Quote:
Originally Posted by Ian Flowes
Everything seems to be in black and white....perhaps it is my eyes.
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Do you mean black and white or greyscale? Forgive me if I am covering ground that you already know, but if you mean grey scale it is your eyes, Your human eyes that cannot detect colour at low illumination. When you say it doesn't look like the photo do you mean it's not in colour? If you look at DSOs your eyes use the low light rod cells which do not encode for colour. Your daytime cone cells come in 3 populations sensitive to different wavelengths so they encode colour. The rod cells are only one population and you will only see nebulae in grey. The Great Nebula in Carina (ie the Eta Carina nebula) should be readily seen as a grey mist and with patience you can observe many dark lanes and folds therein. You should also see that Eta Carina itself appears as a golden blob more than a star. The blob bit around it is the homunculus nebula. If you observe for some time you will find much to see.
Also your rod cells are absent from the fovea, the part of your retina that is the bit illuminated when you look straight at something. You will see more in DSOs if you look a little to one side of the bit that you're interested in as this will illuminate rod cells, not the insensitive cone cells.
As I said, apologies if you're already familiar with this.