Photographic stellar photometry in the late 19th and early 20th centuries

Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astrophysics

Scientific paper

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Scientific paper

The development of photographic stellar photometry in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries is reviewed. Major pioneers in this field were the Pickerings at Harvard, who early on recognized the immense potential of photography as well as some of its inherent problems. Two huge programmes in celestial photography dominated late 19th century astronomy, the CPD and the Carte du Ciel. The problems of obtaining magnitudes from field star images were numerous, including reciprocity failure, unknown wavelength response and variable seeing. Plate calibration techniques and the use of standard stars also created new problems. Some observers preferred extrafocal images, as these gave more reliable results for brighter stars. The ill-fated North Polar Sequence and the associated International System were products of this era. The NPS originated from Harvard about 1907, was adopted by the Astrographic Congress in 1909 and (in greatly expanded form) also by the IAU at its first General Assembly in 1922, but was never able to deliver a completely reliable and transferable system of standard stellar magnitudes for use by all observers.

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