3 ms·

Eyes don't have a framerate. Fighter pilots have been tested and can identify the type of plane in an image with just one frame at 255 fps. Noticing a flash of

• apl 12y ago
  While it's true that a biological eye doesn't really have a defined "framerate" like video sensors do, the examples you're providing don't really show that. Sensitivity to very short stimuli doesn't prove temporal resolution in the sense that's applied here; what you want to be looking at is flicker fusion instead. As a cheeky example -- still pictures have approximately zero frames per second temporal resolution but would be able to pick up that 2.5ms plane if their sensitivity was sufficiently high... Measuring ERGs (electro-retinogrammes) indicates that our photoreceptors can't really resolve luminance fluctuations above, at the very limit, 70-80Hz. Even Drosophila's high speed cascade doesn't really modulate beyond 200-250Hz. I'm really doubtful about those claims.
  • ghusbands 12y ago
    Indeed, flicker fusion for humans pretty much tops out at 80Hz, but you're underestimating the effects of smooth pursuit eye movement. For example, if you animate a fast-moving object at 80Hz on a 160Hz display, and follow it with your eyes, you will see two copies of the object. There's really no upper limit for this effect.