ESO photometric and astrometric analysis program for Adaptive Optics

ESO is developing an array of software analysis packages to perform Photometry and Astrometry on both stellar and diffuse objects observed with Adaptive Optics (AO) Systems. Element programs of this ESO-PAAPAO will be made available to AO observers using ADONIS and the AO systems being developed for the 8.2 meter VLT telescopes at Paranal. The performance of the ESO-PAAPAO will be extensively quantified, both to support data analysis and as a guide for the formulation of AO observing strategies. We address the objectives of the ESO-PAAPAO, the calibrated ADONIS data sets which have been collected for distribution to contributors to the ESO-PAAPAO program, and the methods and results of comparisons among various packages, particularly, the STARFINDER program developed at the University of Bologna in collaboration with ESO which has been used on data from ADONIS at La Silla, UHAO at Mauna Kea, and HST. Results of this astronomical AO data analysis are presented, i.e. photometric precision of 0.03 magnitudes, astrometric precision of 0.1 pixel in crowded fields.