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Explain this picture to me

Started Feb 9, 2012 | Discussions thread
ALHET Forum Member • Posts: 71
Re: Explain this picture to me

I didn't have time to read all the responses (only the first couple) to your post, but I imagine that you got the correct answer from one or more people - lots of smart people on here. Thought I'd jump in, just in case the discussion took a turn and no one gave you an answer that made sense to you.

I love imppmi's diagram. He answers your question, but perhaps didn't understand what you weren't understanding about his written answer...

The car headlight you see is not the beam of light coming from the headlights. It is likely still far too light out when you took this to be able to see the beams. What you are seeing is the glowing headlights themselves. The streak of light that distance is due to two things. The first is the distance the car traveled in the tenth of a second your shutter was open. The other factor contributing to the length of the perceived beams was your panning in the opposite direction.

Cool effect, and I love the question, the way you gave it. How fun it would be if it were possible to catch the lights, just as they were turned on, traveling away from the car at the speed of light?

Great post, and fun snapshot.

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