Really, REALLY, dumb Question

[inVINCeable]

This question flies so far below all the other topics I've seen in the last day I've been perusing but it's something I've always wanted to know. Consider this an idiot's disclaimer. I'm not even an amateur, just a dude who likes learning what he can, when he can. All that being said...

A lot of the images that you see of space (nebulae, galaxies, etc...) are in pretty amazing color. I've always assumed this was something added on to the original image just to make it look better. However, only some of the pictures note them as "false-color". I'm curious what the true nature of the majority of space photos are. Do they mostly come in the black and white spectrum while only a few show true color? If anyone happens to have a link to an article about this subject, I'd be interested to read it.

Thanks in advance for your time and sorry to bother you,
Tim

[Amir]

try this:
http://hubblesite.org/gallery/behind_th ... _of_color/
it's not a dumb question it's been a year since i know the answer, and not everybody even know that those are false colors in many images.
as Chris explained somewhere else before, when you observe celestial objects there isn't enough light provided for your eyes to see the object in color. but when you capture that object with a camera or CCD in long exposures, the colors appear.
even some images are combination of different wavelengths (infrared + visible + ultraviolet for example) with different telescopes.

[Guest]

Super neat Amir,

Thanks for the link and explanation!

Tim

[wonderboy]

It is slightly misleading really. I always thought that most of the pictures on there were real colour. I'm absolutely gutted now . Some of the greatest pictures I have ever witnessed have been partly because of their colour. There was on picture of a nebula which looked like it had daylight inside it, the light couldn't escape because the dust from the nebula trapped it in. I thought it was amazing until now . That blue light is probably brown or something.


Paul



Apparently (if it intErests you) the overall colour of the universe is Beige. Thats right..... Beige.

[Chris Peterson]

It is slightly misleading really. I always thought that most of the pictures on there were real colour. I'm absolutely gutted now :(. Some of the greatest pictures I have ever witnessed have been partly because of their colour. There was on picture of a nebula which looked like it had daylight inside it, the light couldn't escape because the dust from the nebula trapped it in. I thought it was amazing until now :(. That blue light is probably brown or something.

Most of the APOD deep sky images approximate true color. Most of those that don't are made through various narrow band filters designed to show the elemental makeup of the object, and are identified as being false color. I don't know how this makes the pictures any less amazing.

Apparently (if it intrests you) the overall colour of the universe is Beige. Thats right..... Beige.

But that's about as interesting as realizing that the overall color of all the paints used by artists is beige. It may be true, but there are still thousands of masterpieces hanging on museum walls.

[wonderboy]

So the trifid nebula is pretty close to real life colours? If it is its amazing. It does genuinely look like sky in there! I wanna go there and see what the deal is. But alas, it is impossible.

Paul.

[Chris Peterson]

So the trifid nebula is pretty close to real life colours? If it is its amazing. It does genuinely look like sky in there! I wanna go there and see what the deal is. But alas, it is impossible.

Which Trifid image are you talking about? This one is made with true colors; this one maps the emissions of hydrogen, nitrogen, and oxygen to red, green, and blue; this one maps infrared wavelengths to visible ones.

IMO, all the images are beautiful- each in its own way.

[wonderboy]

It was this one that I was talking about

Gutted its not the true colour one. You are right though, they are all beautiful in their own way, but its now not one of my favourite APODS .

It doesn't do it for me as much as that volcano picture lol


Paul