Australian Astronomy Pics--A Question?

[gvstn]

So I just saw these beautiful pics over at Buzzfeed. http://www.buzzfeed.com/jemimaskelley/these-stunning-photos-of-the-milky-way-will-give-you-chills

I think I understand that he is taking a picture with just a camera (not telescope) of the night sky and then adding a day light view of the terrain below the sky to help orient the viewer.

My question is do some parts of Australia give views like this to a regular camera or more precisely do people looking up at the sky see anything near this detail? I'm neither a photographer or astronomer but can't believe you could see something like this with the naked eye.





Over at the photographer's site he gives details about his technique that are above my head but basically setting shutter speeds and leaving the exposure open for 30 seconds. I hope someone can explain if there is a huge difference between this type of photograph and what the human eye can see looking at that same sky. The photographer mentions light pollution becoming a problem but he would be crying if he looked up at my local nighttime sky.

Thanks for any insight!

[bananas]

1. The desert sky is amazing. nt

[jberryhill]

2. Yes the sky really looks like that

There's a high plateu area on the North Island of New Zealand I was passing through once, and it was the first time I saw a dry austral sky, and I was overwhelmed. Yeah, it looks like that.

The constellations are a little hard to pick out, because the zillions of stars are collectively so bright that the structure of the galactic dust clouds is the most obvious interesting feature.

I finally picked out what looked like Orion's Belt, and then picked out the rest of what looked just like Orion - but it was upside down! And it suddenly hit me and I was shouting, "Look! Look! Orion is upside down!"

Just blew me away. Yeah. It looks like that.

[gvstn]

5. Thanks.

I know the stars are a lot less bright here then when I was a kid (40 years ago) but couldn't imagine even in a less light-polluted and smog free space you could actually see something more than numerous stars that looked closer (which I remember from my youth). I never saw any of these larger entities and always thought they were available only to space telescopes.

I still can't wrap my mind around it.

[jberryhill]

6. You can stare at it for hours...

...and never wrap your mind around it.

[bananas]

10. The Milky Way and the Zodiacal Light are both visible in dark areas

Here's a description from February:

[bananas]

11. It can take a half hour or more for night vision adaptation

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adaptation_%28eye%29

<snip>

The human eye can function from very dark to very bright levels of light; its sensing capabilities reach across nine orders of magnitude. This means that the brightest and the darkest light signal that the eye can sense are a factor of roughly 1,000,000,000 apart. However, in any given moment of time, the eye can only sense a contrast ratio of one thousand. What enables the wider reach is that the eye adapts its definition of what is black.

The eye takes approximately 20–30 minutes to fully adapt from bright sunlight to complete darkness and become ten thousand to one million times more sensitive than at full daylight. In this process, the eye's perception of color changes as well (this is called the Purkinje effect). However, it takes approximately five minutes for the eye to adapt to bright sunlight from darkness. This is due to cones obtaining more sensitivity when first entering the dark for the first five minutes but the rods take over after five or more minutes.[1]

Dark adaptation is far quicker and deeper in young people than the elderly. [2]

<snip>

Rods, whose photopigments regenerate more slowly, do not reach their maximum sensitivity for about half an hour.[1][5] Cones take approximately 9–10 minutes to adapt to the dark.[1]

<snip>

Inhibition by neurons also affects activation in synapses...a strong stimulus of 100 rods equivalent to a weak stimulus of 1,000 rods.

<snip>



1. Dark Light
... Sensitivity is limited by neural noise. ...

2. Square Root Law
This part of the curve is limited by quantal fluctuation in the background. ...

3. Weber's Law
Threshold increases with background luminance proportional to the square root of the background.[12]

4. Saturation
At saturation, the rod system becomes unable to detect the stimulus. ...

<snip>

The fovea is blind to dim light (due to its cone-only array) and the rods are more sensitive, so a dim star on a moonless night must be viewed from the side, so it stimulates the rods.

<snip>

[JHB]

3. Yes, there's a huge difference

Your eyeballs can only see light as it reaches them. A photograph with a long exposure time can collect all the light that comes in over the exposure time. This lets faint sources "build up" light on the film or CCD, enough so that they can bee seen in the sort of vivid detail that appears in the photos.

Also, since it's a long view and the exposure time is only 30 seconds, those landscapes are probably not superimposed, they're the real thing in the shot. That time-span is short enough that the angular change (due to the Earth's rotation) wouldn't be all that much.

The ones where the hills look like they're in daylight are probably moonlit, and the faint illumination over the exposure time builds up to something that looks close to daylight.

EDITED TO ADD after reading jberryhill's reply#2: OK, viewing conditions are a lot better in those remote areas, so the difference isn't as huge as it would be elsewhere, but the photos still have more detail than you could pick out with your eyes. They're simply able to gather more of the light.

[gvstn]

7. Thanks. The photographer said something about it being better than human eyes.

It is all above my head but you might enjoy a read through his nightscape photography 101 http://www.mikesalway.com.au/nightscape-photography-101-intro/

You seem to understand the concept already. I'm going to read through a bit more tomorrow to see about the daylight vs. moonlight scenario.

I enjoy astronomy about planets and moons but these larger groupings have always eluded me. I just see a sort of blob but am still fascinated that one might see something like that with a camera or crude telescope.

[nadinbrzezinski]

4. Yes, it has to do with a tripod, likely a remote trigger

and very long exposures, as well as low to none light pollution.

And yes, I am a photog, but I have not done anything like that. I just know the theory. My job is photo journalism. That said, I tried, and barely succeeded, at a photo of the moon during the eclipse. Hey, hopefully clear skies, for the next try.

You can find areas like that in the South West of the United States, but Australia has a unique view of the milky way.

[gvstn]

9. Thanks.

Good luck with your next eclipse photos!

I've been to New Mexico and seen clearer skies and "closer" stars but will be putting more remote areas on my bucket list. I want to see something like this (or at least close to this) with my own two eyes. Australia may be a pipe dream and too many "creatures" for my taste but I really do want to see a clear night sky again to gain some perspective.

[bananas]

8. There's a new meteor shower in two weeks, and it may storm.

This would be a good opportunity to see what the night sky really looks like.

It's the evening of Friday, May 23, here's info: http://meteor.seti.org/

This website combines weather service cloud models, light pollution, and other info to predict viewing conditions at many locations used by local astronomers: http://cleardarksky.com/csk/coverage.html

Here's a description of how light pollution affects viewing: http://cleardarksky.com/lp/Ottawalp.html?Mn=science