EXPOSURE PARAMETERS AND BINNING
1. The pull-down menu in the center top of the Pictor window lets you select one of about 15 exposure settings. To edit the parameters for a setting, select the setting from the menu and then press the button with horizontal lines located immediately to the right of the menu. This will bring up the exposure parameter window.

Pull down the menu, select a setting, and then click at the white arrow.

This is what you get.

2. The '0 sec' and '1 sec' settings should be left as-is. The exposure times for the '0-1 sec', '1-60 sec', and '1-60 min' settings can be adjusted as necessary. The five 'user' settings can be adjusted as you desire.

3. The 'Analog binning' option is important and deserves some explanation. When this is enabled, the pixels on the chip are grouped into 2x2 superpixels during readout. The full viewing area of the chip is preserved, but at lower resolution. The advantage is that the readout is 4 times as fast, and the lower resolution isn't really a big issue most of the time, because our typical seeing is so crappy. So we recommend using the binning mode most of the time, but if it looks like the seeing is good, or you want the full-size image, turn it off.

FINDING AND IMAGING TARGETS
1. Finding your desired imaging target is done much the same as with standard eyepiece observing. If the target is visible to the naked eye, use the Telrad to point the scope at it; otherwise, the setting circles should get you within a degree of its coordinate position on the sky. Then use the finderscope crosshairs to refine the pointing. Finally, use the red targetting eyepiece to center the object in the field of view. The CCD package can be removed from the telescope while powered up, but you must place it safely in its case when not in use, with the cables out of the way.

2. Bright targets, such as the moon and the planets, will require very short exposures, but even then may saturate the chip. If this occurs, use the cardboard aperture stop to reduce the amount of light entering the telescope.

Put the aperture mask...

...over the end of the scope.

3. For very dim targets, you will need longer exposures, but anything longer than 15 seconds or so may show blurring or streaking, due to inaccurate telescope guiding. We hope to fix this problem soon, but you'll just have to keep your exposures short in the meantime.

4. To adjust the display parameters (to see faint details in an image, for instance), select 'Image:Image Scaling'. You will see a histogram of pixel intensities. With the mouse, double-left-click on the desired black value, and double-right-click on the desired white value. Click 'OK'. The image will be redisplayed with the new greyscale range.

DARK SUBTRACTION AND FLATFIELDING
1. For most images, but particularly for long exposures of faint targets, you will want to take a second exposure of the same duration, but with the telescope closed, in order to create a 'dark frame'. This dark frame is then subtracted from the image frame to remove the thermal background and 'hot pixels' which speckle the image.

2. After you've gotten an exposure that you like, save it with 'File:Save As'. FITS format is the best choice -- see below for more file saving details.

3. Without changing any of the exposure parameters, select 'Camera:Take Dark Frame'. The program will prompt you to cover the telescope. Place the top cap on the main telescope. Unless you're sure that you're done with this target, do not move the telescope to put the cover on -- use the stepstool if you need it, and put the cover gently over the top of the scope.

4. Click 'OK', and the computer will take a dark exposure.

5. Save the dark exposure in the default directory \pview\calibrat. Give it a descriptive name, like D20.FTS for a 20-second dark exposure. It's okay to overwrite existing files of the same name.

6. Return to your image exposure (select its window), and then choose 'Image:Subtract Dark'. You will be prompted for which dark frame file to use. Indicate the one you saved above.

7. Ignore the exposure time fields, and click 'No scaling' in the dialog box.

8. The dark-subtracted image will be displayed. Adjust the greyscale if desired (step 4 in the previous section) and make sure the image looks good. A lot of the speckle should be gone or at least greatly reduced. If something looks awry, reload the image file and try again.

9. Save the fixed image under a different filename or file format (like .JPG).

10. Flatfielding is a similar technique which divides the image frame by an image of a uniformly illuminated field, to compensate for sensitivity variations on the chip. Small chips like ours are generally pretty flat to start with, so flatfielding is not necessary, but flatfield instructions may be added to this documentation later.

SAVING YOUR IMAGES
1. The current window can be saved to disk via the 'File:Save' and 'File:Save As' commands.

2. Feel free to make a subdirectory for yourself in the \users directory, using 'File:Create New Directory', and put your images here. For the time being, there should be enough disk space for everyone, so we won't have to institute space quotas, but please keep your directory clean of unnecessary stuff.

3. If you plan to do further mathematical manipulations on an image, it is best to save it as FITS (.FTS). Once an image is in final display form, you can save it as .GIF or .JPG for web publishing or further tweaking with a program like Photoshop.

4. Files can be saved or copied to floppy disks to be taken home.

MISCELLANIA
1. If the computer screen is too bright, and ruins your night vision, pressing the F5 key will toggle it into 'night vision mode', where everything is dim red.

2. I like to keep observations from different nights in different folders in my main folder, so that I'm less likely to have similar filenames colliding. If you name the subfolders with the date (like 24JUN98), you also have a record of your observing runs.

3. Under 'File:Set User Preferences', you can specify your name, to be imbedded in the data header of each file. Please don't mess around with any of the other parameters.

4. Don't keep too many image windows open at once -- it tends to make Windows crash. Save early and often.