[mister_mort]

I think this effect might not be limited to video games - I remember when I was learning 3D modelling and rendering a few decades ago I started to break down scenery in my mind automatically, a permanent "how would this be made or faked in a program if you were to do it".

I think excessive concentration on a new skill can just create that pattern in your mind, no matter what the source.

[PaulHoule]

General lore is that if you're creating training sets for visual recognition you can make about 2000 judgements a day. I've occasionally done about twice that and found my visual system misbehaving.