Negative Afterimages From Flicker-Augmented Colors

Abstract

A patch that alternates between two hues such as dark green and light blue looks greenish on a light gray surround and bluish on a dark gray surround (“flicker-augmented contrast”). Thus, when an edge alternates between two hues in the same location, the visual system selects the more salient hue—the one with the higher Michelson contrast. However, the afterimage is the same pink, driven by the time integral of the physical, not the perceptual, adapting hues and regardless of the surround luminance. So the process of edge biasing does not transfer to the mechanism that creates afterimages.