
How Do We See Art: An Eye-Tracker Study (2011) - sebg
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3170918/
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SuperPaintMan
Excellent study, giving a measure to the hard to define area of composition.
This eye-movement study confirms a few principles of composition, such as gaze
following the direction of various figures (Rembrandt), movement along high-
contrast lines (chiaroscuro), movement between chromatic patches (Mondrian
studies), focus resting on areas of greater detail (Molina). In the non-square
format works you can also see that gaze follows generally along the longest
axis, the portrait aspect of the last piece helps drive the gaze up the
central axis. These principles are taught, but rarely understood. It becomes a
trained instinct to analyze the composition of a work and exploit it in a
practice.

Another thing I see in this data is a sense of inertia with sight-line. Eyes
in motion, prefer to keep moving and seem to gloss over small details to the
bigger compositional director. When slowed, these details are observed and the
larger compositional elements ignored. Neat!

>Eye-tracking recordings were done in 10 subjects (six male, four female; age
23–34) sitting comfortably in front of a 24 inches computer screen, at a
distance of about 70 cm, in which different images were shown for 1 min each.
Images were digital reproductions (size 1024 × 768 pixels) of original and
modified art pieces. My only issue with this approach is that it does not take
into account the scale of the work, impasto techniques, light effects or the
change in medium (paintings are scanned differently than a typical monitor
would, the screen frame may introduce bias).

Overall interesting data.

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lifeisstillgood
Years ago I stuck my head in an eye tracker at the National portrait gallery
in London, and advised ahead of time I tried hard just to stare at the first
things I saw.

I saw a nice constable-esque painting of two children. And then I sat back and
... There was a damn cat in the foreground, huge, how did I miss it!

The screen afterwards showed dots where my eyes focused, and I had bullet
holes all over the faces of the two kids - but had completely avoided the rest
of the painting (as advised). And yeah - my brain had just not bothered
noticing the damn cat.

It has stayed with me for years - if you get a chance do it just to remind
yourself how much of the world we see is stitched together.

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throwaway049
I came to ask if anyone had put eye trackers in public galleries so thanks for
posting this. I hope it is still there.

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mturmon
Don't miss the results from the modified Mondrian paintings in Figures 2 and
3. They recolor one of his block paintings and discover the eye saccade
pattern changes a lot.

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HerpDerpLerp
If my experience is anything to go by it is 90% reading the little explanation
written next to the art, then 10% looking at the painting before hurrying onto
the next thing.

