David Long - Featured Faculty 2016

He completed his BS in Chemical Engineering from the University of Texas at Austin, an MS in Materials Science from the University of Rochester, and a PhD in Color Science from Rochester Institute of Technology.

His research in motion picture science, focuses on the crossover between physics and psychology viewers experience when they are subjected to cinema and television displays. For over a century, motion pictures were distributed via film in theaters at 24 still frames per second or via analog video technology on televisions at 30 or 60 frames per second. Specifically, the human perception of reproduced color and apparent motion were consistent and fairly well understood for each system. But future systems are rapidly breaking the old rules. Rather than color being formed by the layering of cyan, magenta and yellow dyes on a piece of film or glowing red, green and blue phosphors on a CRT television screen, new digital displays are increasingly using advanced photonic systems based on lasers, LED and quantum dots. Further, they are capable of providing image refresh rates well above 24 or 60 fps.

But the eye and mind react to these new systems differently than they did to the old. Laser light engines used in projectors promise a greatly increased palette of colors for the screen but they exacerbate natural variability in human color vision. This means individuals will actually interpret the colors in a movie differently based on their own unique physiology. In a marketplace where images and colors on the screen are meticulously controlled by artists, this variability of experience is a big concern. And emerging trends in higher framerate delivery also impact perception, as we learned when Peter Jackson released The Hobbit in 48 fps to theaters. High framerates are known to make images appear sharper and more realistic. But cinema audiences also associate this imagery with cheap or fake production quality, likening it to soap operas or video games. In motion picture science, we work to fully understand the influence of these engineering decisions on human perception in the movies.

David Long
Program Chair and Associate Professor
College of Imaging Arts and Sciences