Country vs City

[Peter Ward]

Testing some new glass, I thought this comparison between light polluted vs dark skies was interesting.... I know the sky RA's don't match, but hope to get the Milky way at the zenith...in a dark sky... with this lens soon

http://www.atscope.com.au/BRO/galleyOS11.html

[renormalised (Carl)]

It's ridiculous, the amount of wasted light we're throwing skywards...and they whine about CO2 emissions!!!. Put in the right lighting and then light things intelligently and we might get halfway back to having skies in our cities like our dark sites. At least have a visible Milky Way.

[dugnsuz (Doug)]

Absolutely beautifully illustrative comparison Peter.

I'm very lucky in my semi-rural location.

Doug

[Mighty_oz (Marcus)]

Very nice, same exposure times?

[alexch (Alex)]

Lots of stars on the dark sky image, is it the mighty 8mm Nikkor fisheye showing off the 130mm of aperture?

How does the new lens deal with coma at the edges?

Cheers,
Alex

[SkyViking (Rolf)]

Originally Posted by renormalised

It's ridiculous, the amount of wasted light we're throwing skywards...and they whine about CO2 emissions!!!. Put in the right lighting and then light things intelligently and we might get halfway back to having skies in our cities like our dark sites. At least have a visible Milky Way.

Exactly. Last year here in Auckland the local council encouraged submissions to new district plans. They were asking the local residents what features made the area unique and valuable etc. I of course submitted a letter pointing out the (relatively) dark skies we enjoy in the Waitakere Ranges due to low levels of street lighting, even though we are only 20mins from Auckland CBD. I explained how reducing light pollution also saves energy and benefits nocturnal wildlife etc.
A while later they mailed me a copy of the resulting district plans, and amazingly the dark skies is now written into the plan as a unique feature which future legislation must aim to preserve!
I'd have thought in general nobody else really cared about this, but was positively surprised.

[OneOfOne (Trevor)]

Originally Posted by SkyViking

Exactly. Last year here in Auckland the local council encouraged submissions to new district plans. They were asking the local residents what features made the area unique and valuable etc. I of course submitted a letter pointing out the (relatively) dark skies we enjoy in the Waitakere Ranges due to low levels of street lighting, even though we are only 20mins from Auckland CBD. I explained how reducing light pollution also saves energy and benefits nocturnal wildlife etc.
A while later they mailed me a copy of the resulting district plans, and amazingly the dark skies is now written into the plan as a unique feature which future legislation must aim to preserve!
I'd have thought in general nobody else really cared about this, but was positively surprised.

I think because you pointed out things that were not "selfish", ie. "I am an astronomer, I would like you to keep my skies dark". Dark skies are just a side effect of reducing the amount of energy wasted on inefficient lighting (pointing skywards or widely distributed). I think you are more likely to get a positive response if you concentrate more on where it hurts, the hip pocket! We don't leave any external lighting on at home, not to preserve the night sky, but to preserve a little money.

[multiweb (Marc)]

Pretty dramatic example... Didn't realise it was that bad. Oh well, there is always narrow band.

[desler]

Spectacular comparison. In the last six Months they've put in new street lighting and cleaned all the old ones in my neighborhood, the difference is quite dramatic, but not as bad as the orange high density lighting the use on the new freeway to the north, what a pain!

Nicely done Peter.


Darren

[Peter Ward]

Originally Posted by alexch

Lots of stars on the dark sky image, is it the mighty 8mm Nikkor fisheye showing off the 130mm of aperture?

How does the new lens deal with coma at the edges?

Cheers,
Alex

At F2.8 there is some edge coma, but at F4 it looks pretty tight across the field

The Nikkor is proving to be interesting with my Canon 5DmkII....the adapter has a little bit of slop which is showing up as a tad of focus asymmetry...but I suspect a thin shim/washer will be a workable fix short of buying a Nikon 3d

[Paul Haese]

Great demonstration of the extremes of lighting and the complex problem that currently exists for city dwellers.

[telecasterguru (Frank)]

Peter,

A very good demonstration of the issue of light pollution.

Frank

[StephenM (Stephen)]

A very interesting comparison Peter. And I love the dark sky image!

Cheers,
Stephen

[DavidU (Dave)]

A great illustration Peter. If you did that at my place it would be a lot worse than that.