Why you can't take a good picture of a rainbow

2019-09-19

[public] 551K views, 33.4K likes, 322 dislikes audio only

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There's a mismatch between the sensitivity of colour pixels in a digital camera sensor and the sensitivity of colour sensing cells in the human eye. We don't normally notice until we try to take a picture of the whole visible spectrum (like in a rainbow!). For example if you take a picture of a rainbow with a goPro Hero 7 violet disappears!

I also talk about how computer screens can show violet even though the pixels only go as far as blue.

Here's my video about how cones cells work:

/youtube/video/dvovtbLGaUw

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just like these amazing people:

Glenn Watson

Peter Turner

Joël van der Loo

Matthew Cocke