Nice morning then nasty green experience...

[ollypenrice]

We started off about 2.00am this morning with the 20 inch Dob and 10 inch SCT. After the inevitable visit to M42 we pottered around and then got the SCT onto M46 and M47. I particularly like M46 because of the small planetary within it, NGC2438. While not bright, it was clearly visible and rather better without, rather than with, the OIII filter.

Once the clusters rose sufficiently to get to them in the Dob we went over to it and I put in the 26 Nagler. 'Doh,' I thought, 'I've left the O111 filter in.' The entire cluster was green. This struck me as odd because the filter doesn't normally turn faint stars green, just bright ones, and M46 is a delightfully powdery, small star cluster. I pulled out the eyepiece and... no OIII filter. Uh-Oh. I looked up at the stars and absolutely all of them were bright green. This was a truly horrible experience. Blinking, closing my eyes and starting again etc had no effect. I was only seeing in green. We are such visual creatures that a defect in our vision is deeply disturbing. I quickly went inside, turned the lights on, and things seemed normal. When I went back out all was well again. By the end of the night I think I still had a residual green preference but only very slight. Has anyone else had this?

Anyway, the Dob was great on M46 and the planetary was very easy. This put us in a mood for the Owl which took power very well (165x) though I always struggle to see the 'eyes' very well with or without filter.

A perfect alignment of Venus, Mars and Saturn displayed below a rising Regulus concluded the evening.

(Regulus? What, is it springtime already?  )

Olly

[laudropb]

Very nice report Olly. You have now got me seeing green with envy for your wonderful clear skies. Clouded out here for the last week.

[Mr Spock]

Never green. I've seen red a few times though...

[cotterless45]

I see green at astronomy shows,

Nick.

[PeterW]

Green is the new black. Everything is green when you use an intensifier... Makes those pesky "faint" nebulae pop up all over the place.

PeterW

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

Nice report Olly. I have never had that "green" experience, I must say

[ollypenrice]

I asked Alan Longstaff about the green experience. His main scientific life is in neurobiology and his first reaction was to ask if I'd just been looking at something red. I wonder if that might have been the Telrad. Perhpaps I had it turned up full when I went to the Dob and took an eyeful of red moments before looking at the cluster. I can't remember now.

Olly

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

That does seem a likely explanation, especially because the effect wore off

[scarp15]

 I looked up at the stars and absolutely all of them were bright green. 

Are you sure they were stars and not the erm little green men.

[Dave Lloyd]

Obviously the Bayer matrix mod in your retina is malfunctioning.

[kev]

That saves on solar continuum filter cost... (I'll get my coat)

Sent from my iPhone so excuse the typos!