What are the true colors of planets? – BBC World

Image copyright Thinkstock

Image caption are these the true colors of planets?

The images coming from space probes we have out there to study the planets and moons do not cease to surprise us.

Some planets are shown in more intense than other colors. But what we are seeing the true colors

The short answer is “sometimes” because there are truly colorful

Others are covered by rock and are virtually gray?.; so If you come across a picture of them in which they are full of c or lor, you can be sure that this image is not very accurate.

they usually tend to exaggerate the subtle differences that the human eye could not detect without a little help.

Anyone who has used a smartphone to take photos phone, you’ve probably encountered several options to exaggerate or lower the tone of the colors.

Image copyright NASA

Image caption Saturn usually a pale yellow.

Similar techniques are used to process images arriving from space telescopes, and almost always the colors are exaggerated.

What happens is that a camera placed in a spaceship rarely detects colors the same way as a human eye .

for example, red, green and blue components are typically recorded by separated as three separate images in black and white and combined colored with the sole purpose of showing the photo.

the way the colors blend is designed to be as would your eyes .

what’s more, the colors in the image does not correspond to the original, even if it has not been done no attempt to exaggerate.

in principle, a camera, a spacecraft can record any part of the light spectrum.

When one channel is beyond the visible range, as ultraviolet, we still have to use red, green or blue to display it.

This means that the resulting image has a “false color”, which can be exaggerated even more .

The giant planets

Image copyright NASA

Image caption The Great red Spot is red

Jupiter : this giant of the solar system has “the Great Red Spot”, a huge storm oval shaped

While the more subtle colors we see elsewhere Jupiter may occur. clouds granite look through different depths of the atmosphere, clouds in the stain itself was stained red by a contaminant that is still unknown.

it may be concerned phosphorus, a compound sulphide or a complex organic molecule.

The propensity of Jupiter by strong colors is shared by his innermost moon, Io .

Image copyright NASA

Image caption Io has a natural yellow, while Europe often retouched.

There, frequent volcanic eruptions bathe the surface sulfide and sulfur dioxide, which makes the TV look like a yellow pizza with black olives, which actually are spots of lava that are too fresh to be hit the yellow.

in contrast, the next moon, Europe, has a water surface frozen .

This makes it very reflective, but without much color.

most of the images of Europe color that you usually see is a reproduction with an exaggerated color.

Saturn has more colors dumber than Jupiter, despite having a similar atmosphere.

Its natural color is pale yellow, so any photo you see with vivid tones will be a they colored.

Image copyright NASA

Image caption This is the natural color of Neptune

Uranus and Neptune also hiding in an immensely dense atmosphere.

to our eyes, Uranus appears green and blue Neptune, because their higher condensed methane clouds seen through a methane gas much depth filters red component of sunlight.

there is not much variation in color, the highest clouds appear white but everything else is blue or green.

rocky planets

We usually refer to Mars as the “Red Planet” .

The iron in its rocks and dust become iron oxide. It is why the planet looks red to the naked eye when we see in the sky.

It also looks red from orbit, and red is for the probes that explore its soil.

Image copyright NASA

Image caption Three versions of the same view of Mars taken by the Rover probe. On the left: A raw. Medium: an adjusted to how the human eye would see. Right: how it would look under the light conditions on Earth.

Here the debate is to show the colors as “really” look or if it should be displayed as if the quality of light on the planet was like of Earth .

Venus is wrapped in a dazzling white clouds and the surface has only been visited by . a bunch of Soviet probes

the dense clouds allow only a dull red glow reaches the ground; so everywhere is that orange.

But actually, the rocks are a kind of gray wash opaque .

Image copyright NASA

Image caption This is the natural gray of Venus

Mercury is an airless world made from a drab gray rock with just a hint of red.

only reflects 7% of the sunlight that falls on it, it’s just a little more than reflect a burning coal, but is three times closer to the sun than Earth. And that closeness is what makes sunlight make it look very bright, and does not need to adjust the brightness of the image.

However, to unravel the color variations that are hidden in the landscape features of Mercury , is a common practice to use a false color to basically increase very subtle differences in natural color and make them to jump into view .

Image copyright NASA

image caption the surface of Venus taken by Venera 13 probe Pictured above is the natural color of the planet, while below it would look like if I had the same sunlight on Earth.

But do not think this is cheating.

They reveal truths about worlds that could have seen if your eyes and mind had developed there, and doing so the information we have available from the planets is maximized.

* David Rothery h a written several books about the planets and the moons of the solar system and this story originally published on the site the Conversation .