Biographie

Jay-neitz
Jay Neitz in partnership with his wife, Maureen, has used colorblindness in primates as a model for exploring the potential of curing vision problems in humans with gene therapy. They have successfully added a third type of cone pigment to dichromatic retinas using viral vector mediated gene transfer. The process by which adult animals receiving this treatment gained a new dimension of color sensation may recapitulate the evolution of color vision in primates. The Neitzes are in the Department of Ophthalmology at the University of Washington in Seattle. They were formerly faculty members at the Medical College of Wisconsin. Jay and Maureen both received PhDs from the University of California in Santa Barbara.

Abstract: How the World Became Coloured—The Evolution of Hue Perception In Primates

Nearly 40 years ago, in his book “Human Color Vision,” Boynton wrote “The chromatic code of the visual nervous system is incomplete and difficult to interpret;” however, a series of recent discoveries are providing the missing puzzle pieces needed to complete a picture of the diversity of ganglion cell types involved in primate color vision and their varied functions. Boynton proposed a model that, in its simplest form, has just two color channels, red-green (RG) comparing L vs. M cones and blue-yellow (BY) comparing S-cones to the other two types. Neurobiological explanations of color vision have focused on the two ganglion cell types that most closely correspond to the channels Boynton described, small bistratified for BY and midget ganglion cells with L vs. M opponency for RG. However, in contrast to this simple idea, recent evidence suggests that there are many ganglion cell types and subtypes in the primate retina that carry color information. These have appeared at vastly different times over the history of the evolution of vertebrates, they project to several different places in the brain and serve a variety purposes. Many appeared before mammals evolved; including color coded ganglion cells involved in the modulation of sleep and mood, guidance of movements, detection and object segmentation. In contrast, based on recent results we suggest that four specific types of chromatically coded ganglion cells evolved exclusively in primates for the uniquely anthropoid function of assigning blue, yellow, red and green colors to objects for use in identification and classification.



Biographie

david-kremer
David Kremer ist Geschäftsführer der Kremer Pigmente GmbH & Co. KG. In zweiter Generation führt er das 1977 gegründete Familienunternehmen zusammen mit seinem Vater Dr. Georg Kremer. Zusammen sind sie ständig auf der Suche nach neuen Farbnuancen quer durch Europa. An mehr als 60 Fundstätten graben sie nach Erden und Mineralien.
Das familiengeführte, mittelständische Unternehmen hat sich auf die Herstellung und den Vertrieb seltener und historischer Pigmente spezialisiert. Die in der Farbmühle in Aichstetten im Allgäu beheimatete Firma ist Weltmarktführer im Bereich der Pigmente für die Denkmalpflege, Restaurierung und die anspruchsvolle Malerei. Durch die Entwicklung von Spezialprodukten bedient Kremer Pigmente weitere Nischenmärkte in diesem Bereich.

Abstract: Didaktik der Pigmente – eine Einführung

Ausgehend von einer Begriffsklärung des Wortes Pigment werden die verschiedenen Pigmentklassen erarbeitet. Die anorganischen Pigmente werden in der Unterteilung natürliche Erden, natürliche Mineralien, synthetische anorganische Pigmente und Gläser in ihren charakteristischen Vertretern vorgestellt. Die organischen Pigmente werden als natürliche und als synthetische organische Pigmente vorgestellt, sowie einige Beispiele von Pigmenten, welche in ihren Eigenschaften verschiedenen Gruppen gleichzeitig angehören.
Besondere Eigenschaften der Oberfläche, der chemischen Stabilität und der Lichtechtheit werden bei geeigneten Vertretern angesprochen. Unter anderem wird Dr. Georg Kremer über Ocker, Purpur, Indigo, Krappwurzeln und Smalte sprechen.



Biographie

Bach-Michael2
Prof. Dr. Michael Bach ist Professor für Neurobiophysik am Universitäts- Augenklinikum Freiburg und leitet dort die Sektion Funktionelle Sehforschung, Elektrophysiologie. Er ist Präsident der International Society for Clinical Electrophysiology of Vision (ISCEV) und Schriftführer des Kunstvereins Gundelfingen. Zu seinen Forschungsschwerpunkten gehören das Sehsystem des Menschen und elektrophysiologische Diagnostik von Augenerkrankungen. Er erhielt 2006 den Elfriede-Aulhorn-Preis für seine Forschungen im Bereich der Physiologie und Pathophysiologie des Sehens sowie der Neuroophthalmologie.

Abstract: Is all colour illusory?

Sind alle Farben nur Täuschung?

“All perception is illusion” has some grain of truth, but is not very conducive to understanding. However, in the case of colour, “out there” are only spectra of incident light, absorbance and reflectance. Very little of this rich information remains after passing through our three cone types. Yet our perceptual apparatus creates out of this stable categories, which we call colours, which can be consistently communicated and reflect stable object properties even under widely varying illumination (colour constancy). The wide variability of colour naming across cultures indicates that there is more to colour than just physiology. And indeed the poetry of colour can deeply touch our innermost. My talk will will not be at the cutting edge of science but rather introduce a little to our understanding of colour vision, demonstrate that we are all –somewhat– colour blind, and pursue many beautiful factors that affect our perception of colour.

“Alles war wir wahrnehmen ist eine Täuschung” – da ist was dran, aber es hilft nicht viel wenn wir unsere Wahrnehmung besser verstehen wollen. Bei Farbe ist aber die “innere Konstruktion” besonders deutlich: “Da draußen” sind nur Spektren von Beleuchtung, Absorption und Reflektion; davon bleibt nur wenig Information übrig, wenn das Licht unsere 3 Zapfentypen aktiviert hat. Und doch schafft es unser Wahrnehmungsapparat, daraus Kategorien, eben die Farben, zu konstruieren und zu kommunizieren, die Objekteigenschaften stabil repräsentieren auch unter stark variierender Beleuchtungsspektren (Farbkonstanz). Die große Varianz der Farbkategorien über Weltkulturen hinweg verdeutlicht, dass zu Farbe mehr gehört als reine Physiologie; auch kann uns die Poesie der Farben besonders tief berühren. Mein Vortrag wird nicht neueste wissenschaftliche Erkenntnisse vermitteln, sondern etwas in das Verständnis des Farbensehens einführen, demonstrieren, dass wir alle in gewissem Maße farbenblind sind, und mannigfache und schöne Einflussfaktoren auf unsere Farbwahrnehmung vorführen.



Biographie

Bevil Conway
Bevil Conway is Professor of Neuroscience at Wellesley College in the United States.
He is a visual neuroscientist and artist who studies the neural basis of color using physiological, behavioral, and modeling techniques. His laboratory uses a range of techniques, including fMRI-guided microelectrode recording and microstimulation in awake-behaving non-human primates trained to perform visual tasks, along with psychophysics and fMRI in humans, and computational modeling, to define and test hypotheses relating physiology and perception. In addition to maintaining an active studio practice, Prof. Conway is involved in ongoing projects at the interface of visual neuroscience, visual art, and the practice of making art. He teaches core courses in the Neuroscience program and an advanced interdisciplinary laboratory course, Vision and Art: Physics, Physiology, Perception, and Practice.
His artwork has been published in several books including Vision and Art (Abrams, 2002) and Brain and Visual Perception (Oxford University Press, 2004), and has been used by BOSE Wave Radio in advertising. A major solo show of his work, 'FACTS', took place at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study in 2010/2011. The work is held in several private collections in Europe, Africa and North America and is in the public collection of the Fogg Museum and the Boston Public Library, and on semi-permanent exhibit at the N.I.H. He is currently working on a series of drawings and etchings, a 'Rake's Progress', exploring mark-making and movement, inspired by Mark Morris's Dancers.

Abstract: How Colour Language Reflects Usefulness of Colour

The question of color categorization has long been caught in the crossfire between universality and cultural relativism. Color categories across languages are somewhat consistent, suggesting a common basis in physiology. But the variability between languages, and the lack of physiological or other causal evidence, promote the alternative idea that languages are constitutive of color categories. I will attempt to reconcile these positions through an analysis of a new, extensive, well-controlled dataset on color-naming in three diverse groups: the Tsimane’, a hunter-gatherer isolate in the Amazon; Bolivian Spanish speakers; and English speakers near Boston. These data resolve widespread methodological concerns about the World Color Survey (WCS), and license an analysis of this impressive dataset covering 110 languages to determine how successfully people can communicate color. Despite a large range of average communicative efficiency across languages, we discovered remarkable within-language consistency: in all languages communication was best for warm colors (yellows/reds), rather than cool colors (blues/greens). We show that the communicative efficiency of a given color is predicted by the frequency with which salient objects have that color—in natural images, we found that objects tend to be warm-colored against cool-colored backgrounds; this relationship was true for natural objects as well as artificially colored objects. These results suggest that the color terms across languages are driven by the common goal to optimize communication about colors of likely relevance. In additional experiments, in Tsimane’, Bolivian Spanish, and English, we assessed memory color for familiar objects and labeling of real-world objects. The results support the idea that the overall communicative efficiency of a language is determined by the extent to which color is generally useful for the culture. Together, the results provide the first explanation of the most basic, universal color categorization, and show how this single mechanism—usefulness—can also account for the variance among color-naming systems.



Biographie

maria3
Dr. Maria Olkkonen works as a lecturer at the Department of Psychology at Durham University in the UK, and as an Academy research fellow at the University of Helsinki in Finland.
She received an M.A. in psychology from the University of Helsinki in 2004, writing her master's thesis on the interaction between brightness and color information in the simultaneous contrast illusion. Working with Dr. Pentti Laurinen on her master's thesis instilled in her an excitement about using psychophysics as a rirogous tool to study psychological processes and neural computation. After working in corporate research for a while at the Nokia Research Center, she decided to go back to academia and was offered a PhD studentship with Prof. Karl Gegenfurtner at the University of Giessen where she received her PhD in 2009. To learn more about color and material constancy, she then moved to Philadelphia to work with Prof. David Brainard at UPenn. While in Philadelphia, she also worked with Prof. Sarah Allred at Rutgers on the relationship between color memory and perception, and finally did a two-year project in Prof. Russell Epstein's lab learning about fMRI adaptation and MVPA methods. She has been in Durham since September 2015.

Abstract: Colour Memory

Department of Psychology, Durham University Institute of Behavioural Sciences, University of Helsinki Humans perceive the colors of objects in a relatively stable manner regardless of widely varying viewing conditions – an ability called color constancy. According to a common suggestion emanating from a Bayesian theory of vision, the visual system uses constraints from prior knowledge to infer object properties from noisy sensory inputs.
However, very little is known about how this knowledge is learned from the visual input, and how it is used in visual estimation tasks. I will talk about how object knowledge is learned from visual input for color, how it is used by human observers in noisy color estimation tasks, and how it interacts with well-known color context effects. I will present a quantitative framework in which learning, memory, and perception can be considered jointly, reflecting the structure of natural tasks. I will argue that to understand color perception in the real world, all of these processes need to be considered together.



Biographie

news-profhurlbert-alumni
Anya Hurlbert is a Professor of Visual Neuroscience at the Newcastle University in the UK.
Her background is in physics, medicine and neuroscience, with her higher education and early career research experience taking place on both sides of the Atlantic. She graduated from Princeton University in 1980 with a BA in Physics, followed in 1981 by a Part III Diploma in Theoretical Physics and in 1982 an MA in Physiology from Cambridge University, where she held a Marshall Scholarship. In 1989, she received a PhD in Brain and Cognitive Sciences from MIT, where she studied with Tomaso Poggio and Peter Schiller, and in 1990, an MD from Harvard Medical School. She then held a Vision Research Fellowship at Oxford University in Andrew Parker’s lab, before joining Physiological Sciences in the Faculty of Medical Sciences at Newcastle University in 1991 as a lecturer.

Having moved from Physiological Sciences to Psychology, she became acting Head of the Division of Psychology, Brain and Behaviour (Faculty of Science, Agriculture and Engineering) in 2003, and interim Head in 2007, helping to create the new School of Psychology in the Faculty of Medical Sciences. In 2004, she co-founded the Institute of Neuroscience with the late Professor Colin Ingram, and was co-Director of the Institute until 2014. In 2012, they established the Centre for Translational Systems Neuroscience with a Capital Award from the Wellcome Trust.

Abstract: The Colour of Paintings in a Contemporary Light

People tend to think of colour as an intrinsic property of objects – red apples, yellow bananas, green grass – not as the subjective, variable, perceptual phenomenon which it is. Paradoxically, the variability of colour arises partly from colour constancy, a stabilising mechanism by which the brain compensates for changes in the illumination spectra on objects. Although colour constancy is universal, the weightings people give to different components of the mechanism, and hence the overall strength of constancy, vary between individuals. As a result, striking differences in reported colour may emerge when the illumination spectrum changes or is ambiguous – as in #thedress.

Here I will discuss the role that colour constancy plays in people’s perception of paintings, both in terms of the artist’s intent in capturing the constant colour of objects (as in Moroni’s Portrait of a Lady) or the effects of changing illumination spectrum (as in Monet’s series paintings), and in terms of the illumination spectrum under which people view the paintings. For the latter, I will review experiments in which people view artworks illuminated by dynamically changing light from a bank of tuneable LED light sources, demonstrating, as in #thedress, that the colours people see in paintings vary widely. These experiments also highlight the fact that the colours we see, and the constancy with which we see them, must evolve along with the technology that enables new and ever-changing illuminations.



Biographie

karlraps
Karl Gegenfurtner studied Psychology at Regensburg University. Subsequently he obtained a Ph.D. degree from New York University, where he also spent his first PostDoc. In 1993 he moved to the Max-Planck-Institute for biological cybernetics in Tübingen, where he obtained his Habilitation in 1998 and a Heisenberg-Fellowship in the same year. In 2000 he moved to the University of Magdeburg and in 2001 to Giessen University, where he since then holds a full professorship for Psychology. The emphasis of Karl Gegenfurtner’s research is on information processing in the visual system. Specifically, he is concerned with the relationship between low level sensory processes, higher level visual cognition, and sensorimotor integration.
Karl Gegenfurtner is the head of the DFG Collaborative Research Center TRR 135 on the “Cardinal mechanisms of perception”. He was elected into the National Academy of Science Leopoldina in 2015.

Abstract: Mechanism of colour perception: From cones to cognition via constancy

The first stages of color vision are well understood. The spectral absorption functions of the cones in the retina have been standardized and even the genetic basis of individual variability is known. The second-stage, cone-opponent circuits of bipolar and ganglion cells has been characterized at the computational, anatomical and functional levels. However, the contributions color makes to high level vision and cognition are less well established. I will argue that there are mainly two functions of color in higher level vision. First, color makes a tremendous contribution to segmenting objects from their background, leading to quicker recognition of scenes and objects. Second, color contributes to visual memory, leading to better recall of scenes and objects, a function that is crucially mediated by color constancy.



Biographie

csm_euler-thomas-02_ccda01dafc
Thomas Euler studied Biology at the University of Mainz, where he obtained a PhD degree (Dr. rer. nat.) in 1996. He conducted both his diploma and PhD work at the Max-Planck Institute for Brain Research in Frankfurt/Main. In 1997 he went to Boston, MA, for his first postdoc at the Massachusetts General Hospital and the Harvard Medical School. In 2000, he moved back to Germany and started as a project leader at the Department of Biomedical Optics of the Max-Planck Institute for Medical Research in Heidelberg. In 2006, he became a research group leader at the Department of Biomedical Optics. Between 2007 and 2009, he was offered professorships in Erlangen and Heidelberg, before moving to the Centre for Integrative Neuroscience of the University of Tübingen, where he since holds a full professorship for Ophthalmic Research at the Centre for Ophthalmology. Since 2015, he is coordinating the EC-funded training network “ITN switchBoard”.
Thomas Euler’s research focus is the functional organization of retinal microcircuits, aimed at a better understanding of the underlying computational principles. Furthermore, he is interested in how microcircuits change during retinal degeneration.

Abstract: Seeing with the Eyes of Mice

Seeing with the Eyes of Mice. Mice are not the first animals that come to mind when thinking of colour vision. Mice are certainly no colour specialists but like most mammals, mice feature two spectral types of cone opsins, a medium (M, "green") and a short (S, "UV/blue") wavelength sensitive opsin. Mice are, thus, dichromates - as confirmed by behavioural experiments. In addition, the mouse retina displays an odd specialization that one would expect to hamper colour vision at least in the ventral retina: a dorso-ventral gradient of cone opsin co-expression that renders ventral M-cones UV/blue-sensitive. In my talk, I will review the chromatic circuits in the mouse retina and discuss what functional role the opsin gradient might have in mouse vision.



Biographie

axel_venn
Der Farbexperte, Künstler und Designer flaniert zwischen den Welten von Wahrnehmung, Wirkung und Realität. Seine farbforscherischen Arbeiten zielen auf die Entschlüsselung semantisch-semiotischer Botschaften. Ein Großteil seiner Tätigkeit widmet er dem wissenschaftsfundierten, strategischen Trendscouting und den Auswirkungen auf die Gesellschaft, die Ökonomie und das Design. Seit Jahrzehnten ist er Vortragsgast in Deutschland und rund um die Welt. Axel Venn ist em. Professor für Farbgestaltung an der Hochschule für angewandte Wissenschaft und Kunst, Hildesheim und ein Ehrenvorsitzender des Deutschen Farbenzentrums e.V.. Seine 25 Bücher über Farbe und Gestaltung sind bisher in 12 Sprachen übersetzt. Er lebt und arbeitet in Berlin.

Abstract: Marketing mit Ewigkeits-Appeal. Giga-Trends als Option für langfristige Gestaltungsoptionen.

Es geht um Design- und Architektur-Konzepte, deren Profile zum kollektiven, internationalen Kommunikationswerkzeug der kommenden Jahrzehnte gehören werden. Die kommerziell formulierten Leitappelle nutzen eine Art Farbe-Form-Esperanto als Verständigungsmittel.
Neueste Beispiele aus unterschiedlichsten, internationalen Anspruchsebenen und Funktionsbereichen sollen die folgenden Thesen illustrieren.

Die Gigatrends der Gegenwart und der näheren und weiteren Zukunft bedienen immer häufiger archaisch anmutende dessinatorische Grundmuster. Sie nutzen u.a. altbekannte Vorbilder der vorklassischen morgenländischen Stadtkulturen von mäandrierenden Lineaturen, Flechtwerken und Überkreuzungen bis hin zu verschlungenen Gewirke-Konstrukten. Das geschieht in gleicher Weise in der Produkt-Architektur in Form differenzierter Flächengebilde: Das ehemals klein bis mikroskopisch Abgebildete dehnt sich zu makroskopisch aufgeblasenen, plastischen Strukturen aus.

Gleichzeitig erleben wir eine veritable Renaissance metallisch geprägter
Farb-, Glanz- und Griff-Anmutungen. Silber-, Gold- und Platin-Oberflächen, sowie zuhauf genutzte Skulptur-Fragmente in Bronze und Messing gehören genauso zum kommenden Zeitgeist wie die nimmersatte Sehnsucht nach konventionellen, jahrhundertelang zitierten Farb- und Form-Metaphern. Die Innovationscharakteristik manifestiert sich nicht mehr durch den schnellstmöglichen Überraschungscoup, sondern in der Verstetigung tradierter Wertanmutungen oder: „Das Alte ist das Neue“. Und:
„Zukunftsträume wechseln die Richtung“.



Biographie

daniel_sammans
Geboren 1968 in Düsseldorf, macht Daniel Samanns seine ersten photographischen Erfahrungen im Bereich Mode, Werbung und Still-life. Anfang der Neunziger noch ganz analog, ab 1997 dann völlig digital. Nach der bunten Welt der Werbung wechselt er in den Journalismus. Von 1996 bis 2000 ist er Photograph beim Axel-Springer-Verlag. Zunaechst in Düsseldorf, dann in München. Bei der ddp-Nachrichtenagentur arbeitet er seit dem Jahr 2000. Als Gründungsmitglied der erfolgreichen Münchner Photogalerie Pantarhei kuratiert und organisiert er von 1999 bis 2002 vielbeachtete Ausstellungen. Von 2002 bis 2007 ist er freier Photojournalist bei Focus Magazin, während er zusaetzlich Ressort übergreifende Auftragsarbeiten und Reportagen für Magazine und Illustrierte ausführt. Nach einem Jahr Bildberichterstattung mit Auslandsreportagen in Südost-Asien, landet er 2008 in Berlin, wo er als Photo- und Video-Journalist arbeitet. Seine Leidenschaft für die Kollodium-Nassplatten-Photographie (Wet-Plate-Process) lässt ihn seit 2011 nicht mehr los.
Um das kulturelle photographische Erbe am Leben zu erhalten, ist Daniel Samanns seit 2013 als freier Dozent taetig.
Das Interesse an Samanns´ kuenstlerischer Arbeit waechst ebenso . Ausstellungs-Anfragen, Portrait- und Spezial-Auftraege mit dieser Technik mehren sich seither.

Abstract: Autochrome. The Vital Process

Die Gebrüder Lumière brachten Autochrome 1907 auf den Markt, das erste ernstzunehmende farbfotografische Verfahren verbreitete sich rasch, verschwand aber mit der Kleinbildfotografie Ende der 1930er Jahre. Das komplizierte Autochrom gilt heute als eine verschollene Technik. Vor dem Hintergrund der intendierten Neuentdeckung, resümiert der Vortrag die Ergebnisse der "freien" Forschungsarbeit des Fotografen Daniel Samanns und des Physikers Julien Fière. Die deutsch-französische Kooperation hat sich zum Ziel gesetzt, die autochrome Technik wissenschaftlich zu entschlüsseln und sie für die zeitgenössische analoge Fotografie des 21. Jahrhunderts praktikabel zu machen. Angefangen bei der stillen Betrachtung der piktoralistischen Autochrome, den ersten "Farb-Diapositiven" der Gebrüder Lumière mit ihren unzähligen farbigen Stärkekörnern, bis hin zur archaischen, tonnenschweren punktuellen Pressung der Körner auf kleinsten Flächen der Glasplatten: Der Vortrag vermittelt ein tieferes Verständnis für Zusammenhänge und praktische Unwägbarkeiten – gleichsam als mögliche Lösungswege zur Herstellung von Autochromen und zur Wieder-Entdeckung des Verfahrens an sich.



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