The difference between how humans and nocturnal animals view, of course, lies in the different structure of the eye. Nocturnal animals have proportionally larger eyes than humans do. The pupils in their eyes open wider in dim light to absorb as much light as possible. The rods become more specialized while cones are more specialized in humans. Rods work in areas of low light to detect motion and basic visual information while cones work in areas of high light and register in details.
Nocturnal animals have a structure in which human lack called tapetum.
The tapetum amplifies the amount of light that reaches the retina. In the tapetum, there are these mirror-like membranes that reflects the light that reaches the retina so that the light is passed through the retina again. This way, the light that was not detected the first time would be detected the second time around. Since nocturnal animals' eyes are very acute at night, they are very sensitive during the daytime. They protect their eyes either by a retractable flap or by their pupils.