The cathodic arc actuator (CAA) is a pulsed plasma actuator intended for atmospheric flow manipulation, currently being developed at the Aerospace Plasma Laboratory, Technion. The CAA operates by forming fast jets of metallic neutrals, known also as cathodic arc jets (CAJ), emitted from a cathodic arc discharge. In this work, a series of optical measurements were performed to characterize the velocity and quantity of metallic neutrals in a CAJ pulse. The optical setup consisted of a long range microscope and an intensified charge coupled device camera (ICCD). The current-voltage characteristics of each pulse were also recorded. An image processing algorithm was used to calculate the axial extent of the CAJ and the total amount of photon counts per image. The calculated front velocity of the CAJ exhibits an exponential decay, from an initial value of about 1.5 km/s down to several dozen m/s after 50 μs. The calculated total photon count exhibits a more complex behavior: 1) the signal raises sharply in the first 1 μs; 2) the signal then decays to about 60 % of its maximum ~ 10μs; 3) the signal begins to rise again to a global maximum at ∼ 50 μs; 4) finally signal decay after 50 μs. This complex behavior results from a gas-dynamic interaction of the CAJ and the background gas. The results suggest the existence of an optimal CAJ pulse duration, in terms of the momentum introduced to the background flow at a given input energy.