Automated Variable Star Observing and Photometric Processing at the Abbey Ridge Observatory (Abstract)

Volume 36 number 1 (2008)

David J. Lane

Abstract

(Abstract only) In the second half of 2006, the author’s backyard observatory began observing (mainly Cepheid) variable stars in collaboration with David Turner and Daniel Majaess of Saint Mary’s University. This paper will describe the automated variable star observing and photometric processing software (Abbey Ridge Auto-Pilot and accompanying scripts) developed for and in use at Abey Ridge Observatory. This software completely automates observing the fields, taking calibration frames at night’s end, calibrating the images, combining sequentially-taken images, astrometrically solving the images, and doing the aperture photometry of the selected stars. At the end of the night, the resulting calibrated images and excel-compatible photometric data are automatically uploaded to an internet server and human-readable summary emails are sent to the observer. As input to the software, the observer provides two types of text files. The first type contains the list the fields to be observed on a given night. The second type is a simple database of information about the fields, including such things as: the equatorial coordinates of the field; the exposure details in each filter; the equatorial positions of the target, reference, and check stars; and the aperture photometry settings.