Perception of Reality vs. Computer-Graphics

SimonT

Hi,

for a long time I ask myself some questions about: Why sometimes the brain is a bit stupid and sometimes very smart while looking at computer generated graphics. Maybe you guys have knowledge about the psychology of perception and can help me out with some search-words for Google.

EXAMPLE #1
http://10-themes.com/362191.html

When I started gaming most games where pixelated BUT as a child I did NOT even notice. I accepted the pictures beautiful images and didn't bother about the technical limitations. But...why? Shouldn't my brain have told me that I look at very blocky graphic which doesn't look "good"?

EXAMPLE #2
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B9PWZnqIUAEt3Rq.jpg:large

The text in the lower right corner says "Almost in-distinguishable from reality ...", what? I mean for 1984 this is great graphic BUT you only have to look out of the window to see that there's A LOT difference from reality.
I mean we all know this: We look at every gaming-revolution and think "THIS IS PHOTOREALISTIC!!!!1111" and some years later we scratch our heads and can't believe that we liked this low-poly-blurry-texture-stuff from the past.
Why does it seem that the brain "turns off" when it looks at a screen and accepts way more stuff as "looking good" or "photorealistic" than it should? Does technical enthusiasm make us blind?

EXAMPLE #3
http://static02.mediaite.com/themarysue/uploads/2015/12/195121.png

I'm wondering why it's totally OK for the brain to have totally different styles within one image. Here for example we've wonderful painted backgrounds while the characters are reduced to be able to animate them. But why doesn't my brain say that there is a collision between the styles?

EXAMPLE #4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OI_JONTVVuE&feature=youtu.be&t=23s

This is really interesting: Not only that there are letters put directly into the movie-world, no, the Zombie even collides with one! But still, my brain is perfectly able to "see" that these letters are more like a nice graphic effect and no one put "real" paper-letters into the world of the movie. But why am I able to abstract this?

I hope you get what I'm asking myself and maybe some of you guys also had such questions or even better: Answers

Have nice day!
Simon

Bek

1) Kids are dumb
2) Possibly we place an unreasonably high value on something we know to be the best currently available - just because something is "the best yet" doesn't mean it's actually good, but we don't consider that at first.
3) What would you expect the brain to say? What makes a conistent style and is breaking style necessarily 'bad'? How consistent must a style be before we can say it's now something else? (paradox of the heap)
4) Probably because we recognise that cgi is being mixed with a practical effect; we guess at how it was 'done' (as in, that's more likely to be the case rather than all pratical effect).

To expand on #1 which was a somewhat unfair lead, it's more that while young your crtical faculties are still developing, and generally you're less likely to notice flaws that would otherwise snap you out of the fantasy. I remember being able to lose myself in games/books when I was young that I would now consider trivial and boring - but back then my imagination ran rings around my reason (and if that sounds pretentious it's only because I'm using myself as an example; I assume most people would agree that they found it easier to escape into adventures as children)

Noren

SimonT said:

When I started gaming most games where pixelated BUT as a child I did NOT even notice. I accepted the pictures beautiful images and didn't bother about the technical limitations. But...why? Shouldn't my brain have told me that I look at very blocky graphic which doesn't look "good"?

You did distinguish these graphics from reality, it's just that you didn't know yet that computer graphics could e.g. look like Bioshock or Crysis as well. 
You accepted them for what they were. "This is what a computer game looks like."
I wouldn't even say this is necessarily limited to children, though I agree that children have an easier time to create fantasy worlds for themselves. 

Shrike

I remember always being pissed about the clash of simple flat colors for the animated characters and the oil/acryl painted static backgrounds in cartoons as a child.
Second that what Noren said about games

kanga

When you are playing a game you accept a stylized form of reality easily. Just the same as you do when reading a comic book. In fact the most beautiful comics only have an anchor in reality and go beyond it using over the top representation. I enjoy the graphic style of Boarderlands for example for just that reason.

SimonT

Bek said:

Possibly we place an unreasonably high value on something we know to be the best currently available - just because something is "the best yet" doesn't mean it's actually good, but we don't consider that at first.

I guess it's exactly like that and I wonder if there's an psychological term for this.

SHRIKE said:

I remember always being pissed about the clash of simple flat colors for the animated characters and the oil/acryl painted static backgrounds in cartoons as a child.

That's interesting. How is it today? Isn't it interesting that in almost all games the style between characters/props/environment is consistent while it isn't in almost all 2D-animated movies. The only game I know where it is like in a movie is this: http://gamingtrend.com/wp-content/screenshots/ni-no-kuni/Ni-No-Kuni-Town.jpg

KANGA said:

When you are playing a game you accept a stylized form of reality easily. Just the same as you do when reading a comic book.

Yeah it seems that the bain accepts it as own world but when it comes to the rendering from 1984 you can clearly compare it to the real world (which would be hard with a comic which plays in an own universe) but still, people thought it's almonst not distinguishable

Noren

SimonT said:

Yeah it seems that the bain accepts it as own world but when it comes to the rendering from 1984 you can clearly compare it to the real world (which would be hard with a comic which plays in an own universe) but still, people thought it's almonst not distinguishable

Squint your eyes a bit. It's not that bad, especially relative to what people were accustomed to. If you think about it, much of our perception works relative. From our point of view, we see it more absolute and think the baseline is actually a photo. But the baseline were the usual computer graphics.
 And of course a bit of exaggeration plays a role, too. Hype sells hardware and magazines alike, and it's more exciting to take part in that than to be a party pooper. "Now wait a minute, Mister Journalist! I can clearly distinguish this picture from a photo!"