Hamilton Spectrograph Observations and Data Reduction

This is a package put together by Jason X. Prochaska, Joe Hennawai, and Scott Burles to reduce spectra from a number of instruments.

There is a specific set of procedures for the Hamilton spectrograph part of this larger package. To use it, you need IDL and to follow these directions

Beyond your data, two calibrations are required. A third calibration is suggested.

1. Optional pixel flats - see our instructions here. Note that these instructions do not match the ones on the Hamilton's webpage. Beyond opening the slit to cover a larger portion of the detector, these instructions defocus the instrument. If you are going to do this, do it before any other observations.
2. Arc calibrations - a set of exposures open and a set of exposures with the BG12 filter
3. Trace flats - two set of flats taken with the same decker as your data, one set with the BG12 filter and one set with the BG13 filter

The usual steps in data reduction for a spectrometer are all bundled into one wrapper file called hamspec_pipeline.pro, discussed in further detail here. The only preparation work required is that the data must be in a subdirectory called Raw. The pipeline is run by hamspec_pipeline,'Path_to_parent_directory_of_Raw'. In principle, every step will be done in the correct order, yielding one-dimensional extractions of the final two-dimensional spectra.

To co-add multiple observations requires a second step.