[TASS] Alignment & stereo was: Flat fielding

[Chris Albertson <calbertson@LOGICON.COM>]

Herbert R Johnson wrote:

>
> I happened to think this weekend about setting up my Mark III with
> parallel lenses rather than staggered, just to get a little better
> relative photometry and a little more observing run time. The downside
> is that seperating the lens views gets rid of some slow-moving objects
> like satellites (or reduces them to mono-colored objects). Maybe
> a pair that is stereo and one offset could do both...?

I think we'd have far fewer "seen once" objects if we used parallel alignment.
But the 15 minute revisit time helps when you want to find the
period of a short period variable.  What about a compromise:  If the two
end cameras have the same filter align only one end with the center.
So the offsets are 0, 0, 15 rather then the standard -15, 0, 15
>
> As for your kilometer-wide pair, you've got a site in Cincinnati OH and
> one in Dayton OH....?

Two sites would have to be separated by exactly
0, 15, or 30 degrees of longitude to have two of Mk III cameras see the same
chunk of sky at the same time  Assuming each center camera looks exactly
at the meridian.  There is room to play if one site is off the meridian.
So either we already have hundreds of stereo pairs or we have zero.
My money is on zero pair.


--
  Chris Albertson

  calbertson@logicon.com                  Voice: 626-351-0089  X127
  Logicon, Pasadena California            Fax:   626-351-0699