[Aavso-photometry] how many stars can I measure

[David Craft]

Hi Everyone,

As you will see, I'm completely inexperienced, not even a newbee yet.  
I'm attempting to develop an observatory program and I've discovered an 
important area of my ignorance.

Would a few knowledgeable folks please tell me how many say, magnitude 
17 stars it is reasonable to measure in one 10 hour evening?

What I would like to know is:  assuming clear skies, flawless automated 
hardware, intelligent slewing, blah blah blah, 600 minutes might give 
200 images. I imagine that  the post-processing of these images to 
develop say, 0.01 mag photometric solutions will take more than 10 
hours.  Problem is, I only have my guess, I have no knowledge regarding 
the degree of automation that may be possible or the degree of operator 
involvement required to say, match dark frames to the nightly variations 
in camera temperature and to correctly position the apertures on the images.

Please inform me about what a reasonable expectation would be for an 
experienced operator using AIP4WIN, Canopus or MIRA (anything except 
IRAF) unless someone would like to offer a compelling benefit of IRAF.  
I wish to scale my observing program properly, and I am completely 
ignorant in this area..

Thanks in advance.

Dave Craft