Astronomy based idea

So. I need assistance confirming this... but I think it would be a cool feature if I am right on how it works... but I do have a few questions I hope someone can answer.
So, I learned in astronomy that our atmosphere has absorbs all wave (X-rays, Gamma Rays, Microwaves, etc.) except visible light and some radio waves. There is a "window" in the atmosphere that let these through.
I was wondering if there could be a planet that blocks out visible light. If so, then there could be a few planets in starbound that would be just black and white, or would it be black and white and pitch black. Either way I think it would be really cool.
The question this raises though is:
would you be able to use a flashlight here... I would say gamewise yes to make it easier.
All in all though I think it would be sweet if you ran across a planet whose atmosphere absorbed visible light so all you could see in is infrared or black and white with a flashlight. But I'm iffy on the details. anyone who can "shed some light" on this would be awesome! Thanks for taking the time to read this!

 

Sounds like an interesting idea! I think one of the big things in starbound will be unique planets and unique biomes. But those will be worked on post-beta or post-release, probably.

My vision of starbound in the future is that it has like 300 uniquely diffirent planets, too finally get the "outer world" feel of it all.

 

I'm not certain, but it sounds like something in the upper atmosphere would block light from a nearby star from entering the inner atmosphere. If that were the case, light could still be produced on the surface from any light source. So, your flashlight would still work. As far as the ability to see color: it isn't the sun, or the atmosphere that creates color, it is the rods and cones within our eyes that divides the visible light spectrum in order for us to perceive color. So, even if we had a planet that block the light of a nearby start, we'd still be able to explore the surface of this planet with flashlights, lanterns, glowsticks, etc. and still see plenty of colors.

The part of your question that confuses me is the part about a planet that blocks "visible light". Light and vision are two separate things. We are able to see light because of our sense of vision. Light would exist whether or not we were around to see it.

But yea, a planet like this might be kinda cool in the game. Another way to create a "dark planet" would be to set a planet somewhere with a heavy cloud layer, like Venus, and set your nearest star too far away to allow light to penetrate the cloud layer. Venus, on the surface, is very cold, and very dark.

 

In theory it is possible to have a planet with the light of almost every color, except just black and white. There is possibility for atmosphere to block some wavelenghts of visible light while letting others through, but white is a mix of all visible wavelengths and if you have white lighting on a planet, you can see EVERY color there is.

 

Carl Sagan is extremely disappointed by this

 

this should be in suggestions.

 

Well the planets sun colour in the game affect the light on the planet a little, but I don't know if it goes that deep

Its a good idea

 

They use future light it's a pixel based technology that does not depend on suns, there problem solved.

 

Atmospheres that absorb visible light exist, they just look like a thick fog/cloud to us. When it's overcast on earth it's darker because the clouds absorb/reflect some of the light.

 

indeed... I forgot about that when I posted. then the world should be black and grey =P
and for greenman, color is actually determined by the object. A green shirt, for example, absorbs all color (because white light is a mix of all colors) except green, which it reflects, which makes said shirt appear green.
I also was not asking for every scientific idea to go into the game. I just thought I would see what the community thought of one.
I didn't post it in suggestions because I wanted to see what people thought first.
Thanks for the replies!
P.S. I really need to learn how to quote multiple posts!

Edit: Basically I was just asking what people thought of a black and white planet where there was not color or a pitch black one. I just used the things I learned yesterday to attempt to support it.

 

I guess it can be plausible. It'd worked as constant night with black starless sky, but all local light sources, like flashlights, torches and weird luminescent walking bugtrees, will be fine. And yeah, everything will be colored as usual, because this planet is, basically, "inside" or "under roof", nothing more.


On nature of color. What our eyes interpret as colors are electromagnetic (light) waves of different frequencies, all from very narrow part of electromagnetic spectrum. There are ridiculous amounts of electromagnetic waves of various frequencies around us, but our eyes perceive only specific ones. Eye contains light-sensitive cones, which are sensitive to red, green and blue colors (frequencies). This is what forms color in our eye: if it is washed with predominantly red light, you'll see red. "Predominantly" as in "there can be whatever electromagnetic waves around, but out of visible spectrum there is mostly "red" frequency.

Sure, objects in surrounding world do have inherent properties of absorbing and reflecting electromagnetic waves of various frequencies, including ones from visible spectrum. Red object, for example, absorbs frequencies we perceive as green and blue (ones that innervate green-sensitive and blue-sensitive cones respectively), and reflects "red" frequency.

Other animals (and possibly aliens) see in different parts of spectrum. Bees and perhaps some other insects can perceive ultraviolet light, but fail to see common red. So for them red and orange seems as one color (probably red), but they do see things we just can't, probably interpreting ultraviolet as violet, but I can't guarantee that.

Narns from Babylon-5, as it seems, have their visible spectrum shifted to infrared side — that's what I am thinking when I see their preferred habitats, filled with monotonous (for human eye) red color. Probably because they evolved that way, it could be explained as combination of stellar class of their sun, home atmosphere composition and ancestral habits. So, the funny thing is that Narns should see everything which is neutrally-lit for Earthlings (and Minbari, and Centauri et cetera) as ridiculously blue. Of course, this minor issue is never explored in the show, and I am not sure that JMS (author) even thought about that.

 

If visible light were to be blocked by the atmosphere it could make for some really neat [any-non-visible-light-wavelength] goggles and flashlights.

Be right back guys, planning my next dungeon-arcology.

 

Ah, this is cool stuff. Reminds me of my remote sensing and atmospheric courses. As interesting as it could be to do something like this I think it's beyond the scope of this game. That said it wouldn't surprise me to see planets with a slight hue applied to everything.

This is the window the OP is talking about:

http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/A/atmospheric_window.html

 

nice... this is exactly like the picture in my book would be cool to have pitch black planets though... especially if they want to put the "creepier" things in... could be like pitch black but with no daytime lol

P.S. @nababoo yes they could throw in heat vision goggles or something to that effect!

 

There are certainly gasses that block out most/all visible light (think smoke or dense clouds), but they would be pretty hard to play on because you'd be permanently blind due to the fact that visible light wouldn't propagate. Maybe you could see if you were a robot sensitive to x-rays or something that happened to pass through the atmosphere of the planet, but I'm not sure how much it would offer in game terms, as normal lights do not emit x-rays, either.

TL;DR: Not sure how fun it is to play on a planet where you can't see anything and where normal lights don't work.

 

For those occasions when one needs a visual representation of the olfactory senses.

 

A pitch-black planet would be amazing imo, having to navigate using only a torch/lights etc. Should totally be accompanied by some sinister music/ambiance.