Seen mode

Safer than Professor Rex's office hours
Post Reply
CrampedEyes
Posts: 1
Joined: Sat Mar 10, 2018 12:09 pm

Seen mode

Post by CrampedEyes »

When in seen mode the space in front appears to elongate as you move faster but the space behind appears to contract.

This feels counter-intuitive to my current understanding of relativity, surely it should be the other way around?
User avatar
testtubegames
Site Admin
Posts: 1148
Joined: Mon Nov 19, 2012 7:54 pm

Re: Seen mode

Post by testtubegames »

I wrote a blog post about this which might make it clearer:

http://testtubegames.com/blog/testtube- ... distances/

The quick version is we can imagine the eye as a pinhole camera, and think about the photons coming in through the pinhole and striking the film/retina. By tracing out the rays, we can see how the angle at which things appear changes as you move.

This site does a good (rigorous) job of explaining what's happening: http://www.spacetimetravel.org/aur/node2.html

It turns out the incoming light from things you're running towards 'scrunches' up towards the front of your field of vision, and makes them appear smaller (aka further away). The reverse happens for things you're moving away from, they get spread out to a larger angle, and thus look closer.

As far as intuition goes - I wish I could help you -- while making the game I found my intuition leading me constantly astray.
Post Reply