Lisp Propulsion Laboratory log

Paolo Amoroso's weblog. Main interests: Lisp, astronomy (Moon), space exploration (Apollo and early manned programs)

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Back from the observatory instrumentation course

Monday, November 29, 2004

The astronomical instrumentation course I attended during the past week end at the Valle d'Aosta observatory was a lot of fun. The sky was more or less veiled during both of the nights and the Moon was nearly full (being a lunar junkie, that was not so bad for me :-) But we managed to do some observations and a lot of practical activities with the instruments anyway.

The instructors were skilled and knowledgeable, both in using and building telescopes. I learnt a lot, including some non-obvious -- well, at least for me -- issues on CCD imaging. The other students were nice and fun too.

The picture below shows yours truly next to the observatory's 40 cm f/8 R-C telescope. If you mostly use small instruments, the amount of detail you get on the Moon from such a large scope is amazing.

The other Paolo in the picture (posted with his permission) is a friend of mine, who is an operator at the observatory and is also a colleague of mine at Brera. It turns out that Paolo is the most common first name among operators at the Valle d'Aosta observatory. Go figure.

	Paolo Amoroso (left) and Paolo Calcidese (right) next to the 40 cm reflector at the Valle d'Aosta astronomical observatory.