An Observational Demonstration of Angle Error in Visual Magnitude Estimates

Volume 16 number 2 (1987)

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David B. Williams

9270-A Racquetball Way,

Abstract

Two series of visual magnitude estimates were made during the same minimum of the eclipsing binary BX And, with the optical field of view rotated 180 degrees between the estimates in each series. The resulting light curves are displaced about a quarter of a magnitude, providing a graphic demonstration of the errors in visual estimates caused by changes in the orientation of a variable and its comparison stars.