Correcting things ...
No posts the last days because monday was a holiday and tuesday, yesterday and most of today fixing the whole catalogue for a cluster because FORS WCS is not precise in geometry. Yes, don't trust it, it's terrible and gets worst in the borders of the image ... blah. Now things match and are fine!
Lesson learned. First correct WCS (by default, even if you think it's OK) and then reduce the data!!
Now digging the old photometry, already done, for another cluster!
Part science, part computer stuff
Yesterday I managed to do some science at night. Which I finished today with a k-corrected version of the magnitudes and a final table produced for one more cluster. NEXT coming ...
About computer stuff, today I was suppose to print all forms, have all the invoices and get all the signatures. Not that simple. The uni has this agreement with DELL, but I found out at the last minute that this webpage gives the prices without taxes ... pretty clear for a native German, but not for me ... also appears a delivery fee (also unexpected ...).
Whatever ... done, let's see on tuesday how it goes (monday is a holiday).
Long weekend of science and rest!
No science yet ...
A totally non-productive day today (for science matters).
In principle solved my "mobility" problem. Found a bike to replace the stolen one ... That took me the morning.
The afternoon was used in computer issues to use what's left of a project's budget. But the burocracy makes it more complicated. If it's not both at DELL than we need 3 invoces with prices, including the one of DELL showing it's more expensive (which is the case) or a justification "why not a DELL one".
Tried to get in contact with COMPAQ (now HP) to get a new battery to Bodo's laptop ... impossible, german with a very strong accent is out of my capacity to understand the language and endless phone menus that take you to a message saying "all the information can be found at http://..." (and it's not true) are out of my pacience limits ... so we're gonna do that tomorrow, a native german speaker and me with more hours of sleep and an improved pacience load ...
Now going home with the data to work there a bit more and also read something
K-corrected
So, details finished, tables finished, all organized and k-correction terms estimated. Tomorrow finish the k-correction for this cluster, prepare the table and it's over (by now) ... back to some small issues in the previous one and then a new one, that will be much faster.
Also today checking computer stuff. We have to finish end up a projects computer budget until the end of the month. So deciding what to get!
Naive mistake ...
Yes, I did a naive mistake ... I reduced the whole four filters FORS1 archive retrival, degrade to the worst seeing and calculated everything before checking the seeing of the one filter FORS2 archive retrival ... it was worst (incredible, since the worst for the first part was already bad enough) ... so, had to repeat all the color information analysis. Now it's ready. Just need to do some small adjustments ...
Good! Now, home!
Now at the point I was yesterday!?!?!?!?!?
Almost like this! It would be bettet "at the point I thought I was yesterday".
Photometry done for the list of objects I had. The point is that was the list for the newest run, there was also the list for the old run ... which had to be properly digged and checked. Once confirmed, the proceedure would be plain and quit. It was, despite the fact that SExtractor didn't detect 6 of the object. For many different reasons.
So the day was finding the reason and making it detect the objects! All done, so now I AM at the point I should be. Now next run to have an extra filter and better spectral fitting.
Also a meeting with Bodo, to trace some directive on short term doubts and our group meeting, where Miguel Verdugo showed the progress on the last stages of his thesis!! It's almost there!!
Now something ...
So, yesterday I was feeling quite bad and spent the day double-checking some key points on the photometry of the previous cluster and some progress on the new cluster. Today I changed my mind about reducing the second set of images before closing the first one.
So first run is closed. Calibration, objects detection and photometry and target objects identification finished, with a final catalogue with magnitudes and colors. Now it's just waiting for the second run and for the results of the spectroscopy, which will be added tomorrow.
So, despite still be feeling sick, a productive day ... btw, today is a holiday here in Germany :-)))
A day with not so many things ...
Went to the city-hall early, in order not to wait much and it has worked! 20 minutes and was back home ... wet because of the rain. Then went out, in the rain to try to get a new city bike ... 4 places and no luck ... nothing in town for used bikes my size and with gears ... I'll have to wait!
I may be getting sick, or is the change of the weather (to bad one) but couldn't work today, feeling sick ... only at night I managed to do something useful. Did the final combined images and convolved the 4 filters to the same seeing. Now all set to analyse.
To keep on working on my notebook I had to start installing things, like Skycat, and try to make my external disk compatible with my notebook and my notebook compatible with my desktop at work ... working on that now ...
A day with many things ...
Today was not a "scientifically" productive day ...
I had to go to the city-hall to ask for my new visa, 'cos I'll have the last part of my DLR contract from July to January, but after a quite long wait they asked for an extra paper there (new person in this department, new documents required ...). Now I'll have to come back tomorrow.
Then pick up my new HD. Then check some places about bikes, since I have to buy a new one, 'cos mine was stolen 3 weeks ago ... then get to work, install the new disk, fill the city-hall forms, get all the new papers copied ... than a bit of science at work and at home ...
The weekend activity and today's science was checking the photometry of each of the single frames and of the combined one, so that the zero-points can be calculated as accurately as possible, and bad images that passed the first cliping can be detected and deleted from the combining list.
That is over ... a pass that requires some time, and it's very borring, but it's important to do :-)
Late for friday - reprocessing and buying paperwork
Late for friday (with the 11:59 PM convention ...).
thursday I was not feeling very well ... checked on friday some of the stuff I did that day and didn't like the result, so decided to the process a good part of the work, now I'm sure it's right.
Part of the day was taken by computed burocracy (how to pay the store that sell's us parts, since the university changed the rules to by things outside of the DELL agreement), contacting the store to check if the old hard disk was still in the waranty time (it was not) and checking the retrieved backup for the damaged disk. All set ...
A short group meeting talking about the computer problem and about meetings and conferences for this year.
Basically that. Monday I'll have my new hard disk, so that I can have the whole set of mages and process them locally all at once. The weekend promisses work on the images and some reading also.
over-refining ...
Over-refining somethings is bad!! I was doing it today ... again!
Trying to refine image matching, bumped into IRAF meaningless error messages and took me a while and two computers to figure out the problem (not the reason of it, just how to go around it). Problem "solved" got to the conclusion that the fits I had couldn't be improved ... OK, gotta live with it.
So! First set (FORS1) images combined, now checking quality. Tomorrow more on quality and FORS2 (far less images and filters, so it will be quick tomorrow). Wanna end tomorrow with the final images combined and if possible with objects detected! Let's see.
The day started with a talk from one of the institute students about numerical simulations of pop III stars ... they show stability of the system and pulsation modes. Interesting work ...
Also disk problem solved for Bodo's machine, backup restored, all set!
Still with it ...
Still with the image reduction ... trying to be as automatic as possible, but also gotta check things ... some bad weather images and a "special" remark to the LOUSY flatfielding ESO sent for this set. Different runs, different flats and the best one is LOUSY!!! Fortunatelly I'm not looking for ICL in those images!!!
Also solving technical and burocratic issues ... One of the HDs from Bodo's machine is dead ... since he's not here, I'm in charge of taking care of that ... easy task: call the store and order one ... yep, but not with the burocracy we have here to buy stuff ... and I skept at least 50% of it.
Also solving house problems with the landlord ... grrrrrrr
Still in basic data reduction
Rushy day! Basic data reduction day!!
Also spent some time getting into the RSS feed world ... took me time, but will save me more than that in time ... and is cool!
Basic data reduction ...
Weekend kind of busy writing a section for our group's paper on velocity fields ...
A discussion about some checks on Miguel Verdugo's results led us to the obvious conclusions ... they are right! Great!
Basic data reduction. Carefully checking the proper bias and flats for each of the night and each of the filters of my "lovely" huge archive run! I'd really love to have a script for that, but there's no standard on the headers. Different "ages" different standards ... so, it goes by hand! It's time consuming, but I can be sure of what it happening!
Tomorrow that ends and the data reduction itself starts!
Also checking some administrative issues and updating all the anti-virus, anti-spy and anti-whatever on the notebook ...
Done with tables!
Finished the tables about the images from ESO and their calibrations. Also prepared the tables for all the runs I had (since I was on that anyway).
Weekend task, my section on our paper and more reading!
Also today some discussion about the M/L given by kcorrect. The question is why the masses are around 10^9-10 M_sol for galaxies with 10^12 L_sol!?!?!?!?!? Figuring it out!!
More on tables!
More ping pong with Elif Kutdemir about the k-correction and a nice conversation by phone with R. Peletier about it, hope the problem in their side is solved.
More discussion with Miguel Verdugo about the k-correction of his data also, we got to the need of error bars on the reprojected magnitudes and colors ... his working on that.
Tables for the paper finished, gotta write my section on this to monday ...
More on the FORS images on the very last of the day due to a medical appointment that took me two hours in the middle of the afternoon. The good thing on the appointment is that I manage to carefully read half of the first paper on ICL from Krick et al ... nice work, very carefully done! Comments when I finish reading paper II.
Now theater ...
Long Weekend + Tables day + fine corrections day ...
So! Back from the long weekend!
Sunday was the Tour d'Energie, an amateur bike race that happens here in Goettingen before the arrival of the last stage of the Niedersachsen Rundfahrt (Tour of the Lower Saxony). Our race had 50 or 80 km, I raced the 80 km, the same as last year and finished in 3:02:36, so that my goals were accomplished: being better than last year! :-)) Last year I did it in 3:24:..., so 22 minutes faster. Not only the time was better, but the technical side was much better, so that I've learn something durring the year of training. For next year I have to reduce the amount of water I need to the race (go from 3.5 bottles to 2 bottles) so that I don't have to stop to get water and save a couple of minutes with it. The goal in the beginning of the winter was doing it in less then 3 hours ... considering that the race had actually 81.5 km, the 80 km were finished in a bit less than 3 hours, so that this goal was also accomplished! hehehehehe The whole story will be soon in
Bikes and Coffee.Today was a day of working in tables to organize the large amount of data I've got from ESO archive, about one of our clusters and start reducing it (reducing is faster than understanding what ESO sends you in a data request ...).
The fine correction part of the day was to do a fine kcorrection to the "precise" redshift of each of our galaxies in the "finished" cluster based on the new spectra and not in the old one. So that all the tables for this clusters were updated and now everything is fine :-)))
Some discussion with Miguel Verdugo about k-correction and Fukugita tables. He'll find some information about it and we'll hopefully keep on the topic tomorrow.
In addition to that, some "ping-pong" e-mails with Elif Kutdemir, one of our PhD students that is spending some time in Gronningen, that will continue tomorrow.
Also got a very nice reply from Michael Blanton about M/L passbands and kcorrect, where the M/L are given in the input filter set (in rest frame) and I wanted to know a way to do it in the "output" filter set. Thanks for the reply! Tomorrow I'll send a couple of extra questions about our strange M/L results to a multi-redshift sample of galaxies. I hope Mike can shed some light in this issue!
