[X] My Assistant

[ncc1701d]

I was wondering.
If Venus reflects 70 percent of the sunlight that hits it.
If I was in spaceship on approach to that planet could I look at it with the naked eye out the window and not get blinded?
Would I have to at least use sunglasses?

I am wondering to how much brightness reduction is going on when processing the images before they are release to public or analized.
thanks

[dvandorn]

Many of the Apollo astronauts chose to wear sunglasses when doing a lot of "out of the window" stuff both in lunar orbit and on the surface -- and, of course, the LEVVA visor assemblies had built-in sunglasses (the outer gold-coated visor).

Pete Conrad almost landed on the Moon wearing sunglasses inside his bubble helmet, but all of the standard-issue sunglasses back then were the green-tinted kind, and Pete decided rather late that the green shading washed out too many details. But he indeed removed his helmet and took off his sunglasses just prior to descent.

As for Young, recall that 1) the Descartes landing site was in one of the highest albedo terrain units the Moon has to offer, and 2) by the time they lifted off, Young and Duke were sitting under the highest Sun angle anyone in Apollo would ever see from the surface (owing to their three-rev, six-hour landing slip). Add to that the airlessness, which not only gave the pure black sky in contrast to the brightly lit surface but also allowed full unfiltered Sunlight to beat down. Any place on Earth lit with that kind of unfiltered Sunlight would likely make you "snowblind," as well.

-the other Doug