High power light illusion in the sky?

Juggernaut · Jul 8, 2008

I have always wondered this, why is it that when you shine a high power light up in to the sky and walk away from it, why does it appear to always fallow you? If I point it straight up and walk about 600 feet down the road it appears to be pointing directly at me and the beam stops right on top of me straight up, while if I walk back to my house ,or pass it the beam still seams to stop right above me.

kramer5150 · Jul 8, 2008

really?

I gotta try that some time.

light_emitting_dude · Jul 8, 2008

Same way the moon follows you at night.

climberkid · Jul 9, 2008

what kinda freaky light are you using?!?! :thinking:

Patriot · Jul 9, 2008

I've never really noticed that before. When I shine high power HIDs or the Maxabeam into the air it always just appears to go straight up to my eyes. Just like when an "Event" light is shinning around in the sky it appears to go in other directions besides just toward the observer.

StarHalo · Jul 9, 2008

It's an optical illusion. I first noticed this using the brightest single man-made source of light in the world; the light atop the Luxor in Las Vegas. If you stand out in front of the Luxor and look straight up, it appears that the light is slightly angled towards you, so the light beam eventually reaches azimuth (directly above you). But then if you go through the Luxor and back out again to the west pool area, or east to the monorail and look up, it's the same thing. I'd wager it's either beam divergence on "your side" of the beam making it look slightly angled and/or your brain not properly gauging where true azimuth is. A pretty cool effect either way.

Juggernaut · Jul 9, 2008

StarHalo said:
It's an optical illusion. I first noticed this using the brightest single man-made source of light in the world; the light atop the Luxor in Las Vegas. If you stand out in front of the Luxor and look straight up, it appears that the light is slightly angled towards you, so the light beam eventually reaches azimuth (directly above you). But then if you go through the Luxor and back out again to the west pool area, or east to the monorail and look up, it's the same thing. I'd wager it's either beam divergence on "your side" of the beam making it look slightly angled and/or your brain not properly gauging where true azimuth is. A pretty cool effect either way.

I figured it had something to due with beam divergence, the closes thing I can compare it to is if some one looked up say at the 600 foot away from it, were I was standing and didn't know it was a light they would probably think it was a jet trial acoss the sky lit up by the moon or something.

This happens with the 1000 Watt sealed GE bulb, however it's much more intense with my modded 1766 C Bigbeam light. "It's got a tighter beam"

High power light illusion in the sky?

Juggernaut

Flashlight Enthusiast

kramer5150

Flashaholic

light_emitting_dude

Flashlight Enthusiast

climberkid

Flashlight Enthusiast

Patriot

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StarHalo

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Juggernaut

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