Posted on 12 July 2011 at 07:41h

The most pleasant way to travel to and from Bergen from Flekke (where I live) is to take the fast boat. This is not only the most comfortable alternative but has the best views and free internet. As I was speeding out of Bergen the other day I was inspired to take a photograph of this breathtaking view. I've only got a mobile phone that I use as a camera so the photo doesn't quite do the scene justice but you get the idea. It reminds me of one of those Heaton Cooper paintings of the lake district that my Father used to like so much. It's the way the more distant mountains are a lighter grey than the closer ones. I have been wondering what causes this effect, I thought it could be due to mist. The light from the most distant mountains travels through more mist so is less intense but wouldn't that make them darker? Maybe it's possible to calculate the distance to the mountains by measuring the greyness of the pixels. You can do this in Paint.net by displaying the colours whilst using the colour picker tool.

I've been thinking about this and have come up with the following attempt at an explanation: The sky in the distance is the brightest part of the picture and since the sun is behind me the light coming from this region of the sky must be scattered light. The most distant mountains reflect light but there will also be scattered light. The closer mountains reflect light but there will be less scattered light since there is less atmosphere between the mountain and camera. So the closer mountains appear darker than the distant ones. I don't know if this is true or not but it seems to be plausible.