Yesterday a colleague Pratik Naik posted a gif of an interesting phenomenon, which coincidently illustrates an issue I have been having (at least it appears to be). When you shoot a job with thousands of images it’s sometimes paramount to quickly view and flag or pick the good ones. Some people even start with quickly rejecting the bad ones. This .gif is a good reason why you shouldn’t start with deleting the bad ones.

In the above .gif focus your eyes on the crosshairs in the center and don't move them. What do you see happen and what do you see in your peripheral vision? Please note that this works best if you are viewing from a computer monitor and not a phone.

So here is why I think this .gif explains my problem. I often will go through a job very quickly with my finger on the X button (reject in Lightroom) and another on a rating number (1-5). Often times I will see something I love while quickly scrolling through and then go back to the image for a closer look several seconds later. Upon backing up to the photo, I don’t see what I originally saw, or it looks different if I stare at every part of the photo, or I simply can't find the photo at all. I’ve always thought I was somewhat crazy or this issue was perhaps unique to me. I guess I am not special.

I have also seen this in other situations while working on set as a digital tech with Rob Grimm. As a digital tech I sit at a Mac Pro with a 30 inch Monitor and manage the software and scroll trough the catalogue for art directors, clients, and of course the photographer. Often times this is of 30-40 images that are just barely different from one another with minor changes in light, prop, or product position. I’ve always noticed if I scroll through the images too quickly someone will shout “Go Back to the one with the ____________” and I won’t be able to find what they saw and neither can they.

Very strange indeed. Another colleague here at Fstoppers Rich Meade then explained that this could be the result of a phenomenon described as Persistence of Vision, which is described as "The phenomenon of the eye by which an afterimage is thought to persist for approximately one twenty-fifth of a second on the retina."

Could it be that our brain blends together images if we scroll through them too quickly? Have I been picking, or even deleting, images I shouldn't have because I scroll through them too quickly?

I'm corn fuzzed here people, what do you think?