I think the parent's point was that we can't see or image anything until those photons enter our sensor.
> you can watch as the photons strike your hand first, and it lights up. The photons that don't strike your hand continue on towards the wall next to
This analogy doesn't work. In order to watch, some photons have to enter our eyes, but they haven't got there yet, as they're just now interacting with our hand, etc. I.e until sufficient photons enter our eyes (sensors), there's nothing to watch.
This points to the fact that the technique is not imaging the whole scene at once, but doing some kind of reconstruction on an assumed static scene.
> you can watch as the photons strike your hand first, and it lights up. The photons that don't strike your hand continue on towards the wall next to
This analogy doesn't work. In order to watch, some photons have to enter our eyes, but they haven't got there yet, as they're just now interacting with our hand, etc. I.e until sufficient photons enter our eyes (sensors), there's nothing to watch.
This points to the fact that the technique is not imaging the whole scene at once, but doing some kind of reconstruction on an assumed static scene.