Best practice for developing ...

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Rainer Ehlert
Posts: 135
Joined: Thu Sep 29, 2011 9:36 pm

Re: Best practice for developing ...

Post by Rainer Ehlert »

Hi James,

Happy New 2019 and really thanks a lot for that explanation.

Will try. I understand ISIS being the standard for spectrum developing. I tried it many years ago and honestly it is more then intimidating compared to, Sorry, RSpec which is very intuitive eg easier to get to a result.

I also tried Vspec and that one is also intimidating ... :shock:

Anyhow will test and read read and read again the LISA / ISIS tutorial and hopefully will get to a result.

Very nice RC you have there. Is it a 12" or 14" Ø ?

regards Rainer
regards Rainer____Observatorio Real de 14_____MÉXICO_____N 22° W 101°
James Foster
Posts: 439
Joined: Sun Jan 24, 2016 7:14 am

Re: Best practice for developing ...

Post by James Foster »

Hi Rainer,

RE:"Very nice RC you have there. Is it a 12" or 14" Ø ?"

This is a Planewave CDK17 or 17" (43cm) aperture, corrected dall-kirkham cassegrain working at F/6.8.

Isis is somewhat complicated, but by strictly following the guides on processing in Isis, you'll quickly understand the "thinking" behind it.
I strongly advice not just to read the LISA guide, but also the Alpy600 and even the LhiresIII Isis processing instructions. After about a year and
a half, I can process visual and IR low resolution spectra with the Alpy600/IR LISA spectroscope, and near-UV and visual high resolution spectra
with the LhiresIII.

Sincerely Yours,

James
James Foster
eShel2-Zwo ASI6200MM Pro
Lhires III (2400/1800/600 ln/mm Grat) Spectroscope
LISA IR/Visual Spectroscope (IR Configured)
Alpy 200/600 with Guide/Calibration modules and Photometric slit
Star Analyzer 200
Rainer Ehlert
Posts: 135
Joined: Thu Sep 29, 2011 9:36 pm

Re: Best practice for developing ...

Post by Rainer Ehlert »

James Foster wrote:Hi Rainer,

RE:"Very nice RC you have there. Is it a 12" or 14" Ø ?"

This is a Planewave CDK17 or 17" (43cm) aperture, corrected dall-kirkham cassegrain working at F/6.8.

Isis is somewhat complicated, but by strictly following the guides on processing in Isis, you'll quickly understand the "thinking" behind it.
I strongly advice not just to read the LISA guide, but also the Alpy600 and even the LhiresIII Isis processing instructions. After about a year and
a half, I can process visual and IR low resolution spectra with the Alpy600/IR LISA spectroscope, and near-UV and visual high resolution spectra
with the LhiresIII.

Sincerely Yours,

James
WOW :shock:

Just downloaded Bulkrename = intimidating as ISIS and Vspec together

:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

I think I will stop taking Spectra and do something easier :mrgreen: :mrgreen: :mrgreen: like sit in my rocking chair :lol: :lol:

Rainer
regards Rainer____Observatorio Real de 14_____MÉXICO_____N 22° W 101°
Rainer Ehlert
Posts: 135
Joined: Thu Sep 29, 2011 9:36 pm

Re: Best practice for developing ...

Post by Rainer Ehlert »

Rainer Ehlert wrote:
James Foster wrote:Hi Rainer,

RE:"Very nice RC you have there. Is it a 12" or 14" Ø ?"

This is a Planewave CDK17 or 17" (43cm) aperture, corrected dall-kirkham cassegrain working at F/6.8.

Isis is somewhat complicated, but by strictly following the guides on processing in Isis, you'll quickly understand the "thinking" behind it.
I strongly advice not just to read the LISA guide, but also the Alpy600 and even the LhiresIII Isis processing instructions. After about a year and
a half, I can process visual and IR low resolution spectra with the Alpy600/IR LISA spectroscope, and near-UV and visual high resolution spectra
with the LhiresIII.

Sincerely Yours,

James
WOW :shock:

Just downloaded Bulkrename = intimidating as ISIS and Vspec together

:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

I think I will stop taking Spectra and do something easier :mrgreen: :mrgreen: :mrgreen: like sit in my rocking chair :lol: :lol:

Rainer
Hi James,

I managed to rename some files in Bulkrename.

I printed the ISIS / LISA instruction and will try to go step by step.

Thanks again.

Rainer
regards Rainer____Observatorio Real de 14_____MÉXICO_____N 22° W 101°
James Foster
Posts: 439
Joined: Sun Jan 24, 2016 7:14 am

Re: Best practice for developing ...

Post by James Foster »

To: Rainer,

Let me know if you need and raw spectra, Ne-Ar, and flats to play with. One more thing, its important to determine the A/px scale of
your optical system/spectroscope for the spectrum images to process under the 2nd (General) page under "Pixel size (mircons):" box.

I bin my spectra 2x2 from my Atik 460ex so my image scale is 8.94 microns. If this is off by more than 5%, the calibration process usually fails.
Sometimes it easier to take some 1x1 bin spectra images to determine this value, then just multiply by 2x to get the 2x2 bin scale.

James
James Foster
eShel2-Zwo ASI6200MM Pro
Lhires III (2400/1800/600 ln/mm Grat) Spectroscope
LISA IR/Visual Spectroscope (IR Configured)
Alpy 200/600 with Guide/Calibration modules and Photometric slit
Star Analyzer 200
Rainer Ehlert
Posts: 135
Joined: Thu Sep 29, 2011 9:36 pm

Re: Best practice for developing ...

Post by Rainer Ehlert »

James Foster wrote:To: Rainer,

Let me know if you need and raw spectra, Ne-Ar, and flats to play with. One more thing, its important to determine the A/px scale of
your optical system/spectroscope for the spectrum images to process under the 2nd (General) page under "Pixel size (mircons):" box.

I bin my spectra 2x2 from my Atik 460ex so my image scale is 8.94 microns. If this is off by more than 5%, the calibration process usually fails.
Sometimes it easier to take some 1x1 bin spectra images to determine this value, then just multiply by 2x to get the 2x2 bin scale.

James
Hi James,

I will come back to you

BTW I am using a little QSI 520i with a CCD chip with 1600 x 1200 pixels and in MaxIM DL I bin the camera 1x3 which means horizontal size is 1600 pixel and vertical size is 400 pixel (1200 pixel binned 3x)

I am working in getting solved the steep fall off in the blue end. It is interesting that the FLAT lamp in the LISA calibration module seems to be of not great help ¿? from what I understood in the posting which Robin Leadbeater gave me. The problem is, it is in French and the automatic translation seems to be a bit off and confuses me a bit.

So far I understood it is better to use a 4700K lampo instread of the integrated 2700K land of the LISA module. Will see if I get a 4700K lam here in Mexico.

regards Rainer
regards Rainer____Observatorio Real de 14_____MÉXICO_____N 22° W 101°
Robin Leadbeater
Posts: 1926
Joined: Mon Sep 26, 2011 4:41 pm
Contact:

Re: Best practice for developing ...

Post by Robin Leadbeater »

Hi Rainer,

The calibration lamp in the LISA is fine. It is only a problem if you are working in the UV. You have a wonderful setup there. You do not need any more equipment.

Doing spectroscopy at a pro-am level is a big challenge though and very different from taking a few spectra for fun using RSpec. I recommend following the steps in Christian's tutorial. It takes time to master ISIS but it gets easier and it is definitely worth it. ISIS does so many small things correctly compared with Rspec and the results are better. I recommend taking a few stars with known spectra eg MILES stars and comparing your results with the professionally taken spectra. That way you can see if your technique is good and work on any problems.

Have you considered attending this Spectroscopy workshop next month ? They will use ISIS and there is a very good line up of speakers. I believe there are still places.
http://www.smswweb.com/

Cheers
Robin
LHIRES III #29 ATIK314 ALPY 600/200 ATIK428 Star Analyser 100/200 C11 EQ6
http://www.threehillsobservatory.co.uk
Rainer Ehlert
Posts: 135
Joined: Thu Sep 29, 2011 9:36 pm

Re: Best practice for developing ...

Post by Rainer Ehlert »

Robin Leadbeater wrote:Hi Rainer,

The calibration lamp in the LISA is fine. It is only a problem if you are working in the UV. You have a wonderful setup there. You do not need any more equipment.

Doing spectroscopy at a pro-am level is a big challenge though and very different from taking a few spectra for fun using RSpec. I recommend following the steps in Christian's tutorial. It takes time to master ISIS but it gets easier and it is definitely worth it. ISIS does so many small things correctly compared with Rspec and the results are better. I recommend taking a few stars with known spectra eg MILES stars and comparing your results with the professionally taken spectra. That way you can see if your technique is good and work on any problems.

Have you considered attending this Spectroscopy workshop next month ? They will use ISIS and there is a very good line up of speakers. I believe there are still places.
http://www.smswweb.com/

Cheers
Robin
Hi Robin,

Thanks for your encouraging words. You have been always of big help in the past and I appreciate it a lot. :!:

I have been out of spectroscoping for about 6-7 years and now I have the time 24/7 to do Astronomy again.

Yes I have seen that workshop announcement but I ahve to put priorities as I am retired now and finances are shorter then ever and I already booked NEAF 2019 trip. Mexican peso is not strong against the US dollar and it is a lot of mexican pesos.

Unfotunately there is no way to assit remotely on this workshops which I find is a pity.

Saludos Rainer
regards Rainer____Observatorio Real de 14_____MÉXICO_____N 22° W 101°
James Foster
Posts: 439
Joined: Sun Jan 24, 2016 7:14 am

Re: Best practice for developing ...

Post by James Foster »

To: Robin,

RE:"Have you considered attending this Spectroscopy workshop next month ? They will use ISIS and there is a very good line up of speakers. I believe there are still places."

Are you going? I just paid the airfare and will register today for the conference and hotel.......wish I could find a buddy to share the room & shuttle expense!

James
James Foster
eShel2-Zwo ASI6200MM Pro
Lhires III (2400/1800/600 ln/mm Grat) Spectroscope
LISA IR/Visual Spectroscope (IR Configured)
Alpy 200/600 with Guide/Calibration modules and Photometric slit
Star Analyzer 200
Robin Leadbeater
Posts: 1926
Joined: Mon Sep 26, 2011 4:41 pm
Contact:

Re: Best practice for developing ...

Post by Robin Leadbeater »

James Foster wrote: Are you going? I just paid the airfare and will register today for the conference and hotel.......wish I could find a buddy to share the room & shuttle expense!
Hi James,

No I shan't be there but I met Ken Hudson at the BAA/AAVSO meeting in the summer and it sounds like it is going to be a great meeting. (Ask Stella when the AAVSO database is going live ;-) They have been talking about it for 10 years now.

Cheers
Robin
LHIRES III #29 ATIK314 ALPY 600/200 ATIK428 Star Analyser 100/200 C11 EQ6
http://www.threehillsobservatory.co.uk
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