Backseat Driving a Virtual Telescope In Italy
Sunday, April 5th, 2009
No kidding! During the 100 Hours of Astronomy, I decided to test drive some virtual telescopes that were offered.
The scopes I selected were located in Fredericksburg, Texas; Moorook, Australia and Ceccano, Italy.
Looking back I see that signing up for three remote control telescopes in a three day period was rather ambitious, but if I had it to do over, I would sign up for three again.
The reasons I signed up for three was I was considering weather failure, and I wanted to increase my odds of having a clear night with at least one of the locations. It can’t be cloudy everywhere all the time, can it? Well, that was my way of thinking.
Turns out that was a good plan.
Before I get down to the nitty gritty of the experience, I just want to say I prepared in advance for my sessions for each location for the time I would be allotted. The moon was going to be a factor during these nights, so I selected targets away from the bright lunar glare.
The telescopes in Australia were on a first come first serve basis, and the first day that they were available the weather did not cooperate. Too windy. Rats!
I tried in vain to get some time on the Australian scopes each night but they were always busy. No surprise there.
When my assigned time slot came to use the telescope in Texas at the Cherry Mountain Observatory, I could not access it. It turned out later that my firewall was the culprit of me not getting a connection to the remote scope. This was discouraging to me because Texas was right next door so to speak and it’s my former home state.
After e-mailing the owner, and stating I could not get in, he graciously offered me another time slot the following night- he really wanted me to have a good experience with the scope and remote camera. But it would conflict with previous plans and some time I was making for the scope in Italy so I reluctantly declined the offer. Besides, Fredericksburg would be easy enough to try at another time when the traffic for the 100 Hours of virtual astronomy were over and it would not be so hectic scheduling a session.
The following evening when my turn came for the scope in Italy, I could not get in right away because I was using the wrong password. I had arranged for two 30 minute sessions in Italy, one for night and one for a daytime solar viewing run, and I switched the passwords. A simple yet bad mistake!
I must say I have never keystroked an e-mail message to anyone faster than to the astronomer in charge at the Bellatrix Observatory in Italy. I was watching and listening to him talk via the virtual site and my time was rapidly ticking away. My head was aching because I was watching my final chance to use a remote telescope go right down the drain.
Luckily, the astronomer in charge saw my message and since the guy scheduled after my session did not show up, I was lucky to get my time on the remote scope after all. I’m virtually thrilled to be there!
After watching the prior guests use the remote scope I was eager to drive. Watching my predecessors easily slew to an object, snap a few images and then go on to another target had me very confident I could have a successful session.
Prior to logging in with my corrected password, I downloaded VNC software on my computer per instructions on the Bellatrix Observatory site and changed my firewall in advance so as to eliminate any snags that might occur.
Once my connection was made, I could control the telescope and the CCD camera as if I were onsite at the observatory.
Gianluca Masi, PhD., was my guide for the session in Ceccano, Italy (which is about 90 km south of Rome). He was also responsible for organizing the 100 Hours of Remote Astronomy that ran April 2-5. We were in good hands!
He was streaming live comments for the observing sessions via audio and video and providing assistance to each user.
The telescope I would be using was a Celestron C14 f/8.7 optical tube on a Software Bisque Paramount ME robotic equatorial mount as shown in the photo above (courtesy Bellatrix Observatory). The camera was an SBIG ST-8XME, Class 1 with a color filter wheel. We would not be imaging in color since the time slot was only 30 minutes duration.
I could hear Gianluca talking via the virtual telescope project site, so things were looking pretty good. Other users had been denied the virtual experience because of humidity and clouds. On several occasions I watched the dome close and the telescope placed in park position. Many users missed their turn because of clouds and adverse conditions.
I had been watching prior remote users online during the “live” sessions, and had a good feel for how things would work while using the remote scope. The sessions moved along smoothly and on time with Gianluca’s expert guidance.
He was very talkative and animated in his speech as he encouraged each participant to “just shot it”.
The “live” mode offered real time control of the telescope hosted at Bellatrix Observatory and was duplicated on the user’s desktop with the same computer physically connected to the instrument. It’s just like sitting in the same room with the scope and the controls at your own keyboard. The software used to control the telescopes was The Sky Six.
I’m not a Sky user, but I’ve seen it used by friends and watched the previous users online enough to have an idea of how easy it is to control as the little icons are very easy to comprehend, plus the host, Gianluca, was guiding each person through the steps in an easy to understand yet heavily accented Italian voice.
He was always happy and excited with each user and often stated that he is “crazy” and likes to help people use the telescope and make images.
My 1st target was M51, the Whirlpool. I’ve watched it being imaged before by friends with CCD cameras and I wanted a shot of it for myself.
When I selected it, Gianluca said that it is a favorite and popular target. Rightfully so. I think M51 is one of the best things to look at in the sky. I could have picked Saturn, another personal favorite, but I stuck with the galaxy.
After I did a quick focus, I selected my target and the scope slewed to M51 like magic. I could not only hear it slewing, but I could see it slewing on the live site.
Next, I started the image after selecting 1 minute for the exposure time. I think I also selected 1×1 binning mode.
After one minute, a somewhat grainy image of M51 appeared on my monitor. Wow! I did that!
I made another shot, this time 2 minutes. This one is much better.
My next target was M101. Another galaxy. Another two minute shot. It looked grainy on my monitor but Gianluca said it looked nice. I can’t really see the image that well because I have a monitor full of windows open with the live view and the images on in.
Plus I had my laptop running on a chair beside me that Shane was doing screen and page captures for me as I went along. I felt uber geeky, and was having a blast. Sadly, 30 minutes were gone before I knew it and my session was over. It seemed like I had been prepping for days, and I had– and now it was over.
The following night I watched others use the virtual scope and marveled at how easy it was to drive from distant places like Brazil, and India.
In an amazing turn of events while one guest was using the scope and making an image, the effects of a 6.3 earthquake 150 kilometers north of Ceccano, Italy was caught on the image as shakiness. At the time of watching the image come across the monitor we had no idea that an earthquake had occurred. The image just looked shaky as if the slewing was active or something like that.
In retrospect I can offer a few tips for driving a telescope remotely.
1. Use practice sessions if they are offered.
2. Make sure your firewall will let you do what you need to do.
3. Check your password and username and write them down for easy access and logon.
4. Research your target’s compatibility for the size scope and camera you will be using.
If the target is too large it may not fit and you will only get a portion of it.
5. Know your time zone! Be aware of the time specified for your session. Most are given in Universal Time.
6. Remember that there is a slight delay after you input a command, Give the remote system time to catch up before instructing it to do the next task.
7. See number 1.
Over 15,000 people watched the live sessions at the Bellatrix Observatory and 2000 requests for telescope time.
There were 90 users that were able to access the Bellatrix observatory telescope in Italy during the 100 hours of astronomy and at 30 minutes per person this means that 45 hours of virtual astronomy were completed. That’s amazing!
I was one of the lucky few. Ciao!
I hope to post the images I made with the remote scope sometime tomorrow.
