Labels:text | screenshot | font | number OCR: FACT FILE .............................................. BECAUSE THE APPARENT magnitude of a star depends on its distance from the Earth as well as how much light it gives off, the apparent-magnitude scale cannot be used as a guide to the real brightness of a star. Instead, this is measured on the absolute-magnitude scale, which compares the true brightness of stars as measured at a standard distance from the star of 32.6 light years.