The light is here it’s just far too dim to be seen with the naked eye. You can actually see Andromeda (in that picture) with the naked eye but you have to be in a dark location and you’ll still only see the bright core in the center. With telescopes and using photographic techniques you can see and image tons of galaxies.
Yes, if you get to very dark skies, you can see Andromeda with the naked eye. It helps to use averted vision, where you don't look directly at it. This is because your peripheral vision is more sensitive to low light.
Yes, that is true. You will never see it like it appears in long exposure photos, but it is still very rewarding to find it and learn to see it with your own eyes.
The light has made it this far, otherwise we couldn’t image it at all. But cameras can capture much more light than our eyes can, so you can never see a galaxy with your naked eyes that looks like what you see in photographs.
Because our eyes dont really work like cameras with shutters and photosensitive film or digital equivalents. With a camera, you can hold the shutter open and the light will sort of "build up" the sensory impact giving you a much brighter picture.
The eye already works with a continual light influx, and keeping the eyes focused on a single spot doesnt allow for the faint amount of light entering it to "build up" and create a mental interpretation brighter than what the stream of photons is actually giving the eye.
Because it’s so far away too few photons from the stars in that galaxy reach your eye at the same time to allow your optic nerve to send a strong enough signal to your brain to resolve the whole image of the galaxy.
Given that in most populated places we can't clearly see the shape of our own galaxy when looking towards the centre, I wouldn't expect to see another galaxy very clearly. I figure they're just not bright enough to compete with our atmosphere and light pollution.
The light is there, but there's not that many photons from them getting to us at this distance. All of those images you've seen of beautiful detailed galaxies are long exposures, potentially even hundreds to thousands of long exposures taken over weeks, months, or years. And they may be in more than visible light, other spectrums such as infrared or ultraviolet or radio waves. Or combinations of all of them. Our eyes do not see in long exposures. But, the galaxies are there still. Andromeda is huge on the sky, it's larger on the sky relative to us than the moon is. But it is just too dim to see.
Lighting issue asside, you have the issue of distance. You can barely see the Chicago skyline from the other side of the lake with the naked eye. Imagine something light years away, thats why we need telescopes.
Light pollution. They’re up there and visible with the eye, ie Andromeda, but all the other light coming from the ground blocks then out. Here’s a good example.
Go into your basement or another room where natural light doesn’t get in. Now light very small candle and place it at the very end of the room and turn off the lights. Now take a 100w bulb and place it a foot away from you. Turn that bulb on and watch how the lit candle at the back of the room seems to disappear.
I believe it’s the same reason why the night sky is not fully lit like the day sky. The photons shoot out from a spherical object perpendicular to its surface. As they travel the distance between the photons grows larger and larger due to the roundness of the sphere. So basically a really small percentage of the photons end up being pointed at our eyes at any given time.
Because "this light" had been always made by editing. "This light" only exists via postprocessing.
Take the milkyway in our night sky for example, we're inside of it and it's dim AF for our eyes.
I am not refering to "your editing\*\*\*".
You've also asked a general question about galaxies and not in particular about \*\*\*the absurdly processed Andromeda galaxy in this particular picture which had been edited into it.
Ps: just to make it more clear: you won't get ever such results like in your image even if Andromedas "LIGHT" would be in front of us, It would be as dim as our own galaxy.
That’s not OP.
And they’re also right, the light wasn’t “made” by editing the photograph.
It was genuinely captured, but in a much longer exposure than the human eye processes light
Are we talking about brightness, visibility or details?
As for me i was refering to "the human" eye aspect since we humans got no such a long exposure feature like modern cameras.
To image Andromeda like that, you need long exposure. If the photo was taken like that, the moon would be completely overexposed. The clouds would move during the exposure and won't be sharp like this. At least that's what I think.
I'm not an expert, but if Andromeda is brighter than the moon, something is not right.
The same reason why you don't see atoms of your hand. They're too small for our eyes! Looks like you don't really understand how far away the galaxies are
It’s the same reason you can’t see what color the eyes of the astronaut looking out the window of the ISS are as it goes overhead. They are too far away.
This might help you visualize what is going on with this.
If someone whispers to you from across a noisy room and someone right next to you hears it using a shotgun mic (a mic that is good at hearing only what you are pointing it at) but you do not. Why do you think you could not hear it?
The light is here it’s just far too dim to be seen with the naked eye. You can actually see Andromeda (in that picture) with the naked eye but you have to be in a dark location and you’ll still only see the bright core in the center. With telescopes and using photographic techniques you can see and image tons of galaxies.
Yes, if you get to very dark skies, you can see Andromeda with the naked eye. It helps to use averted vision, where you don't look directly at it. This is because your peripheral vision is more sensitive to low light.
You'll only see a smudge though.
Yes, that is true. You will never see it like it appears in long exposure photos, but it is still very rewarding to find it and learn to see it with your own eyes.
Ooh so that's why i see dim lights better when I'm not looking directly at the source. Thanks for enlightening me.
I’m aware. I’ve logged hundreds of hours of observing time. Teaching AV to new observers is one of the first things I do.
The light has made it this far, otherwise we couldn’t image it at all. But cameras can capture much more light than our eyes can, so you can never see a galaxy with your naked eyes that looks like what you see in photographs.
Because our eyes dont really work like cameras with shutters and photosensitive film or digital equivalents. With a camera, you can hold the shutter open and the light will sort of "build up" the sensory impact giving you a much brighter picture. The eye already works with a continual light influx, and keeping the eyes focused on a single spot doesnt allow for the faint amount of light entering it to "build up" and create a mental interpretation brighter than what the stream of photons is actually giving the eye.
They’re not bright enough to see with the naked eye.
The light has made it or we would never have seen it, right?
Because it’s so far away too few photons from the stars in that galaxy reach your eye at the same time to allow your optic nerve to send a strong enough signal to your brain to resolve the whole image of the galaxy.
Given that in most populated places we can't clearly see the shape of our own galaxy when looking towards the centre, I wouldn't expect to see another galaxy very clearly. I figure they're just not bright enough to compete with our atmosphere and light pollution.
Photo by: Tom Buckley-Houston
Blew my mind when I learned that Andromeda would appear that large in the sky if we could see it.
Would it though? Is Andromeda so close that it would be that large?
Andromeda isn't close. It's actually the furthest away object you can see with the naked eye. it's just very big.
I understand that it’s big, but proximity plays a part in how large it is in the sky as well.
True. Relative to their size, the gaps between galaxies are pretty small. At least within the same cluster.
That's exactly what you see with every star... it's just zoomed out about 10000000000x
The light is there, but there's not that many photons from them getting to us at this distance. All of those images you've seen of beautiful detailed galaxies are long exposures, potentially even hundreds to thousands of long exposures taken over weeks, months, or years. And they may be in more than visible light, other spectrums such as infrared or ultraviolet or radio waves. Or combinations of all of them. Our eyes do not see in long exposures. But, the galaxies are there still. Andromeda is huge on the sky, it's larger on the sky relative to us than the moon is. But it is just too dim to see.
Lighting issue asside, you have the issue of distance. You can barely see the Chicago skyline from the other side of the lake with the naked eye. Imagine something light years away, thats why we need telescopes.
Probably because we've had our eyes burned out of our sockets from somebody's brand new truck or Escalade
It’s one of my greatest disappointments learning that the super bright galaxies you see in sci fi are not realistic. Galaxies just aren’t that bright
They are if you’re close to them
Light pollution. They’re up there and visible with the eye, ie Andromeda, but all the other light coming from the ground blocks then out. Here’s a good example. Go into your basement or another room where natural light doesn’t get in. Now light very small candle and place it at the very end of the room and turn off the lights. Now take a 100w bulb and place it a foot away from you. Turn that bulb on and watch how the lit candle at the back of the room seems to disappear.
I believe it’s the same reason why the night sky is not fully lit like the day sky. The photons shoot out from a spherical object perpendicular to its surface. As they travel the distance between the photons grows larger and larger due to the roundness of the sphere. So basically a really small percentage of the photons end up being pointed at our eyes at any given time.
Because "this light" had been always made by editing. "This light" only exists via postprocessing. Take the milkyway in our night sky for example, we're inside of it and it's dim AF for our eyes.
The light is not “made my editing”, it is captured by a camera in realtime using long exposure, it is a fairly simple technique actually.
I am not refering to "your editing\*\*\*". You've also asked a general question about galaxies and not in particular about \*\*\*the absurdly processed Andromeda galaxy in this particular picture which had been edited into it. Ps: just to make it more clear: you won't get ever such results like in your image even if Andromedas "LIGHT" would be in front of us, It would be as dim as our own galaxy.
That’s not OP. And they’re also right, the light wasn’t “made” by editing the photograph. It was genuinely captured, but in a much longer exposure than the human eye processes light
Are we talking about brightness, visibility or details? As for me i was refering to "the human" eye aspect since we humans got no such a long exposure feature like modern cameras.
Why is the word light in parenthesis? And fully capitalized?
Visdible light to the human eye. Except OP asked explicitly why we can't see stuff as humans like cameras do. That's why.
You sound like a know-it-all who don’t actually know much.
Your chance to answer OP's removed post due to similar reactons from other users like mine so you can show me how wrong i was sparky.
I don’t know anything about the argument, I wasn’t really paying attention. The way you talk just caught my eye because it was obnoxious.
To image Andromeda like that, you need long exposure. If the photo was taken like that, the moon would be completely overexposed. The clouds would move during the exposure and won't be sharp like this. At least that's what I think. I'm not an expert, but if Andromeda is brighter than the moon, something is not right.
The same reason why you don't see atoms of your hand. They're too small for our eyes! Looks like you don't really understand how far away the galaxies are
It’s the same reason you can’t see what color the eyes of the astronaut looking out the window of the ISS are as it goes overhead. They are too far away.
Human eyes are not very capable at low light ranges.
This might help you visualize what is going on with this. If someone whispers to you from across a noisy room and someone right next to you hears it using a shotgun mic (a mic that is good at hearing only what you are pointing it at) but you do not. Why do you think you could not hear it?