14
votes
If, brightness → dynamic range... white balance → what?
The phenomenon you describe is called color constancy, and it is enabled partially by the human vision system's chromatic adaptation and partially by something I will describe using the scientific ...
- 143k
12
votes
Accepted
What would happen if a camera used entirely different primary colors?
Color photography is indeed based on the tri-color theory. The world saw the first color picture in 1861 made using red, green, and blue filters by James Clark Maxwell. Today’s color photography is ...
- 38.7k
10
votes
What would happen if a camera used entirely different primary colors?
Is this already being done?
Sure. The Hubble Space Telescope senses the near IR, visible, and near UV spectrum. Any images you see from Hubble that contain information outside of the visible ...
- 32.3k
9
votes
Accepted
Why do we actually need to adjust white balance?
The perceived color of an object depends on two elements: the intrinsic color of the object, and the color spectrum of the light shining on it.
A red apple for example, will appear nearly black with ...
- 1,192
8
votes
Accepted
If I flip my picture horizontally then would it be the accurate depiction of how people see me in real life?
No. The picture straight out of your camera is what you look like to others. You don't need to reverse it. Think about it - when you take a picture of something else with your camera, you don't need ...
- 2,893
7
votes
Accepted
Which one is the real car and which one is the reflection?
It's hard to tell with this low quality of image (and one which has presumably undergone some degree of post-processing), but at first glance it appears that the image is not inverted; the reflection ...
- 143k
7
votes
Can the human eye be seen as more like a Bayer sensor than a Foveon sensor?
It's more complicated than this because:
Moiré appears when there is a slight difference of spatial frequency between the image and the sensor. But the cones and the rods, being organic, are not in a ...
- 20.6k
6
votes
If, brightness → dynamic range... white balance → what?
The human eye can also adjust to any color temperature. So, it has a broad ______. What is the blank?
Our eyes have a wide range of color (chromatic) adaptation.
- 175k
6
votes
What would happen if a camera used entirely different primary colors?
Some general use photographic cameras actually record outside the visible spectrum, so there is some experience with that. Leica M8 was notoriously known for recording IR. The extended range had bad ...
- 5,215
6
votes
Accepted
Can all colors be described with RGB?
Have a look at this introduction to color perception and reproduction. It also contains a comparison of CIE, RGB and CMYK gamuts at the bottom, where CIE represents what the eye can do and RGB and ...
- 453
6
votes
Can all colors be described with RGB?
The colors used in a Bayer filter are already centered as closely as possible to the three wavelengths of light to which human eyes are most sensitive. How sensitive each color is relative to the ...
- 175k
6
votes
Accepted
If I take a photo of a light outside the visible spectrum, what will it look like after print?
If humans can not see it, they can not see it.
But this kind of photography happens all the time using a device that is sensitive to that wavelength. For example Astrophotography or infrared ...
- 23.8k
5
votes
Accepted
Why do photographs make a place look bigger than it is?
Short answer:
Lenses and field of view.
Long answer:
Your eyes work very much like a camera, with field of view for binocular vision at about 115 degrees.
According to this site, the true central ...
- 492
5
votes
Technically, why is the out of focus area blurred more when using a bigger aperture?
The other answers incorrectly associate the blur effect with some lens properties. You don't have to assume anything about how the image is formed by the lens or even that a lens exists.
The scene ...
- 5,045
5
votes
Why does this happen: objects which are surrounded by brighter objects appear darker?
If you'll look at the exposure data of both images you will see, that they are not equivalent. That means that the shadow spot was exposured differently and thus has different intensity.
That's how ...
- 1,791
5
votes
Accepted
What Kelvin-range of "white balance" does the human vision compensate?
This is described by the Kruithof curve, and the answer depends on the brightness as well as color temperature. From Wikipedia:
At the brightness of direct sunlight (along the top of the chart), ...
- 143k
5
votes
If, brightness → dynamic range... white balance → what?
We see using a combination of our eyes and our brain. As to color adaptation, this phenomenon operates on both eyes independently. Because of this, there is a splendid way that you can demonstrate ...
- 38.7k
5
votes
Accepted
How high resolution can a picture be before the human eye stops caring?
I love this question.
There are several concepts of resolution and several aspects that affect each one. I will be playing with different names, sorry for that, ppi, lpi, pixel density, etc, but you ...
- 23.8k
4
votes
What would happen if a camera used entirely different primary colors?
The intensities recorded by each specialized pixel can be mapped to the hue spectrum below.
The Bayer matrix does not map to any color. The image is interpolated to yield a full-color-per-pixel ...
- 2,445
4
votes
How can I correctly adjust skin color in Photoshop when I have a color vision deficiency?
I think I found something interesting. It feels like a revelation to me!
There are some articles about using the eyedropper but on CMYK model.
I found a very, very simple method that I feel works well ...
- 23.8k
3
votes
What *exactly* is white balance?
What exactly is white balance?
'White' doesn't have a color balance/white balance. Light sources have a color balance. The amplification of light collected by a camera's sensor needed to make ...
- 175k
3
votes
How does the human eye compare to modern cameras and lenses?
Let me throw a question back at you: What is the bitrate and bit depth of a vinyl record?
Cameras are devices designed to, as faithfully as possible, reproduce the image that is projected onto their ...
- 131
3
votes
Accepted
What is the "right" displayed color?
in ideal room lighting conditions?
"Ideal" is probaby all the lights turned off. So the white then becomes the pure white of your white screen. Another ideal is probably a light and gray walls that ...
- 23.8k
3
votes
What is the "right" displayed color?
If the display is calibrated correctly and you are using a profile correctly you can assume the colour is correctly displayed, or more precisely, that it is displayed as accurately as the system can ...
- 6,385
3
votes
Can an RGB channel be shifted to increase color gamut into the violet range?
Yes but you do not even need to.
The color gamut indicated by the triangle is the coverage of linear combinations of the three RGB primaries. By moving the primaries you can expand or contract the ...
- 102k
3
votes
Accepted
Why does my eye lose white balance and feel exhausted when I use my viewfinder?
We see using a combination of eye and brain. Our visual response is so complex, many aspects are still not fully understood.
Light receptors imbedded in the retina are divided into two types. Highly ...
- 38.7k
2
votes
Why do we actually need to adjust white balance?
Our eyes adapt to ambient light. When you look at a photograph, the lighting in the image does not necessarily match ambient light. Our eyes and brain work together to get a global understanding of ...
- 102k
2
votes
What is the "right" displayed color?
Your question leaves out the most important part of the entire equation. It is the reason we do color management. Which setting allows the viewer to perceive the most accurate color?
You refer to "...
- 175k
2
votes
Why does this happen: objects which are surrounded by brighter objects appear darker?
It's all a matter of exposure. If you expose for the brightest part of the image, the other parts of the image will be underexposed. To understand this better, try using the camera in FULL MANUAL mode ...
2
votes
Why does a 50mm lens appear to give a human perspective, rather than a normal lens?
I know this is an old post, but the comments are so off the mark I thought I would chime in. Everyone seems stuck on this idea that a "normal" lens equates to the human eye in someway, a normal lens ...
- 29
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