Everyone post your tips, tricks, and knowledge about how to best see in the dark, and how to best utilise your scotopic vision.This includes discussion of lighting and how to best use it, and IR/thermal/nacht vision options.I'll start:Your scotopic (night) vision takes about 20mins to reach highly effective performance, and up to an hour to reach peak performance - so it's important that you preserve it!Facts about your vision that you can use to your advantage:>your eye has two main types of photoreceptors: cones and rods.>cones are sensitive to colour and most of your fine detail relies on them, they are NOT sensitive to contrast or movement>rods are sensitive to contrast and very sensitive to movement, they see ONLY contrast: dark vs. light and never in fine focus.>cones are grouped in the centre of your retina, directly behind your pupil and lens>rods are non-existent in the centre of your retina, but are spread around the outside, off-axis from your cornea, making survival possible because it is your peripheral vision that you rely on for reflex if anything suddenly moves in on you>in scotopic vision your cones fail and you rely entirely on your rods, this is why in low light everything looks grey or black & white>this also means in the dark anything you try to stare directly at (if you think something is lurking out there in the moonlight) you won't be able to see, you're basically blind to anything you stare at>look away slightly, using your peripheral (rod) vision and even though you couldn't read a chart you will get more information and immediately identify if something is movingcont'd
>>2853038Some tips about lighting:>narrow spectrum lighting helps preserve your night vision compared to white or wideband light sources, red is quite popular but it has some drawbacks (good contrast, everything in the woods looks gray or black, red light is visible from much further away than higher frequencies)>green is good to maximise your visibility because we're most sensitive to it, not visible from as far away>blue makes blood look inky black which helps with tracking game, scatters considerably in foliage, fog, an atmosphere and least visible from far away; added bonus that it penetrates water better than other colours if you need to see through a water surface.>t. majored in lighting design, optics, and photometry
I have wondered because putting black paint beneath your eye reduces glare directly into the eye thus improving vision if putting white paint under the eye would improve it? Then I remember I am toilet bowl white so probably not. Blue eyes help. Other than that from memory I think you are correct I do recall direct vision being limited in the dark.
>>2853040the tried and trusted combination for clearest vision on a sunny day is dark pain under the eyes and a visor over them.still not typically as good as polarized sunglasses or goggles with narrow apertures
>>2853041Does it work inversely? If a dark skinned person put white under the eyes would it actually improve night vision?
>>2853038I use a headlamp
>>2853049reflecting light into your cornea will not help you see better
Cool thread and hope it grows. Also going to post a stupid comment in honor of internet shit posting lore bumping“I like putting my rod in between your moms cones”
Oh also, are you saying if I don’t want to be detected to use green light rather than red light? Some of my flashlights have both options but I’m not a fan of green for whatever reason
>>2853038If the moon is out and you are still and observing, often times all you really need is a big ass lens. Sit out in a meadow with a full moon and some 8x40 nocs and you will be amazed at what just those larger lenses can pick up.
>>2853038Really just this plus a headlamp like the princeton tec sync where the red light is a distinct position with off on either side, or one of the USGI angle flashlights with filters. The old school bulb is pretty nice and not too harsh on the eyes and the red is nice for not nuking your eyes.
>>2853149technically yes, the problem is you can function with a much lower power green light than red light because you are naturally much more sensitive to green, the problem is green flashlights are often overpowered and you can't dim them enough to benefit from them and keep your night vision at the same time. when they're too bright people are gonna see you from far away no matter what. so yeah, if you can dim it down to almost useless you'll find in the pitch dark it's very effective. for example, the little green LED on my mac charger I don't even notice at night when I shut the lights off, but after getting a few hours of shuteye when I wake up it's lighting up my entire bedroom. and that's just a weakass green light the size of a pinhead>>2853155that sounds rad, I've never used my monoc at night but I should really try>>2853161yeah red is the overall best bet unless you're hiding from someone
Most recent camping trip went on a night hike first time ever, with only a single red LED keyring torch as a backup in case I got stuck. Barely needed it, the star light was enough to see the trail. Apart from walking through one spider web it was kino af trudging through the wild in darkness. Got up to a vantage point/lookout, beautiful view of the surrounds and the constellations. Will do again.
>>2853193that's the way to do it. I like the convenience of a headlamp for hiking or urbex or something but having this white or red spotlight right over your eyes is also a pain in the ass. a little hand held is so much easier to control and you can muffle the light however you like to use as little or as much as necessary, without the beam always being right in front of your face
good thread, i hope it survives a week or more. too bad i don't have anything to contribute. i'm a knife/flashlight guy for 10+ years and i've only used white light. now you're making me scroll through aliexpress again for something i don't think i need...
>>2853282buy the weakest handheld green LED you can find. use you regular light as needed, and have the little green light handy for when you're mostly coping under skylight but need a teeny bit of reinforcement, because you can use a very dim single colour light to great effect without bouncing your pupils back to photopic mode
>>2853038interesting thread, i was just reading about something similar how living in civilization theres so much light pollution that our eyes never get to fully switch from cones to rods even at night, and how this is presumeably bad for our health..
>>2853382exposure to electric light, especially fluorescent and LEDs, is known to be a major contributor to sleep disorders. any light with lots of blue effects our circadian rhythms.
these are my night vision toys>Bushnell Equinox z2 IR monocular scope/camera>FLIR Scout TK thermal scope/camera>Supercheap Kmart brand video camera with IR night mode>external IR lamp because the camera's own lamp is weak and only really useful indoors
>>2853332wouldnt a normal red light work best as is common with many headlamps for exactly this reason?
>>2853576the issue is the ability to dim the light, most headlamps I find don't dim enough. with a handheld light you can cover or obscure the beam with your hand. once you have adjusted full night vision you don't need 100 lumens strapped to your noggin
