Dark Energy Survey » Science Verification

h1. SV Notes for MJD 56236 (starting evening of November 4)

h2. Observers

| *Observer 1* | *Observer 2* | *Run Manager* | *SISPI Expert on Call*| *Eyeball Squad*|

| Soares Santos | Depoy | Soares Santos | Honscheid | Romer |

h2. DECam Configuration and Setup

|SISPI Configuration File|  *sv.ini*|

|DECam constants |*DECAM:CURRENT*|

|Proposal ID| *2012B-0003*|

|Image Processing (Calibration)| *NCSA*|

|Image Processing (First Cut)|*NCSA*|

h2. Almanac

Twilight ends 21:34, middle of night to hand over to community SV at 01:26

Moonrise at 23:24, 84% illuminated, 54 degrees away from our Mini-Survey field on Stripe 82.

h2. Weather Conditions 

* [[Tololo Weather Links]]

h2. Observing Plan and Goals for the Night

# [[Calibration_Observations|Standard bias and dome flat]] sequence during afternoon

# Please try to get dome open for temperature equilibration at earliest appropriate time, be sure all cooling/ventilation systems are on.

This plan is with the expectation that guiding and tracking are both too poor to obtain any meaningful long exposures.  If the guiding/tracking issues are resolved, we can revert to the [[SV_11_2]] plan of obtaining SN Template observations in good conditions.

Monitor Conditions:

# Check on DIMM status, running if at all possible.

# Make sure RASICAM is online if weather conditions permit.

# A few times per night ask the operator to contact the other telescopes on Tololo to get their seeing value. Record those in the eLog.

If *good*  conditions - sky is clear or thin clouds, and seeing is <=1.4":

# [[Calibration_Observations|Photometric standards]] sequence as soon as dark enough (grizY in 3 fields at different airmasses,  preferably one at X < 1.25, one at X = 1.25-1.65 and one at X > 1.65).  Follow link for the suggested fields and scripts.  Douglas suggests standards can begin 30 min before astronomical twilight.  

# Repeat standards hourly if the night is photometric, ask for as many in AM hours as Dara is willing to provide.

# [[Star_Flat_Observations|StarFlat sequences]] of 20 wide dithers in each grY (g and r first, with Moon down).  Move to lowest accessible Galactic latitude (b>=10 degrees) to increase stellar density w/o crowding.  Should take ~20 x (80+30)s = 37 min per filter, ~3 hrs total.

# [[Polar_Axis|Polar Axis]] determination exposures.

# If seeing is <1.1" and reasonably stable, take series of [[Alignment_Observations]] in i band to check relative focus of science array and F/A chips, and to characterize PSF response to motion in all degrees of freedom on hexapod.

If *poor* conditions - thicker clouds and/or seeing >1.4"

# [[Calibration_Observations|Photometric standards]] at evening and 1:10 AM  if thin clouds or clear

# Take [[Star_Flat_Observations|StarFlat sequence]]  if thin clouds or clear

# [[Polar_Axis|Polar Axis]] determination

# DECal sweeps that were not completed during commissioning

h2. Notes from the 4PM Meeting and Additional Comments

h2. Notes from Observers

Here is "Night Summary":http://decam03.fnal.gov:8080/nightsum/nightsum-56236/nightsum.html

h2. Notes on Analyses of Night's Data: