Gee, hasn't this turned into a great thread?
Alexander's post makes a lot of sense, and actually Atmos' post stirred a memory: when I was in my early 20s I had a Tasco 4" or 4.5" newt, and I remember the Jewel box being one of my favourite if not the favourite targets. It was vivid with colour. I loved it. I don't recall ever seeing colour in orion.
Fast forward 20 years of the Tasco collecting dust, I acquire a 10" then a 14" and I'm DSO hunting every few days
... But the jewel box is a bitter disappointment.
I have been putting it down to open clusters not being good targets in the bigger scopes. But realistically with the 35mm Panoptic, the magnification would be on par with the 20mm in the old newt and besides the TVs all have better True fov, light transmission etc etc. I can't do a side by side comparison as I gave the Tasco away on the eve of acquiring the 10", but now come to think of it perhaps the lack of colour may well be the fact that I'm in my mid 40s.
this would confirm Alex's point about male vision.
Luckily for me my night vision is as good as ever. I can see the deep fuzzies pretty well.
Cheers all.
P.s. Great post Colin , I love stories of those magic moments.
still great post Colin, but I had actually meant to reference Brendon's post here not Colin's. My bad