Floaters and binoviewers

I hardly ever notice floaters, but when I tried a binoviewer for the
first time, they were very prominent. I thought the trend was the
opposite, binoviewers making floaters less noticable, but for me the
opposite was true. Has this happened to anyone else?


--
Clear Skies,
Paul Murphy

(remove gemini to email me)

Floaters become more visible as illumination
per unit area decreases. Since you are
dividing the light intensity in half, the illumination for each eye is
50% of what it
would be as a monocular system.

DC

Paul Murphy wrote:
I hardly ever notice floaters, but when I tried a binoviewer for the
first time, they were very prominent. I thought the trend was the
opposite, binoviewers making floaters less noticable, but for me the
opposite was true. Has this happened to anyone else?

Another possibility, in addition to what Dan mentioned, is decreased exit
pupil. It is not uncommon for binoviewers to entail, as a side effect,
increased magnification (sort of like an incidental Barlow). This would
yield a smaller exit pupil and enhanced floater visibility.

--
Brian Tung
The Astronomy Corner at http://astro.isi.edu/
Unofficial C5+ Home Page at http://astro.isi.edu/c5plus/
The PleiadAtlas Home Page at http://astro.isi.edu/pleiadatlas/
My Own Personal FAQ (SAA) at http://astro.isi.edu/reference/faq.html

Paul Murphy wrote:
I hardly ever notice floaters, but when I tried a binoviewer for the
first time, they were very prominent. I thought the trend was the
opposite, binoviewers making floaters less noticable, but for me the
opposite was true. Has this happened to anyone else?


Hi:

I'm not troubled by floaters when using the Denkmeiers. What are some
possible causes? Mainly, a smaller exit pupil than you are used to
using. Generally, as you say, binoviewers tend to decrease the
prominence of floaters if the images are well merged.

Peace,
Rod Mollise
Author of _Choosing and Using a Schmidt Cassegrain Telescope_
and _The Urban Astronomer's Guide_

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Join the SCT User Mailing List.
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See my home page at
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for further info

For Uncle Rod's Astro Blog See:
http://journals.aol.com/rmollise/UncleRodsAstroBlog/

"Paul Murphy" wrote in message
. ..
I hardly ever notice floaters, but when I tried a binoviewer for the first
time, they were very prominent. I thought the trend was the opposite,
binoviewers making floaters less noticable, but for me the opposite was
true. Has this happened to anyone else?

The result of a binoviewer isn't necessarily the reduction of floater
noticeability, but rather the reduction of the impact they have on viewing.
Since two eyes are now involved in observing, and no two eyes will have the
same floaters, the image information is available to the brain.

As with all things, time improves binoviewing. Although it probably helps to
not have one of your eyes be overly dominant.

The tough thing is, now that you have seen your floaters, chances are you
are going to be aware of them all the time. For a while it will be a real
nusance.