Lighting factors affecting the visibility of a moving display.

Compensatory tracking performance was shown to be substantially degraded by oscillation of the visual display at both 1.0 and 2.0 Hz. The severity of this decrement was altered significantly by changes in both the color and the intensity of the display illumination. Performance was significantly better with red light illuminating the display at 0.05 mL than with blue light at the equivalent luminance. This improvement in performance was similar in magnitude to that found for an increase in broad-band illumination of the display where luminance was increased from 1/2 log unit below to 1/2 log unit above 0.05 mL. Visual mechanisms that may have been responsible for these findings are suggested.