Large collaborations - why don't we see any

[Robp]

Hi all,

Most collaborations I see are from two or three members but I was thinking it would be great to get a bigger collaboration together, lots of people all imaging the same target and combing there data into one pot for all to use.
So why don't we see any big collaboration projects?

I have put a couple of questions together to try and get the discussion going

1. Would you be interested in taking part in one?
2. Would there be benefits to doing this that would make it worthwhile?
3. Do the variations between setups make this a bad idea?
4. Do you prefer to protect your data and not share it with others?
5. Would you have reservations about giving someone your data to be shared to the other members of the group?
6. Is it simply because no one has tried to organise one?

Any other discussion points welcome

[Demonperformer]

It's a nice idea, but I suspect no one would really want the data that I produce under my LP skies - I would undoubtedly be one of the 'winners' from such a scheme

 

[johnrt]

Indeed, why not? Well the data has to be all of a similar quality, what am I going to add to for example Olly's data, when he is under inky black skies and I am 25 miles outside of London and trapped between large towns in every other direction. The issue then of imaging scale and equipment then comes in to play. It's certainly not impossible, but quite awkward to organise.

[Robp]

You are correct that someone in pristine black skies might not benefit from a larger collaboration. They could for instance concentrate on LRGB and allow other users from less than perfect skies provide the HA. You also might get an improvement if you took 20 hours of your own HA data and added another 40-50 hours from lesser skies?

You could try to tier the collaborations and put restrictions on what is accepted. DSLR users could have there own collaboration, people who expose for long periods of time with mono CCDs another . Or have a beginners collaboration where more experienced members will submit data specifically for beginners to integrate into there own data, offering advice and tips on how to process it.

Differing equipment and image scales would be a bit of a pain but there are ways to integrate them into single pictures. someone with a wide field rig might enjoy adding some high resolution images from someone with a larger scope.

You could even assemble the team based on equipment, each member with a different task to complete. For instance having three members that concentrate on widefield HA, three on widefield LRGB and three on widefield OIII. then another set of members producing high resolution images of specific parts of the target.