Notes for May 2014 trip:
Items for improvement for when we are next on-site:
- Shorter focal length fish-eye lens for Cananon Mk5-III - something like 11mm. Canon makes an 8-15mm zoom fisheye. DONE
- Replace acrylic dome.NO
- Glass domes avail from Edmund Optics, http://www.edmundoptics.com/optics/windows-diffusers/specialty-windows/glass-domes/3147?#products
- Acrylic Domes from California Quality Plastics, http://plastic-domes-spheres.com/shop/acrylic-hemispheres/
- Domes from underwater camera vendors
- Perhaps camera with IR block removed?
- Perhaps camera with UV response?
- Bring down more 2 TB USB-powered disks DONE
- Bring USB hub
- Bring power strip, multi-outlet
- Bring extension cables
- Bring aluminized mylar for daytime calibration images
- Figure out a higher-bandwidth connection to US DONE
- Think about adding sdss filters behind the lens, one per camera. Would this work with shorter focal length fisheye? A: yes, Canon 8-15mm zoom fisheye has provision for filter insert. Data on Wratten filters here: http://www.edmundoptics.com/optics/optical-filters/color-dichroic-filters/kodak-wratten-filters/1326?#products
- here is a link with distortion map of Canon 8-15mm lens: http://michel.thoby.free.fr/Canon_8-15mm/8-15mm_review.html
- Do nodal point calibration of lens and camera ahead of time DONE
- install astrometry.net on a local machine NOT NEEDED
- Attempt to obtain increased bandwidth for image xfer to US DONE
Items for the photo-diode system:
- Automate the data taking with scripts
- Develop/install infrastructure needed for long term installation
- Figure out effective A-Omega for the diode, so we can calibrate in mags per square arc sec.
- Obtain 3 full sets of grizy (LSST preferred or SLOAN) 1-inch diameter filters for sky monitors
List of things left in Chile, in La Serena in green Pelican case:
- keyboard, mouse and monitor for Mac Mini sys admin, with associated cables
- cordless drill/screwdriver for mechanical installation
- misc wood screws and 1/4-20 bolts for mechanical installation
- Cat 5 network cables, various lengths
- USB cables
- 1 pr safety glasses
- drill bit and driver set
- mounting brackets (Newport type L brackets), 2 large and 1 small for mech mounting
- cross-bar for mech mounting
Notes from Feb 6 meeting in Tucson:
make spectrograph that can catch OH emission. FAILED!
buy second lens for existing camera. DONE
Get NCSA accounts for Cws, Michael and anyone else
environmental monitoring of camera temp
Kem points out that sky is a slippery thing- we should define "LSST Sky" as what DM fits around point sources, for a 15 sec image on a 6.5m equivalent aperture telescope. Our pixels are really big and include lots of stars. This isn't such a big deal for scheduler and where-to-point decisions, but it does matter for making a model of sky background. In particular the Milky Way is a problem, in that stellar density is varying but not sky brightness. We should consider fitting out the stellar density dependence.
So we should go to Magellan and take 15 images in grizy.
For May 2014 trip:
- replace 5D Mark III with new camera body, and wider field lens
- change out disks with formatted ones
- run full-spectrum 5D Mark II as water monitor, with transmission grating and NIR long pass filter
- If photometric, take rotated set of calibration images with old 5D Mark III and wider field lens. (need to take down the second lens)
- try daytime solar-backlit water band monitoring, by re-imaging optical fiber.
- correlate our photometric catalogs against Tycho-derived griz magnitudes.
- SDSS-band imaging with IR_blocked camera