How we change what others think, feel, believe and do

Visual Perception: How We See

Explanations > Perception > Visual Perception: How We See

We perceive the world through our five senses remarkably quickly. In fact we have to, as we live in real time and seldom have time to ponder 'what's that?' While the process of perception is very fast, it is not instantaneous. We go through an approximate sequence of perception.

Most notably this is done when we see things, although other senses also use a similar sequence, for example in seeking understanding, boundaries, patterns and coherent units that can be named and understood in relation to other units and the containing context.

• Colour theory:
  • Trichromatic Colour Theory: Red, Green and Blue.
  • Twelve Color Wheel: A basic set of colors, in a circle.
  • Tint, Shade and Tone: Three dimensions of hue fading.
  • Hue, Saturation and Luminosity: An alternative to RGB, liked by photographers.
  • Color Space: How much we can see.
  • Lightness, Luminosity, Luminance and Other Tonal Descriptors: Black and white is not always black and white.
  • Colorfulness, Saturation, Chrominance and Other Ways of Understanding Color: Ways of seeing color.
• The Eye
  • The Lens System of the Eyes: The front of the eye.
  • Eye Dimensions, Data and Statistics: Interesting data.
  • How the Eye Detects Light: The basic principle.
  • Vision Opponent Process Theory: How the eye sends color to the brain.
• Contrast: The fundamental means of perception.
  • The Principle of Contrast: The basic principle.
  • Eye Seeks Contrast: The start of meaning-making.
  • Initial Contrast: First look for the beginnings of a thing.
  • Tone Contrast: Dark to light.
  • Hue Contrast: Colors that contrast with one another.
  • Contrast Variables: Means of sensory identification.
  • Object Contrast: In the comparison of things.
  • Zones of Contrast: Possibility of a thing.
  • Eye Avoids Blur: blur repels eye (which seeks sharpness).
  • Light Attracts Eye: Light attracts more than dark.
  • Dark Repels Eye: Dark is a primitive fear.
• Line: The edge between (boundary, separation)
  • Lines are Like Eye-Roads: Guides and speeds the eye.
  • Eye Seeks Line: The first step to seeing things.
  • Eye Follows Line: Tracing out things.
  • Eye Fills In Line: Join the dots. Things in a line.
  • Eye Extrapolates Line: Newton's first law for the eye. Gestalt continuation.
  • Straight Lines Reduce Effort: Keeping lines straight makes the picture calmer.
  • Angles Add Effort: Greater angle, more effort.
  • Intersections Add Effort: complications at the crossroads.
  • The Eye Follows Similar Line: When lines cross, similarity to current line wins.
  • Eye Follows Dominant Line: When lines cross, bigger, stand-out lines win.
  • Lines Separate: lines separate things and areas.
  • Gradient of Lines: Lines going up and down have subtle effects.
  • Pointers Direct Movement: Eyes follow arrows in the pointed direction.
• Shape: Finding a thing
  • Eye Traces Outline: We find a shape by outlining it.
  • Mind Seeks Shape: Shape tells you what it may be.
  • Mind Prefers Basic Shapes: Triangles, squares, circles, etc.
  • Mind Matches Patterns: We are pattern-matching machines!
  • Fine Detail Becomes Texture: When it's small, it merges into a texture.
  • Texture Makes Surface: Realistic surfaces have texture.
  • Mind Separates Inside from Outside: What is object and what is not object.
  • Mind Separates Subject (Figure) From Background: Where attention should go.
• Object: Complete thing
  • Mind Closes on Object: Knowing that an object is.
  • Mind Classifies Object: Broad category of objects.

So what?

When designing visual and other media for use in changing minds consider how they will be understood. Slow down the perception process to see how the person progresses through each stage. Make this process as easy and quick as possible.

An alternative is to deliberately add confusion into the process, for example by making shapes ambiguous. When you make them think, you grab attention, which may then be transferred to the real message you want to put across.

See also

Gestalt Theory