Getting to the stars is tough. We believe with a good idea, passion and planning we can help you achieve your designs. We offer a wide variety of services, though operating and managing optical telescopes is our focus.
- Observatory Design and Management – This is our primary focus – we offer a complete end-to-end service, from the proposal phase to purchasing, construction and installation. Night Sky Concepts can also help your organization optimize, manage and train your staff in order to maximize your observatory investment.
- Personal Observatory Consults – It’s easy to get lost in new equipment and the obscure software that is required to run it. For those that have an existing observatory and want to elevate your observing game or if you recently purchased equipment and need 1 on 1 support, we can do that as well. We offer hourly training sessions and remote support. On-site support is possible as well.
- Telescope Automation – Ready to get some sleep and wake up with more data than you have time to look at? Automation is possible, but can be daunting. We have experience with several different automated observing packages, including Voyager and ACP.
- Space surveillance / SDA / SSA – Whatever your target of observation is, whether it be stars or satellites, you have to start with a solid foundation, select the right equipment and insure that the customer receives the level of performance they expected. I have years of experience working closely with the engineering team to craft the optimal ground station for space domain operations.
- Light Pollution – Learning from what often goes wrong in municipal lighting improvement projects, Tim went all-in in Pepperell, MA. From the initial kick-off meeting, to presenting to town government, designing a streetlight demonstration featuring different lighting packages, conducting public surveys to inform key decision makers and then quantitatively assessing the outcome – we know how to avoid increases in light pollution and preserve your night sky. The end result is that Pepperell, MA has one of the most environmentally friendly streetlight programs in the country, saving 81% of our electricity and minimizing the harmful blue light in an eco-sensitive community. We are currently investigating the optimal lighting solutions for observatories.
- Classroom design and operations – Over the last 2 decades I have had the opportunity to manage several classroom spaces, particularly in the observatory, physical sciences and planetarium domain. I recently completed a state-of-the-art classroom at MIT to facilitate remote telescope observations, communications, situational awareness, outreach and education. This skill set can easily be adapted to a variety of locations, including college campuses, field sites, military bases and public science institutions and museums.