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B Julesz

Publications and source records attributed to B Julesz.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources
PubMed1987

Short-range limitation on detection of feature differences.

We studied the ability of observers to detect the presence of a clearly visible line segment against a background of line segments of different orientation. As we increase the number (density) of these background lines, we find that detectability does not behave monotonically. Adding a small number of background lines decreases detectability but if adjacent line segments are permitted to fall in close range, a further increase of background lines improves performance which eventually reaches a constant level. This suggests that detection of feature differences involves a short-range process. The range of this process is about two degrees or twice the length of the line segments used. Thus texture-gradients between different elements are only formed if the distance between these elements is not much larger than the average element size.

Form Perception↗
PubMed1986

Texton gradients: the texton theory revisited.

A brief outline of the texton theory was given in several review papers (Julesz and Bergen 1983; Julesz 1984a, b, 1985) without going into details. Here a more complete version of the texton theory is presented, with emphasis on the critical distances within which the density of textons is determined by the preattentive system. Particularly some recent findings by Sagi and Julesz (1985a, b) influenced the current version of the texton theory. The stimuli are restricted to drawings composed of line segments that permit a precise definition of neighborhoods and distances to which the line segments and texture elements have to be confined in order to quality for preattentive texture discrimination. These critical distances and the aperture of focal attention are scaled by the average size of the texture elements. Furthermore, it is stressed that even when the stimuli are restricted to line segments, the blobs outlined by line segments behave like textons. The preattentive system ignores the exact shape of these blobs, but is sensitive to their average width, length, and orientation.

Attention↗
PubMed1985

"Where" and "what" in vision.

The mixture of a few horizontal and vertical line segments embedded in an aggregate of diagonal line segments can be rapidly counted and their positions rapidly determined by a parallel (preattentive) process. However, the discrimination between horizontal and vertical orientation (that is, discrimination of a single conspicuous feature) requires serial search by focal attention. Under recent theories of attention, focal attention has been assumed to be required for the recognition of different combinations of features. According to the findings of this experiment, knowing "what" even a single feature is requires time-consuming search by focal attention. Only knowing "where" a target it is mediated by a parallel process.

Attention↗
PubMed1985

Cooperative and non-cooperative processes of apparent movement of random-dot cinematograms.

In this study, we investigated the cooperative and non-cooperative models of stereopsis on apparent movement of the short-range process using spatial frequency filtered random-dot cinematograms. Our results showed that when spatial frequencies were below 4 cycles/degree, maximum displacement (dmax) was decreasing (linearly) with increasing mean frequencies, but at 4 cycles/degree and above dmax stayed constant. For low frequencies, non-cooperative models such as Marr and Poggio's could explain these findings, but not for frequencies above 4 cycles/degree. However, in a previous study we found that the average cooperative neighbourhood for apparent movement of the short-range process is 15 arc min. This fortuitous agreement on 4 cycles/degree could suggest that dmax being constant at frequencies above 4 cycles is related to a cooperative process.

Depth Perception↗
PubMed1985

Fast noninertial shifts of attention.

It was suggested that some discrimination tasks (e.g. discrimination between the letters T and L) require serial search by scrutinizing each letter (target) with a small aperture of focal attention. Here we examine the effect of intertarget distance on discrimination performance, using two targets. We find reduction in performance at short distances, in agreement with masking studies, but constant performance independent of distance outside this masking region. This constant performance is still lower than expected from masking effects and might reflect attentive process. Sequential presentation of the targets with delays up to 30-40 ms, while reducing available processing time, does not cause reduction in performance, thus supporting the suggestion that discrimination of the two targets is a serial process. The independence of performance on distance suggests fast noninertial shifts of attention.

Attention↗
PubMed1984

Cooperative phenomena in apparent movement perception of random-dot cinematograms.

To determine if apparent movement perception of random-dot cinematograms (RDC) is a cooperative process, we examined the interaction between adjacent areas whose movement, when perceived independently, was in opposite directions. The stimulus contained alternating ambiguous and unambiguous horizontal random-dot stripes of equal width. The ambiguous areas were biased in a specific direction opposite to the movement of the unambiguous areas. The cooperative process was evaluated by noting that the unambiguous areas were able to reverse the perceived direction of the ambiguous areas. Thus all dots were seen to move uniformly in the unambiguous direction. This phenomenon was dependent on the amount of bias inserted in the ambiguous areas and the width of the stripes. A Cooperative Strength (CS) index was computed. We found that CS depended on the stripe width, and that the average cooperative neighborhood was about 15 min arc in visual angle, suggesting a relationship to the diameter of cortical hypercolumns.

Form Perception↗
PubMed1984

Binocular disparity modulation sensitivity to disparities offset from the plane of fixation.

Corrugated disparity gratings mounted on depth pedestals were portrayed with random-dot stereograms in order to measure the cyclopean disparity modulation transfer function at various offsets from fixation. We found changes in both sensitivity as well as shape as the magnitude of the pedestal varied. Threshold disparity modulation amplitude curves, plotted as a function of corrugation frequency, became narrower and shifted toward lower frequencies as pedestal size increased. There were stable asymmetries between sensitivities to crossed and uncrossed pedestals; these could be accounted for by assuming each observer to have a constant fixation disparity on the order of 5' of arc.

Depth Perception↗
PubMed1984

Detection versus discrimination of visual orientation.

The role of focused attention in vision is examined. Recent theories of attention hypothesize that serial search by focal attention is required for discrimination between different combinations of features. Experiments are reported which show that the mixture of a few (less than five) horizontal and vertical line segments embedded in an aggregate of diagonal line segments can be rapidly counted (also called 'subitizing') by a parallel (preattentive) process, while the discrimination between horizontal and vertical orientation requires serial search by shifting focal attention to each line segment. Thus detecting and counting targets that differ in orientation can be done in parallel by a preattentive process, whereas knowing 'what' the orientation of a target is (horizontal or vertical, ie of a single conspicuous feature) requires a serial search by focal attention.

Attention↗
PubMed1983

Displacement limits, directional anisotropy and direction versus form discrimination in random-dot cinematograms.

Apparent motion mediated by the short-range process was studied. Random-dot cinematograms were used to determine the maximum displacement (dmax) for motion-direction and pattern discrimination. dmax is the maximum spatial separation between a correlated region (target) in the two successively presented random-dot images, when observers can correctly identify the direction of motion or the shape of the target. We have found that: (1) dmax for motion-direction discrimination increases with the square root of the display area; (2) dmax is invariant with eccentricities of 4 deg arc; (3) For rectangular targets and brief presentations, dmax increases with increases of that target-dimension which is parallel to the orientation of the movement. These findings indicate that short-range movement perception is an orientation specific global process. Furthermore, motion-direction discrimination and pattern discrimination of random-dot cinematograms may be mediated by different levels of processes. However, even for pattern discrimination dmax in visual angle increases with increased target area.

Discrimination, Psychological↗
PubMed1983

Displacement limits for spatial frequency filtered random-dot cinematograms in apparent motion.

Two-dimensional band-pass filtered random-dot cinematograms were used to study apparent movement mediated by the short-range process. In the first experiment maximum displacement (dmax) for correct direction of movement was measured for symmetrically filtered low-pass, medium-pass, and high-pass images. dmax was found to be limited by the grain size in the image and increased with the target area. Since eccentric presentation had no effect on dmax, the increase of dmax with target area suggests that apparent movement perception is a global process. In the second experiment the stimulus was filtered differentially in the two orthogonal directions using cone filtering. dmax was found to be commensurate with the length of the clusters in the direction of the movement.

Form Perception↗
PubMed1983

Eye movements and neural remapping during fusion of misaligned random-dot stereograms.

Fender and Julesz [J. Opt. Soc. Am. 57, 819 (1967)] found that fused retinally stabilized binocular line targets could be misaligned on the two retinas in the temporalward direction by at least 30 min of arc without loss of fusion and stereopsis and that random-dot stereograms could be misaligned 2 deg before fusion was lost. To test these results in normal vision, we recorded eye motions of four observers while they viewed a random-dot stereogram that subtended about 10 deg. The observers misaligned overlaid vectograph stereo images by moving them apart in a temporalward direction until fusion was lost. They then returned the vectographs to the overlaid position. Throughout this cycle the observers reported at frequent intervals if they could perceive strong or weak depth, loss of depth, or loss of fusion. For some observers the image separation could be increased to 5 deg beyond parallel before fusion was lost. The visual axes diverged to follow the image centers and varied from overconverged to overdiverged with respect to the image centers while the observers still reported depth and fusion. We call the difference between the image separation and eye vergence the vergence error. If a vergence error persisted for at least 10 sec without loss of the percepts of fusion and depth, we postulate that neutral remapping occurred that compensated for the retinal misalignment. We found that the average maximum neural remapping was 3.0 deg.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Adult↗
PubMed1981

Development of stereopsis and cortical binocularity in human infants: electrophysiological evidence.

Dynamic random-dot stereograms and correlograms were used to elicit visually evoked brain potentials from human infants, and these potentials were compared with potentials evoked by classical checkerboard pattern reversal. The results indicate that infants begin to produce stereoscopically evoked potentials at the age of 10 to 19 weeks, several weeks after showing classical checkerboard-evoked potentials, and suggest that the onset of cortical binocularity precedes stereopsis.

Age Factors↗