Why are green lasers so bright?

[thebouljello]

I was looking at videos and pictures of red green and blue lasers all at the same output. Although they were all the same output, the green lasers always seemed brighter. Does anybody know why?

 

[doubleone44]

Because our eyes are more sensitive for green light than red light. The brightness peak is around 555nm, and green with 532nm is a lot closer than red with 650nm/635nm

 

[marcuspeh]

Have at look at this

 

[hwang21]

Well, OP is talking about cameras picking up the lasers, not our eyes. In this case, the most likely explanation is due to the beam diameter of the green lasers. Green lasers tend to have significantly smaller beam diameters, so their laser beam appears brighter

In person, a 50mW green laser will appear quite bright, enough to be plainly seen at night. A 200mW red or 150mW blue would look around the same brightness, from personal experience. Just a guesstimate

 

[thebouljello]

Thanks for the reply and the wavelength chart.

 

[thebouljello]

Thanks for the article. It makes more sense now.

 

[thebouljello]

Thank you for the reply.