Search for planets with a digital camera
Amateur astronomy has always been a rather expensive hobby. The main expense item is buying or making a good telescope with a large mirror diameter and buying a digital camera with a sensitive sensor.
But lately the situation seems to be changing. For example, amateur astronomer David Schneider (David Schneider) with the help of the usual DSLR was able to observe the planet 63 light years from Earth !
Schneider Camera
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A digital camera is just one of the elements of the “tracker” that Schneider designed on the Arduino board with a stepper motor and a few details from an inkjet printer. The design is fixed on a plywood stand.
The basic idea is to track the target star system for a long period of time. In this case, the camera gradually rotates after the star system, compensating for the rotation of the Earth. The camera takes pictures with long exposures.
Schneider chose the star HD 189733 to observe. It is relatively bright, though not visible to the naked eye.
During the initial camera focus, the nearby Dumbbell Nebula is used as a guide.
Schneider tried to discover the planet HD 189733 b , discovered in 2005. Such “hot Jupiter” planets are easier for others to notice, because due to their size and gravity, the briskness of the parent star noticeably decreases when the planet passes between it and the Earth. In particular, with the passage of HD 189733 b, the star's brightness decreases by 2.6%, i.e. the difference is 28 millimeters.
It was such a short-term "fading" of the star's light that Schneider registered on his amateur equipment in October 2014. At the same time, the Canon EOS Rebel XS camera did not even attach to the telescope, but worked with a simple Nikon 300 mm telephoto, bought on eBay for $ 92 (plus an adapter for $ 17).
Iris software was used for photo processing. The diagram shows that the average change in brightness during the passage of the planet (transit) is very close to the estimated 28 millimetons.
Although amateur astronomers have been using digital cameras for about 15 years, but recently the cost of the necessary equipment has dropped to a very low value. This is good news, because large telescopes cannot cover the entire area of ​​visible space themselves.
But lately the situation seems to be changing. For example, amateur astronomer David Schneider (David Schneider) with the help of the usual DSLR was able to observe the planet 63 light years from Earth !
Schneider Camera
')
A digital camera is just one of the elements of the “tracker” that Schneider designed on the Arduino board with a stepper motor and a few details from an inkjet printer. The design is fixed on a plywood stand.
The basic idea is to track the target star system for a long period of time. In this case, the camera gradually rotates after the star system, compensating for the rotation of the Earth. The camera takes pictures with long exposures.Schneider chose the star HD 189733 to observe. It is relatively bright, though not visible to the naked eye.
During the initial camera focus, the nearby Dumbbell Nebula is used as a guide.Schneider tried to discover the planet HD 189733 b , discovered in 2005. Such “hot Jupiter” planets are easier for others to notice, because due to their size and gravity, the briskness of the parent star noticeably decreases when the planet passes between it and the Earth. In particular, with the passage of HD 189733 b, the star's brightness decreases by 2.6%, i.e. the difference is 28 millimeters.
It was such a short-term "fading" of the star's light that Schneider registered on his amateur equipment in October 2014. At the same time, the Canon EOS Rebel XS camera did not even attach to the telescope, but worked with a simple Nikon 300 mm telephoto, bought on eBay for $ 92 (plus an adapter for $ 17).
Iris software was used for photo processing. The diagram shows that the average change in brightness during the passage of the planet (transit) is very close to the estimated 28 millimetons.
Although amateur astronomers have been using digital cameras for about 15 years, but recently the cost of the necessary equipment has dropped to a very low value. This is good news, because large telescopes cannot cover the entire area of ​​visible space themselves.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/364441/
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