Understanding "Resolution" 101
Related: Retina display The word "resolution" has been so misused that the original definition, if I remember it correctly, actually bears little connection to how it is used nowadays. Let's start at the very beginning, a very good place to start. The first step in the communication process (from the screen to the person) is "visual acquisition". Your eye must be able to acquire the image. The image must be big and bright enough to trigger photosensitive cells in your retina. Ignoring brightness, and just considering a single dot to represent the image, there is a minimum size for the dot below which the human eye cannot pick it out. But this depends on how far away you are from the dot, so a better parameter to quantify this is the angle subtended by the dot to your eye. Figure 1 - Images of different sizes can subtend the same visual angle, depending on distance Obviously the minimum subtended angle that can make a dot visible varies from person t...