From: Flick Harrison (email suppressed)
Date: Fri Nov 02 2007 - 09:13:00 PDT
Todd! Thanks for that. Of all things, a neuroscientist discussing
persistence itself.
(Just noticed - you remembered my name!)
But... but...
If a neuroscientist says we don't notice BLINKING because of p.o.v.,
What causes us to not notice FLICKER in film?
What's the difference...?
I notice... that he says p.o.v. has nothing to do with seeing
continuous MOTION in film - he doesn't dismiss it as a cause of
continuous IMAGE.
That's what I'm arguing about - continuous IMAGE.
Not MOTION.
I thought that was clear!
P.O.V. could be responsible for the failure to perceive FLICKER.
P.O.V. is unnecessary to perceive MOTION. Like I said, a slow
flipbook can create the illusion of motion. Very slow marquee lights
can appear to move.
I could still be wrong - but that quote doesn't settle it.
Also - I'd love to read the rest of that article... is it online? Or
in book form?
And come on, Kodak dude:
"The second 'positive' is the eye/brain hanging on to the image after
the image has disappeared."
followed by:
"If we stored the previous image in our minds it would overlap with
the next one and cause the effect of motion blur."
So - is he saying there's a positive afterimage or there ISN'T a
positive after image? "The eye/brain hanging on after the image
disappeared" or not?
And the plain logic of p.o.v. theory is - if the shutter is timed
properly, the after-image lasts ONLY long enough for the next real
image to arrive. There's no overlap, or piling up. The p.o.v. lasts
ONLY long enough that we miss the blackness of shutter-closed.
If the blackness was too short, the images would overlap slightly,
but our brains could clearly handle that, since that's how we see the
real world.
Assuming some persistence exists - which this neuroscientist seems to
be semi-confirming.
Once again: POV = no flicker.
not POV = SMOOTH MOTION
Toot toot Todd!
* FLICK's WEBSITE:
http://www.flickharrison.com
* FACEBOOK
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=860700553
* BLOG / NEWS:
http://zeroforconduct.blogspot.com
* MYSPACE:
http://myspace.com/flickharrison
On 1-Nov-07, at 11:07 AM, Todd Eacrett wrote:
> Pat,
>
> I'm all for the mythic, the poetic and even the mythopoetic but I
> don't have time for fairytales pretending to be facts. Yes, your
> textbook was wrong. Film studies and historians have perpetuated
> a falsehood for a century after science disproved it.
>
> It appears this is finally changing -- the 9th edition of Kawin &
> Mast has an updated section on pov which admits it has nothing to
> do with the perception of movement in motion pictures.
>
> Pov does exist, just not in the sense you're arguing. This is from a
> neuroscientist at Kodak's research division:
>
> "There are two kinds of persistence of vision. The first - negative
> (e.g. staring for a while at a red spot on a white background causes
> you too see a cyan spot on a blank sheet for a while afterwards) -
> is due to fatigue in the retina and is a simple physiological effect.
> The second � positive � is the eye/brain hanging on to the image
> after the image has disappeared. This latter effect causes us to be
> unaware of blinking most of the time, but has nothing to do with
> seeing continuous motion at the cinema. If we stored the previous
> image in our minds it would overlap with the next one and cause
> the effect of motion blur."
>
> Best,
>
> Todd
__________________________________________________________________
For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.