Visual artifact

File:Winxp estk artifact.png

A screenshot of a Microsoft Windows XP application displaying a visual artifact with repeated frames. This was fixed in the next release, Windows Vista.

Visual artifacts are anomalies during visual representation of e.g. digital graphics and imagery.

Examples in digital graphics

A retinography. The gray spot in the center is a shadow artifact.

• Image quality factors, different types of visual artifacts
• Compression artifacts
• Digital artifacts, visual artifacts resulting from digital image processing
• Noise
• Screen-door effect, also known as fixed-pattern noise (FPN), a visual artifact of digital projection technology
• Distortion
• Silk screen effect
• Rainbow effect
• Screen tearing
• Purple fringing
• Chromatic aberration
• Moiré pattern
• Color banding

Occurrences in video entertainment

Many people who use their computers as a hobby experience artifacting due to a hardware malfunction. The cases can differ but the usual causes are:

• Fan issues, such as failure of cooling fan.
• Unsuited video card drivers.
• Drivers that have values that the graphics card is not suited with.
• Overclocking beyond the capabilities of the particular video card.

The differing cases of visual artifacting can also differ between scheduled task(s).

Confocal laser scanning fluorescence micrograph of thale cress anther (part of stamen). The picture shows among other things a nice red flowing collar-like structure just below the anther. However, an intact thale cress stamen does not have such collar, this is a fixation artifact: the stamen has been cut below the picture frame, and epidermis (upper layer of cells) of stamen stalk has peeled off, forming a non-characteristic structure. Photo: Heiti Paves from Tallinn University of Technology.

In microscopy

In microscopy, an artifact is an apparent structural detail that is caused by the processing of the specimen and is thus not a legitimate feature of the specimen.

For example, a crush artifact is artificial elongation and distortion when smearing cells or tissue for microscopy.