Quantifying target distinctness through visual conspicuity

A simple and efficient psychophysical procedure is presented to quantify the visual conspicuity of a target in a complex (natural) scene. Measurements can easily and quickly be performed in the field or in complex environments. Only a few observers (typically 2-3) are needed to achieve sufficient accuracy. The present study shows that this conspicuity measure predicts human visual search performance in realistic and military relevant complex scenario's. Also, conspicuity measured on photographic slides agrees with conspicuity measured in the field. This implies that the new conspicuity measure can be used in combination with photosimulation studies to optimise and evaluate the visual distinctness of displayed information.