My Equipment:

My Software

I usually use the following programs which interact together
to control the telescope and CCD camera remotely:

ACP - for remote control of the observatory

ACP Planner - to create plans for imaging

Maxim DL - for CCD imaging

AstroMC - control of dome - synced rotation and shutters

I have always been interested in astronomy and around 15 years ago I bought a 10 inch MeadeRCX400 telescope and an SBIG CCD camera and built a sliding roof observatory in the back yard of my house. Here is a link to a web site with some of my astroimages taken using the RCX400 telescope. Light pollution from Los Angeles is a real problem but the site itself is fairly free of local light pollution and sometimes I can even see a few stars with my eyes! But long exposures do a wonder.

I recently bought an Exploradome to replace the sliding roof observatory. The 8 ft diameter dome sits on a 10 ft x 10 ft aluminum frame. See here for the construction details. The dome is motorized and the rotation is synced to the slewing of the telescope. The installation has proved somewhat challenging and is still in progress. Learning how to use a GEM telescope versus my old Alt-Az telescope is still challenging.

I switched from Starry Night to The Sky X for the planetarium program. It is much more powerful with many more features. I alsohad to learn several new programs - PWI to use the Hendrick Focuser built into the telescope, AstroMC to run the movement of the dome, ACCP to run the Planwave telescope, The SkyX planetarium program. Everything is run by the ACP program.

My Software

I recently wrote a Blog entitled "Existential Angst" describing my Astronomy experiences.