xkcd anaglyph
by JackDesBwa 2021-07-11 06:28
This is a drawing in the surreal and nerdy style of the famous xkcd webcomic (https://xkcd.com/).
Megan is presenting a graph showing the transmission spectra of the filters of her anaglyph glasses along with the sensibility response of the cone cells which play a major role in the detection of colors in our eyes. The spectra show the quantity (in relative value) of light that the filters transmit or the cones detect for each electromagnetic wavelength of the visible light. Anaglyph is a stereoscopic viewing method first described in 1853 (though it used different colors than today) that uses colored filters to separate the left and right image for each eye with glasses in order to show depth (black and white work well, but the colors of a colored image are altered in the process). Since the peaks of sensibility do not correspond to maximal transmission zones of the filters, she wrongly concludes that anaglyph cannot work despite the evidence that many people use it with success. The absurdness is enhanced by the fact that she is wearing anaglyph glasses for her presentation that are not needed and will prevent her to see the graph correctly, and by the unexpected question coming from the public.
The graph is based on real data: the transmission values were measured on a real anaglyph pair of glasses with a spectrophotometer and the sensibility of the cone cells was taken from http://www.cvrl.org/cones.htm
-- 2021-07-10, drawing
Comments
JackDesBwa 2021-07-11 18:35
Perhaps it could have been: "Anyway screens cannot display yellows, reds or purples: their red spectrum is too far on the right. However, phylogenetics shows that this mistake was introduced more recently in the evolution.".
Bill Costa 2021-07-11 13:27
As a long-time fan of "xkcd" I have to say you really got it right both in terms of the art work and the humor. At first I thought this was an actual previously published xkcd comic that I had somehow managed to have missed. It wasn't until I read the comment underneath that I realized it was your own creation. Add to that the 'explainer', the only thing you missed was the second punch line being revealed with a mouse over. Of course I understand the technical reason why you could not do that. I am keeping a copy of this (both anaglyph and side-by-side) with my own personal archive of favorite xkcd comics. Thanks for creating and sharing this!
JackDesBwa 2021-07-11 13:07
Thanks KenK. It is totally intended. ☺
Ken Kovar 2021-07-11 11:57
Very good! Your explanation is similar to what I find at https://www.explainxkcd.com too.