The MMT all-sky camera

T. E. Pickering

doi:10.1117/12.672508

23 June 2006 The MMT all-sky camera

T. E. Pickering

Proceedings Volume 6267, Ground-based and Airborne Telescopes; 62671A (2006) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.672508
Event: SPIE Astronomical Telescopes + Instrumentation, 2006, Orlando, Florida , United States

Abstract

The MMT all-sky camera is a low-cost, wide-angle camera system that takes images of the sky every 10 seconds, day and night. It is based on an Adirondack Video Astronomy StellaCam II video camera and utilizes an auto-iris fish-eye lens to allow safe operation under all lighting conditions, even direct sunlight. This combined with the anti-blooming characteristics of the StellaCam's detector allows useful images to be obtained during sunny days as well as brightly moonlit nights. Under dark skies the system can detect stars as faint as 6th magnitude as well as very thin cirrus and low surface brightness zodiacal features such as gegenschein. The total hardware cost of the system was less than $3500 including computer and framegrabber card, a fraction of the cost of comparable systems utilizing traditional CCD cameras.

Citation Download Citation

T. E. Pickering "The MMT all-sky camera", Proc. SPIE 6267, Ground-based and Airborne Telescopes, 62671A (23 June 2006); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.672508

ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE

INSTITUTIONAL
Select your institution to access the SPIE Digital Library.

SELECT YOUR INSTITUTION

PERSONAL
Sign in with your SPIE account to access your personal subscriptions or to use specific features such as save to my library, sign up for alerts, save searches, etc.

PERSONAL SIGN IN

No SPIE Account? Create one

PURCHASE THIS CONTENT

SUBSCRIBE TO DIGITAL LIBRARY

50 downloads per 1-year subscription

Members: $195

Non-members: $335 ADD TO CART

25 downloads per 1 - year subscription

Members: $145

Non-members: $250 ADD TO CART

PURCHASE SINGLE ARTICLE

Includes PDF, HTML & Video, when available