Imaging Quality Control

As from February, every image taken in optical imaging mode is being analyzed on the fly through an automatic post-processing task based on the Sextractor routine. As output, we store FWHM and Ellipticity measurements for every single source found in the images, after some appropriate filtering has taken place. Subsequent analysis of this dataset allows for a very powerful tool to monitor the performance of the telescope. To aid the analysis, we log simultaneous FWHM measurements from the Robotic DIMM station at the ING. A start has been made with analyzing the data.

NOTCAM data are planned to be included in the processing over the coming months, and a study of extending the analysis to include an astrometric solution is being carried out.

As a longer term goal we plan to develop an automatic warning system that will inform the observer when the optical quality of the data does not seem to be optimal (e.g., because the telescope is out of focus).