Estimating Tether Magnitudes

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In a previous life I was a variable star observer, mostly with binoculars. 
 I observed eclipsing binaries, cepheids and long period 'Mira type' stars. 
 One of the techniques that I used often was to compare the surface 
brightness of the out of focus disks of stars.

It should be possible to do the same with the tether.  This would not 
necessarily give the same results as photometric or CCD measurements, but a 
comparison of the surface brightness of the out of focus tether with the 
surface brightness of equally out of focus reference star images would 
probably give reproducible results that would at least be quantified.  One 
pitfall of this method is that it is sensitive to the colors of stars so it 
would be best to use reference stars that are about the same color as each 
other, and if possible the tether.  To do this right would require that all 
observers use the same reference star series.

I will take a crack at this if I get another look at the tether.

Stephen

SThompson@esiusa.com

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