How visible is the BR beam, without smoke?

I have a 118mW blu-ray, and I think that at night the beam appears to be between 15 and 20mW of green. I think mine is a little higher on the spectrum than 405nm, though. Maybe 407 or 408. I can barely even see the dot in the day, though.

-Mark

drgrant1 said:

I have one of Jay's small Blu-Ray's. It outputs 196mw's and is very visible to me in the dark once my eyes have adjusted and I am 50+. I am attaching some photos for you. Also, the Blu-Ray is a blast to paint with. It is also known as painting-with-light. Good Luck!

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Nice pictures Grant!

This is one of the 4X GBW-H10N diodes. You can see from that first picture where the dot is over exposed, that the beam is flat, similar to the 803T diodes.

I like the painting!
Jay

laserman22 said:

[quote author=Xplorer877 link=1227069675/0#9 date=1227089822]Also 405nm is small enough such that the beam is scattered by the molecules of the gasses that make up air. No dust needed.

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What does this mean?
[/quote]

Rayleigh scattering:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rayleigh_scattering



More of the 405nm radiation is scattered by the atmosphere.. reaching your eye (brighter beam)

I've got a 80-100mW BR. In bright to dim light the beam is not impressive. no more so than a red. Smoke helps. However in a dark room, with dark adapted eyes, the beam is quite visible to me.

Yea, it really matters whether your eyes are darkness adapted or not. If you are in a completely dark room for several minutes, you can then clearly see the beam from the side. It's not blazingly bright as a green are, it actually looks more grey than violet when your eyes are darkness adapted. The dot is still pretty weak though.

When I shine mine outside on a clear night, I can easily see the beam, but it's ghosty. It's like it's easy to see and NOT easy to see at the same time.