
position
that
it
should
have
been
in
horizontally,
because
then
the
do,
if
it's
going
to
go
anywhere,
it's
going
to
drip
down
the
side
of
the
lens
not
to
the
bottom
of
the
lens.
So
anyway,
so
it
was
nicely
repaired.
But
I
wanted
to
move
on.
So
I
mentioned
I'd
run
out
of
sharpless
objects.
C
The
brighter
larger
planetary
nebulae
were
done
so
Gary
M
convinced
me
that
I
could
do
a
C11
with
a
Mach
one.
I
used
the
same
camera
and
I
taxed
the
Zoe
focuser
directly
to
the
screw
focuser
on
the
c11.
again
being
dumb.
Now
you
can
collect
a
moonlight
Focus
or
a
fancy
focus
on
it,
like
I,
have
on
the
Stellar
View.
However,
that
adds
another
piece
to
the
collimation
to
the
image
train,
so
I
decided
I
would
do
an
experiment.
I've
been
burned
so
many
times
with
collimation
I
decided.
C
If
this
sucker
can
just
bolt
together.
I
am
not
going
to
have
to
worry
about
collimation
and
it
turned
out.
I
screwed
in
the
camera,
with
I
I
I
went
to
zero
on
all
the
screws.
I
screwed
in
the
camera,
with
the
stock
Celestron
adapter,
there's
an
adapter
that
comes
for
this
camera
and
the
first
picture.
I
took
had
a
flat
field
period,
I
said
holy.
I
can't
believe
it
and
it
took
me
a
month
to
get
the
Stellar
view
flat
and
the
the
problem
is
that
with
that
camera
that
I
have
the
6200.
C
C
Mark
knows
this,
so
that's
I
just
was
just
totally
blown
away
because,
with
the
old
one
I
had
to
go
through,
Nina
I
had
to
do
I
and
I
I
tweaked
it
and
I.
You
know,
got
the
thing:
oh,
it
was
a
nightmare.
Well,
I
got
it
eventually
done,
but
it
was
not
easy
to
do
it.
This
thing
just
worked,
and
the
other
thing
was
that
the
cell,
the
the
C11,
because
it's
F,
whatever
nine
or
two
eight
or
eight
or
nine
or
ten,
it
has
a
big
fat,
critical
focus
zone,
I.
Think
it's
F10.
C
So
it's
like
a
whole
bunch
of
my
claws.
So
that
focus
zone
gets
in
there,
no
matter
what
you
do
so
anyway,
so
that
was
great
Steve
Brady
at
Focus
Max
worked
with
me
with
the
focuser.
It
was
the
first
time
anyone
had
ever
put
that
focuser
on
this
cap
on
this
scope
and
it
had
backlash
and
we
figured
out
how
to
deal
with
the
backlash
and
eventually
it
just
focused,
beautifully
and
I
just
say
one
other
thing
about
this.
This
is
again
a
technical
issue.
C
So
for
those
of
you
who
are
familiar
with
automatic,
focusing
with
a
V
curve
you're
trying
to
get
you
try
to
get
a
star
out
of
focus
on
one
side
of
a
curve,
you
get
it
down
to
focusing
to
best
Focus,
then
you
go
up
the
other
side
of
the
focus
to
get
it
up
the
other
side.
And
then
you
do
a
regression
line
to
figure
out
where
the
optimal
focus
is
so
what
Steve
did
was
he
said:
okay,
we're
going
to
do
the
whole
field
and
we're
going
to
check
the
whole
field.
C
C
That
way,
but
that's
the
way
I
did
this
one
and
it
worked
took
a
long
time
to
get
the
right
distances,
but
it
worked
and
I
just
also
said
that
in
Maxim,
Maxim
has
a
is
a
really
a
horrible
piece
of
software,
but
I
have
to
use
it
because
it's
at
it's
the
only
one.
That's
asked
how
compliant
see
I
can't
use
PhD
guiding
I
can't
use.
Nino
I
can't
use
any
of
that
stuff
because
I'm
I'm
into
this
ecosystem.
C
C
C
B
C
C
C
C
C
C
C
C
I
just
sit
here.
So
if
that
thing
was
sitting
at
a
remote
Observatory,
it
would
be
doing
the
same
thing.
The
only
thing
is
I
haven't
got
the
courage
to
put
it
at
a
remote
Observatory,
I
brought.
You
know
it's
kind
of
fun
for
me
to
play
with
it
and
I
like
to
be
able
to
go
up
and
and
Tinker.
You
know
I'm
a
tinkerer.
You
can
tell
you
know
so.
My
handyman
Salvador
is
great,
and
so
he
loves
to
Tinker
with
it
too.
C
C
C
C
So
thank
you
for
the
summary
I
went
over
this
with
the
most
of
the
roof
challenges.
They
will
appear
roll-off
roof
with
Cloud
Center,
the
mount
astrophysics
control
center,
Mach
1
telescope.
Several,
the
refractor,
the
Stellar
view
simplified
matters,
I
had
a
CCD
and
I
call.
Our
Moonlight
focuser
is
a
great
focuser
but
very
complicated.
C
Then
I
went
for
the
long
focal
length
C11
for
small
targets
and
the
CMOS
sensor,
which
is
more
sensitive,
it's
ten
times
more
sensitive,
but
I
love
the
Stellar
View.
So
this,
when
you
buy
Stellar
view,
Mark
knows
this.
You
get
a
diagram
like
this
of
the
laser
interferometry
of
your
lens,
which
shows
how
good
that
it
can
essentially
split
star
pictures
and
if
you
look
down
at
the
bottom
of
this
thing
down
at
the
bottom
here,
if
you've
ever
tried
to
defocus
your
telescope
and
get
something
to
look
like
this
good
luck.
C
If
you
get
it
looking
like
this,
it's
it's,
it's
quite
remarkable
and
like
if
you
get,
this
stray
number
is
0.99.
If
you
buy
attack,
106
you'll
get
0.95,
okay
so
and
that
costs
more
than
the
Stellar
viewer.
So
I
was
considering
the
tech,
but
I
just
had
so
many
horror
stories
of
people
who
bought
them
recently.
Now
they
used
to
be
great.
C
So
maybe
it's
a
thing
is
to
buy
an
old
one,
but
the
quality
control
on
the
takahashes
is
not
what
it
used
to
be.
At
least
that's
my
Scuttle
run
I'm,
probably
inside
I'm,
probably
irritating
someone
now.
So
that's
what
the
straw
ratio
means,
and
then
the
software
summary
so
after
is
is
I,
get
all
that
stuff
from
expert
schedule:
ACP
maximum
Focus,
Max
and
all
the
rest
of
it.
Then
it
goes
into
one
drive
and
then
the
image
processing.
C
The
important
thing
is
the
urban
site.
Image
selection
is
I
focus
on
narrow
band.
If
I
can
the
sharpless
objects,
the
Stellar
view
allows
also
bright
planetary
nebulae
and
with
the
high
resolution
of
that
CMOS,
very
small
pixel
camera
and
the
Really
quality
lens
of
the
Stellar
view,
you
get
down
to
some
very
ridiculous
resolutions,
particularly
with
narrow
band
images.
You
know
I'm
talking
like
one
Arc
second
resolutions,
I
couldn't
believe
it,
but
I
measured
it
and
there
it
was,
and
my
processing
has
and
when
I
wrote
this
first
slide.
C
C
E
C
Thing
that
has
just
you
know,
change
things.
For
me,
a
little
bit
was
when
I
bought
the
original
computer.
I
bought
a
cheap
Graphics
process
because
I
didn't
have
I
didn't
need
anything,
but
one
of
my
hobbies
over
the
years
has
been
Aviation
and
in
my
lab
we've
had
flight
simulators.
We've
done
a
lot
of
work
on
aging
and
Aviation.
So
what
you're
looking
at
here
is
not
the
Stanford
campus.
C
C
So
I
would
just
say
that
if
you're
looking
for
an
excuse
to
buy
a
good
graphics
processing
card
and
play
video
games,
get
flights
flight
simulator
and
get
a
good
good
graphics,
processing
card
so
anyway,
so
my
acknowledgments,
my
wife,
Danielle
and
her
mother's
pep.
If
my
mother-in-law
hadn't
broken
her
hip,
I,
wouldn't
be
into
astronomy,
so
remember
you're
in
the
hand
of
God
here,
hands
of
God
here
and
it
all
happens.
I
appreciate
Rob's,
moral
and
Technical
Support
over
the
years.
He
kind
of
got
me
stuck
in
this
business
and
I
appreciate
it.
C
C
So
this
is
what
you
see
when
the
system
is
actually
running.
I
took
a
dangerous
thing
here,
as
actually
to
show
this
in
public
when
I
started
up.
So
what
you're
seeing
is
the
software
in
operation
currently
in
the
observatory,
because
it
is
8
30.
right?
So
what
you're
seeing
here
is
the
observatory
Control
software
running
here-
and
this
is
the
telescope
information,
a
Christmas
tree
diagram
of
red
and
white
here
saying
the
Dome
is
open
and
the
weather
is
is
green
down.
C
C
C
The
temperature
business
is
very
interesting
because
you
get
a
temperature
compensation
curve.
So
one
of
the
things
that's
the
problems
that
I
had
with
this
thing
was,
if
you
focus
it
in
the
early
morning,
it's
cold
right.
So
it
gets
to
a
different
Focus
Point
than
it
does
in
the
early
evening
when
it
starts
up.
C
But
if
the
focuser
is
at
the
same
point
than
it
was
in
the
early
morning
when
it
starts
up,
your
stars
are
out
of
focus
and
then
it
can't
do
a
plate
solve
so.
The
first
thing
this
thing
does:
when
it
starts
up,
is
it
does
a
plate,
saw
to
make
sure
that
the
scope
is
oriented
and
all
the
rest?
But
if
the
stars
are
out
of
focus,
it
will
not
do
the
plate
stall
properly.
C
So
what
Steve
did
was
he
has
temperature
compensation
built
in
to
the
focus
Max
software
I,
think
Nina
and
others
have
it
also,
and
so
that
means
that
you
do
a
temperature
compensation
curve
and
you
figure
out
what
the
regression
coefficient
is
for
the
temperature
and
your
focus
settings
so
at
a
certain
degree,
Centigrade
like
24.
The
position
of
this
focuser
is
one
one
one
one
Niner,
however,
I
can
tell
you
that
at
12,
it's
not
that,
but
if
it
was
at
12,
let's
say
it
was
1200
when
it
starts
up
at
23.
C
It
moves
the
focuser
to
the
correct
or
a
a
fairly
close
approximation
of
it.
The
other
thing
it
does
is
that
as
it
cools
during
the
evening,
it
will
re-adjust
the
focuser
or
the
temperature
okay.
So
that's
what
that's?
What
that
guy
does
then?
This
thing
down
here
is
Maxim
notorious
Maxim,
and
so
this
controls
the
camera,
and
this
is
the
setup
The
Guiding
and
the
exposure.
C
It's.
What
can
I
say
it's,
what
they
use,
but
it's
not
a
lot
of
fun.
This
is
the
power
control
panel.
This
is
what's
called
an
IP
controller,
Internet
Protocol
controller,
so
you
can
control
this
remotely
and
change
those
eight
switches
here.
So
you
see
some
of
them
are
the
Christmas
tree.
Diagram
is
green
and
red
by
the
way
for
those
of
you
does
anyone
know
where
the
Christmas
tree
diagram
is
in
World,
War
II
in
submarines,
in
the
control
room
they
had
a
Christmas
tree
diagram
for
the
valves.
C
C
C
So
this
is
what
Bob
Denny
has
to
run
the
whole
shebang.
So
if
you
just
see
this
so
normally,
if
I
come
in
on
remote,
desktop
I
go
to
this
and
it's
really
cool
because
you
look
on
this
thing.
You'll
see
the
observatory
panel
here,
which
shows
the
local
time
so
on
and
so
forth,
and
you
can
have
multiple
schedules.
I
think
when
Rob
was
around
with
this,
we
scheduled
Rob
could
schedule
it
too.
C
C
C
So
these
are
the
images
that
are
in
my
schedule
currently,
and
so
you
can
look.
What
I've
got
on
here
is
a
lot
of
NGC
things.
These
are
small
galaxies
now
now,
with
the
C9.
Let's
see,
11
I
can
image
galaxies,
I'm,
not
afraid
to
image
galaxies
that
are
only
10
arc
minutes
across
and
I
get
reasonable
images.
If
you
look
on
astral
band,
you'll
you'll
see
so
they're
nice
and
then
I
still
am
out
there.
C
Rob
and
I
did
the
veil
way
back
when
I
can't
stop
doing
that
one,
and
then
he
did
a
beautiful
job
of
that,
and
then
these
are
sharpless
objects
which
I
can't
keep
away
from
I've
shot
these
about
three
times,
but
I
shoot
them
again
with
different
scope,
and
now,
with
this
one
I'm
going
to
get
more
detail
because
the
C11
is
going
to
get
me
more
detail
in
those
clouds
than
I
had
gotten
previously.
Some
of
these
sharpless
objects
are
actually
small,
Cloud
small
planetary
nebula.
C
C
The
scintillation
of
the
stars
is
so
bad
that
you
can't
really
see
the
transits
very
well.
So
so
anyway.
So
that's
the
Observatory
control
software
and
let
me
just
see
if
there's
anything
else,
I
think
that's
pretty
much
it
there
I'm
going
to
stop
the
share
here,
because
I'm
talked
out
guys
and
I'll
sit
back
and
see.
If
anybody
has
any
questions,
I'm
going
to
get
a
glass
of
water
hang
on.
A
G
G
C
You
know,
I
didn't
know
what
I
was
doing
when
I
bought
it,
but
I
bought
it
anyway
and
I
thought
it
was
a
good
match
for
the
Stellar
View.
But
it
was
overkill
for
the
Stellar
view
also,
but
they
there's
several
people
on
Astro
bin
that
have
it
and
they
recommended
it.
So
I
did
get
it,
but
that's
that
camera,
but
it
is
oversampled.
Now
the
the
seeing
that
I
can
get.
C
You
know
I've
gone
back
and
forth
with
Gary
ammo.
What
you
can
get
out
of
this
thing-
and
you
know
you
can't
get
you
know
basically
our
second
viewing
out
of
it,
which
would
be
about
two
pixels,
but
where
we
live
you're
not
going
to
get
that
there's
a
guy
on
Astro
bin
in
Australia.
That
has
the
same
setup.
He
does
planetary.
Nebula
Jupiter
does
beautiful
stuff
he's
way
out
in
the
boonies
and
he
gets
you
know
single
Arc.
C
C
D
C
C
So
like
the
way
you
can
figure
that
out.
Is
you
shoot
you?
You
know
what
the
pixels
are
the
size
of
the
pixels
right,
so
you
show
you
shoot
a
picture
and
you
blow
the
sucker
up
and
you
can
see
pretty
much
what
your
resolution
is,
because
you
know
that
the
pixels
are
a
quarter
of
an
arc
second
across
right.
So
it's
not
rocket
science
to
see
what
what
the
resolution
is.
So
I
shot
a
couple
planetary,
nebulae
with
narrow,
a
band
that
you
know.
C
Some
of
them
are
are
just
RGB,
but
some
of
them
are
narrow
bands
and
the
narrow
band
planetary.
Nebulae
will
cut
right
through
our
fog
or
whatever
our
light
pollution
is,
and
so
you
can
get
some
pretty
good
resolution
with
that
so
anyway,
but
for
I
mean
for
our
scene.
You
know,
you
know,
it's
probably
right
that
you
know
130
is
overkill,
but
130.
C
C
C
I
have
two
I,
basically
have
two
waveforms
in
there
and
that's
it
and
it
corrects
very
well.
Some
people
will
have
God
only
knows
what
their
waveform
looks
like,
but
I
got
a
good
one
and
it's
it's
easy
to
correct.
So
the
correction
I
think
the
correction
gets
down
to
one
Arc
second,
and
you
can
measure
that
pretty
much.
You
know
in
your
the
way
that
you
can
do.
That
is
like
a
maximum.
C
If
you're
guiding
you
turn
the
guiding
off
and
then
it
will
give
you
what
your
errors
are,
and
you
can
still
see
the
periodic
error
in
Maxim,
but
it'll
be
small
you're
trying
to
return
the
error
correction.
If
you
turn
the
error
correction
on
it'll
be
better,
so
it's
you
know
you
can
you
can
that's
the
way
I
learned
you
can
make.
You
can
manipulate
it
by
turning
the
periodic
error
on
and
off,
and
then
you
get
an
idea
of
whether
the
periodic
error
did
you
any
good
or
did
you
have
some
harm?
C
I
did
not
get
it
in
mac
and
with
astrophysics.
This
guy
Ray,
the
guru
Greylock,
has
their
modeling
that
you
can
do
to
model
the
behavior
of
the
scope
by
taking
a
sky
model
with
a
whole
bunch
of
stars,
and
all
that
I
did
that,
but
I
did
it
I
and
I.
Did
the
periodic
error
check
with
that
on
and
off,
and
it
didn't
do
anything
for
me.
G
C
You
know
the
thing
is
I
think
it
would
if
you
took,
if
you
take
a
look
at
my
my
pictures
on
Astro
bins.
You'll
see
I've
got
10
years
of
evolution.
All
the
way
back
to
the
C8,
with
a
cannon
on
it
and
I
was
just
so
happy
that
I
could
see.
Ngc
NGC,
253
I
couldn't
believe
it,
but
it's
the
worst
image
known
to
men,
there's
like
200
views
and
one
up
one
up
thumb
up
thumbs
up.
C
But
if
you
go
through
some
of
them
on
the
I
wasn't
going
to
say,
I'm
the
planetary
nebula
you'll
see
some
that
are
taking
with
the
seller
do
and
you
can
see
how
I
struggled
to
get
them
to
work,
but
some
of
them
are
pretty
good
and
they
were
all
done
with
that.
You
know
130
focal
lengths
image
amateur,
so
you
can
do
it.
Hey.
A
A
E
C
I,
don't
I
don't
bother
with
that,
because
I
have
the
Scott
the
sensor
and
they're
really
expensive.
It's
official
IQ
cameras,
but
I
have
I
have
a
fish
eye
view
camera
inside
the
observatory
wish
runs.
If
you
want
to
see
it,
you've
got
nothing
better.
To
do.
I
can
show
you
it,
but
what
it
looks
like,
but
it's
like
it
allows
me
to
see
where
the
scope
is
and
if
the
roof
is
open
as
like
a
check
okay,
but
it
doesn't
get
a.
A
F
Yeah
I
have
a
question
for
Jerry,
please
yeah,
so
Jerry
I
was
wondering
so
I
may
you
may
have
covered
this.
I
had
a
little
drop
out
for
dinner
here,
but
I
was
wondering
with
your
automation,
set
up.
If
you
automate
the
entire
night's
Imaging
run,
including
opening
the
roof
and
closing
the
roof
and
parking
the
scope
at
the
end
of
the
evening
and
whether
you
have
any
safety
monitors
for
you
know
three
grainstorms
or
whatever
to
button
it
all
up
automatically
or
not.
C
Yeah,
it's
it's
completely
automated
and
the
it.
You
know.
That's
what
that
software
does,
that
ACP
software,
it's
designed
for
large
observatories-
and
this
is
probably
the
smallest
Observatory
that
has
that
software
in
it
and
the
startup
script
starts.
It
up,
starts
everything
off
and
starts
the
Imaging
going.
Imaging
is
scheduled
by
their
schedule.
It
has
sort
of
semi
AI
in
it
and
then
at
the
end
of
the
evening,
it
shuts
down
and
if
there's
weather,
there's
a
cloud
sensor
that
senses
that
and
closes
the
roof.
F
So
I
I
still
manually
well,
I
can
do
it
remotely
it's
a
I
have
a
remote
control
of
the
roof,
but
I
don't
automate
the
opening
closing
the
roof.
For
that
reason,
so
I
was
wondering
if
there
was
I
I've
seen
some
people
use
special
Park
sensors
that
use
like
little
sensors
with
reflecting
element
you
put
somewhere
on
the
scope
so
that
it
won't
possibly
close
the
roof
unless
the
scope
isn't
exactly
the
right
orientation.
So
I
was
wondering
if
you
had
to
deal
with
anything
like
that
or
not
when.
C
I
first
got
this
system.
Bob
Denny
told
me
whatever
you
do,
make
sure
your
scope
is
Fail-Safe
with
the
roll-off
roof,
and
that
was
like
the
first
sentence
out
of
his
mouth
because
he's
seen
these
these
roofs
crash
into
Scopes
all
over
the
planet.
Earth
and
you
can
be
the
the
problem-
is
I
I'm
a
programmer
right,
I've
got
Decades
of
experience
and
you
would
say
gee.
You
know
you
ought
to
be
able
to
do
that,
and
you
can
do
that.
C
So
the
first
thing
that
goes
on
is
the
signal
to
park.
The
roof
and
I
went
over
this
with
Daniel.
You
ought
to
be
parked
the
scope
first,
and
he
said
that
would
give
you
a
false
sense
of
security
and
I
have
all
that
stuff
to
do
that
and
I
have
the
equipment
to
to
make
sure
that
that
roof
will
not
close
I.
Have
it
that
controller
that
I
have
I
mean
you
probably
you
can
see
the
picture,
but
I
have
like
an
industrial
strength,
controller
all
designed
to
do
that
and
I.
C
Just
don't
trust
it,
and
so
the
way
I
finally
decided
it
was
that
I
have
the
a
scope
on
a
pier
that
can
be
raised
and
then
the
roof
Fail-Safe
shut
down.
So
if
I
really
have
to
raise
the
you
know,
if
I,
if
I
need
to
see
something
low
to
the
Horizon,
but
currently
it
can
see
anything,
that's
45
degrees
above
the
horizon
and
you're
not
going
to
see
much
under
45
degrees.
F
C
C
I
spent
a
lot
of
money
on
mine
and
I
still
don't
trust
it.
Nobody
trusts
them
because
Danny
has
Denny
knows
everyone
who
has
one
of
these
systems
and
like
the
big
ones
like
I,
don't
know,
I've
never
been
out
to
Sri,
but
they
have
big.
You
know
big
big
systems
with
roll-off
roofs,
but
they're
all
below
the
level
of
the
roof.
F
If
I
was
doing
this
again,
I
would
have
lowered
my
my
peer
because
I
wanted
to
maximize
my
horizons,
so
I
I
have
it
tucked
up
in
in
you
know
in
front
position
right
below
the
roof
line
yeah.
In
retrospect,
considering
I
in
with
seeing
glow
on
the
horizon
honestly
I
I
rarely
I
mean
in
retrospect,
I
wish
I
would
have
just
had
my
peer
two
or
three
feet
lower
so
that
the
you
know
poignant
disease
I
can
still
close
the
roof
without
possible
impact.
C
C
But
what
I've
also
learned
is,
when
you
shoot
down
low
at
the
Horizon,
get
images
and
you're
going
to
throw
away
a
lot
of
those
images,
so
you're
better
off
selecting
targets
that
are
up
high
and
with
this
C
C11
I
have
a
plethora
of
targets.
Now,
there's
there's
10
degree
wide
galaxies
all
over
the
place,
and
you
know,
and
planetary
nebulon,
so
I'll
have
I'll,
have
targets
for
the
rest
of
my
life
that
I
don't
have
to
go
below
45
degrees.
C
So
that's
that's
the
other
thought.
The
reason
why
I
had
the
got
the
C11
I
also
should
mention
that
if
anybody
wants
a
slightly
used,
Stellar
View
130.,
you
know
I,
don't
know
that
I'm
ever
going
to
put
the
thing
back
on
there
Market's
a
good
scope,
honest
but
I
I,
don't
know
that
I'm
ever
going
to
put
it
back
on
there,
because
it's
like
you
know,
I'm
in
love
with
the
c11.
C
D
C
E
C
C
You
can't
quite
see
it
but
on
the
equipment
shed
here,
there's
an
exhaust
fan
next
to
the
computer,
got
it
so
that
exhausts
the
air
comes
in
through
the
bottom
of
this
thing
and
then
comes
out
through
that
and
then
ultimately
it
all
comes
out
through
here
so
and
you
can
see,
the
person
was
asking
me
about
where
the
scope
is.
You
see
it's
below
the
roof
right.
C
Or
that's
the
control
panel
so
that
control
panel
could
handle
the
peer
control
also,
but
it
I
just
don't
trust
it.
It's
used
I
mean
it's
an
industrial
strength
thing,
but
you
know
that's
it.
So
you
can
see
that
thing
is
fairly
low,
but
that's
in
a
horizontal
position
to
skoda
when
it
rotates
when
it
rotates
up.