An Investigation into the Applicability of Computer-Synthesised Imagery for the Evaluation of Target Detectability
Abstract
In the course of an earlier study of the influences on an observer's performance in target detectability assessments, the statistical analysis of the data suggested that there was a difference in the influences at work on an observer between the detection of targets in a real scene and the detection of targets in computer-generated (synthetic) images. Since synthetic imagery is increasingly used in this field, this is an important result. The work described in this report is a further analysis of the original data with the aim of studying more closely this difference. Analysis showed that there is indeed a marked difference between the influence of the observers' visual acuity on their performance in the two types of detection task. The reason is that there is less detailed clutter in synthetic images. which alleviates much of the decision-making an observer has to undergo in detecting a target in a real-scene image. in the synthetic case, the target is either seen or not seen and there is much less uncertainty. This uncertainty, which attends real target detection, swamps any measurable influences on an observer's relative performance in the real-scene case. The conclusion is that computer- generated images used for the evaluation of low-contrast target detection should contain much more clutter detail than at present.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Mar 01, 2000
- Accession Number
- ADP010556
Entities
People
- M. Ashforth