A source may be characterized by its luminous intensity, or luminous flux,

which is the actual light energy of the source measured in units of candela.
The term illumination characterizes the lighting quality of a given working
environment.
1
illuminance / (1)
d2
luminance [FL]
Reflectance [%] = (2)
iluminance [FC]
The brightness of a stimulus, then, is the actual experience of visual
intensity, an intensity that often determines its visibility.
There are two types of receptor cells, rods and cones, each with six dis-
tinctly dierent properties.
Factors or properties that aect our visual sensory processing:

1. Location: The retina center fovea (cones) & periphery (mostly rods)

2. Acuity: Ability to resolve fine detail - much greater when the image
falls on cones

3. Sensitivity: Ability to detect light - rods are much more sensitive

4. Color sensitivity: Only cones cones can discriminate all wavelengths

5. Adaptation: Light stimulation causes rods to rapidly lose sensitivity

(slow response); cones insensitive to changes (sometimes hypersensitive
with little stimulation causes night glare)

6. Diffierential wavelength sensitivity: Cones are sensitive to all wave-

lengths ; rods are particularly insensitive to long wavelengths (red)

Bottom-up versus top-down processing:

top-down processing: what should be there
bottom-up processing: what is there.

1. Accommodation: This is when an out-of- focus image triggers a change

in lens shape to accommodate, or bring the image into focus on the
retina.

2. Convergence

1
3. Binocular disparity / depth perception

(a) Linear perspective: The converging of parallel lines (e.g., the road
toward the more distant points)
(b) Relative size: object know to be same size appear to be dierent
size (e.g., the two trucks at dierent distances)
(c) Interposition: one object obscures contour of another
(d) Light and shading: shadows provide evidence as to location
(e) Textural gradients: distant objects have finer gradient

4. Eye movements

(a) Pursuit: following a moving object (e.g., a plane in the sky)

(b) Saccadic: abrupt, discrete movements from one location to the
next

5. Visual search

(a) Conspicuity
(b) Expectancies
(c) Detection