# colors from a blind person's view

Category: Let's talk

## Post 1 by golden voice (Account disabled) on Wednesday, 07-Sep-2005 13:02:11

greetings all aftr reading some public quick notes in which people were describing what their favorite color was, it got me to thinking. I am totally blind have been since birth and come from a different generation in terms of how blind people were raised. Fortunately or not COLORS were never explained, so i have no concept. just curious to any other totals out their or even partials how inportant are colors and do you feel disconnected from society or sighted friends if you don't understand these concepts.

## Post 2 by Blue Velvet (I've got the platinum golden silver bronze poster award.) on Wednesday, 07-Sep-2005 13:11:55

Well I had good vision (not 20/20 but still good) for my growing up years. So now I can still remember colors and still have favorite colors even though I can't see them any more. I can't imagine life without colors and feel bad for those of you who have never seen all the different shades of blue that the sky can be or the colors of a rainbow or even just had the pleasure of shopping and being able to match clothing items according to what colors you like.

## Post 3 by Brooke (I just keep on posting!) on Wednesday, 07-Sep-2005 21:51:53

I've been blind since birth, and so I guess it would be almost impossible to have a complete understanding of different colors. But I've had many colors explained to me in a variety of ways, and I think I have at least a partial understanding of them. I think I know enough that I can participate in conversations that my sighted friends have about colors.

## Post 4 by Goblin (I have proven to myself and the world that I need mental help) on Thursday, 08-Sep-2005 14:08:24

I have a very fractured idea of colour as my parents, and experienced family members, tried to explain it to me, to bring some life to my blank world---needless to say, I grew up very confused and frustrated as colour seemed to be so important in life,and I badly wanted to understand it..However, I almost understand red and black, but the rest que sera..As I watch my nephew,Louis who sees only vivid colour and light,learning to appreciate yellow and, orange ect, I am very glad that he will not have the struggle that I had, trying and failing to understand them.

## Post 5 by Godzilla-On-Toast (I've now got the silver prolific poster award! wahoo!) on Thursday, 08-Sep-2005 16:28:11

I've been blind since birth, but I think over the years I've come up with my own ideas of what colors represent at least or perhaps I associate different colors with different things. I might ask somebody what color something is out of curiosity. No, I don't think I have much of a concept of colors, but the associations I make in my mind seem to work for me and that's what counts in the end.

## Post 6 by Witchcraft (Account disabled) on Friday, 09-Sep-2005 13:35:35

I saw most colors as a child, but now I see none. However when a color is mentioned a vision of the color immediately springs to mind; or at least what I remember it to be. I do think colors are important; for matching clothes, decorating a home, assisting to produce a mood and so much more...

## Post 7 by Twinklestar09 (I've now got the bronze prolific poster award! now going for the silver award!) on Friday, 09-Sep-2005 14:18:01

I had used to see (and now remember) colors also. I can picture basic colors right away if someone tells me, although if someone says something is, like violet, teal, chestnut, peach, or something like that, I can't readily picture the color and usually ask them to explain it as a light/dark shade of whatever color. As for clothing and styles of decoration, I know my favorite color is blue, but for clothes, it's hard to get how the colors/styles can change the body's appearance, and for decorating (at least for my room) I don't think I pay as much attention to colors as I do to textures and things I make/like collecting.
Leilani

## Post 8 by Witchcraft (Account disabled) on Saturday, 10-Sep-2005 21:28:12

Oh, I definitely display the things I collect, but as I'm almost the only blind person I know I pay attention to the colors too because I want people to feel comfortable when they come in my home. *smile* Besides, my husband is sighted, and if he isn't visually comfortable then life would be; well, let's just say it could be quite difficult, and I guarantee you, if I used to many bright colors or colors that majorly clash he wouldn't be comfortable. LOL. As far as clothes, lighter colors tend to make one look bigger, and that's why some people love dark colors, and some colors will bleech out the skin so you look like the walking dead, or add to much so your white but you look black. LOL, my husband has that problem with light colors because he's dark complected to begin with.

## Post 9 by bashful (professional hypocrite) on Saturday, 10-Sep-2005 22:07:14

I have a general sense of color, because I have some light perception and a vague ability to see color. A lot of colors look the same. Blues and greens look similar to me, but I can see red really well.

## Post 10 by ArtRock1224 (move over school!) on Saturday, 10-Sep-2005 22:15:09

I know what all colors look like; I have enough site to identify them, but barely.
Brice

## Post 11 by BeautyQueen (Veteran Zoner) on Saturday, 01-Oct-2005 11:12:30

I've been blind since birth, but I have enough site to know which colors are light and which are dark. The only colors I can distinguish ar yellow and white. The rest of the colors all look the same to me, especially dark-shaded colors. So I have to imagine what they look like.

## Post 12 by wonderwoman (I've now got the silver prolific poster award! wahoo!) on Saturday, 01-Oct-2005 20:30:58

I've been blind all my life, was born blind, and colors and what they look like just don't interest me. People told my mom to describe things to me, but from the time I was little till now, colors just don't excite me or impress me, and I have no visual impressions of anything. That part is just a total blank.
wonderwoman

## Post 13 by gowith_strangen (Newborn Zoner) on Monday, 10-Oct-2005 6:27:28

Hi. I don't really understand colours, but thats mostly because my sighted friends hav a lot of trouble describing them to me. I usually ask them to link it to something natural that i might hav felt before, but that just makes most of them go blank.

## Post 14 by gowith_strangen (Newborn Zoner) on Monday, 10-Oct-2005 6:28:20

Hi. I don't really understand colours, but thats mostly because my sighted friends hav a lot of trouble describing them to me. I usually ask them to link it to something natural that i might hav felt before, but that just makes most of them go blank.

## Post 15 by dissonance (Help me, I'm stuck to my chair!) on Saturday, 29-Oct-2005 19:12:50

Well I personally don't really care if my perception of what color is is the same as those of the sighted world...I'm totally blind as well and I think I have a basic idea...but I can describe colors to other people, at least what I think they are. Like I asosiate the color green with the sound of wind and the smell of pine, and I think of it as a cool and fresh colorr....so i for one and happy that I can't see thm because really what is color? It's just tsomething that we all seem to go by and know, but it's a really interesting subject.

## Post 16 by lights_rage (I just keep on posting!) on Sunday, 11-Dec-2005 22:52:12

colors mean some to me but i have to link them to something with basic colors I really should explain. When someone gives me a basic color like red i kinda have a clue but say they give another discreption like midnight blue i am clueless. I really could care less about color

## Post 17 by OrangeDolphinSpirit (Despite the cost of living, have you noticed how popular it remains?) on Monday, 12-Dec-2005 2:41:37

I have a vague recollection of what colors look like from before I went blind. You know, all the basic ones like blue, green, yellow, red, etc. Like Leilani said, though, if someone says something's teal or turquoise, or lavender or magenta, I usually have them describe to me if it's a lighter or darker shade of purple or blue or green. Interesting that you should bring this topic up, though, because I always thought about trying to explain colors to someone who's never seen before. I mean, it's a mind-boggling concept. How in the world do you explain what blue looks like? I have a friend who's been totally blind since birth, and she says she associates colors with different things. Like green for grass and leaves, and blue for water and cool things. I just don't know ... it's rather fascinating, though.

## Post 18 by icequeen (move over school!) on Tuesday, 27-Dec-2005 3:00:50

i always wonder if my perception of color in terms of how i visually see it... if it is near the same as how sighted people perceive it. I'm thinking that maybe colors do not appear as vibrant to a vi person or me at least. I notice colors are not as bright or sharp when I'm not wearing my contacts.

## Post 19 by sophiagoh (Generic Zoner) on Tuesday, 27-Dec-2005 4:01:53

well i have wrote the decribtion of colors in another topic entitled how to describe colors. so take a look.

## Post 20 by sledge071 (Shadow Rider, Bourne of Light) on Sunday, 01-Jan-2006 23:27:13

As my sight has declined throughout my life, my abilities to perceive various elements of the visual experience expired at different times. I am presently losing my ability to distinguish colors, and I find that it really doesn't matter. It's just a concept that I no longer require; it just doesn't pertain or apply to me, not entirely unlike the restrictions and prohibitions and other special statuses that no longer apply to an individual upon reaching the age of adulthood.

## Post 21 by mdyer1983 (I can't call it a day til I enter the zone BBS) on Monday, 02-Jan-2006 22:27:01

Hi I think I understand some of the basic colors like red or green or blue I can try to picture things like trees or an apple, but I never understood any of the other colors. oh and I will take a look at the other poste you rote andf let you know what I think I bet it is good though.

## Post 22 by purple michelle (Newborn Zoner) on Tuesday, 03-Jan-2006 16:59:20

Ican see bright colours dark colours all look black to me. Although I get confused when people say things like roses are red but they come in all different colours

## Post 23 by Siriusly Severus (The ESTJ 1w9 3w4 6w7 The Taskmaste) on Friday, 18-Dec-2009 22:11:45

Sight isn't all it is made out to be...

## Post 24 by Harmony (I've now got the silver prolific poster award! wahoo!) on Saturday, 19-Dec-2009 7:59:20

I've never been able to see colors as such, just light and I guess shadows. It's weird though, because I sort of know what stuff looks like, although I can't see it. I can't remember colors and things being described to me, but they probably were when I was younger. OK. That probably doesn't make much sense, but still ...

## Post 25 by LeoGuardian (You mean there is something outside of this room with my computer in it?) on Saturday, 19-Dec-2009 10:25:50

This is an interesting topic I've never talked to anyone about before.
Well I have no optic nerves so have no light perception at all.
As to having sighted people describe what a color is, I pretty much think that may be a rather unfair analysis required of the sighted person; for them it is all experience. You ever seen them fight over whether something is red or pink? Or imagine trying to describe an a minor 7 9 chord to someone who's never heard. Now some people understand the theory, but most of the population doesn't even know what that is, they just know it's a "guitar chord", maybe not even that.
As a software developer, I know there are literal values for colors, but most real humans do not experience them that way. I have applied a yellow color pallet in software, I forget its name in the pallet but could varify it was within the proper spectrum, and had a woman walk by and say ... "hmm I like that orange " - I understand there's a relationship between the two, which is physics not perception. As a little kid I tried to understand enough to fit in but that's what it meant; fitting in. I remember finally learning that mismatched colors were not physically painful / a safety hazard for sighted people: I grew up around people who were quite self-possessed in their analysis of color and the visual space, and so it was easy to imagine anyway, that their eyes were caused undue pain by being exposed to gawdy mismatches. After all, I thought, you can kill someone's eardrums with the right frequencies.
Another tidbit to learn was that not only is it perception-based (ranking it outside of my abilities), but there are a vast number of people who can see just fine, but really cannot identify or pick out a color set that will satisfy the needs of ... whoever you are trying to at the time.
This isn't color but visual: I'm 39 and I didn't know till this past summer that the moon in the sky was very much smaller than the size of a baseball. I saw that when watching a documentary from Discovery on Neil Armstrong and company, and one of them said it was a bit creepy to be able to block out the earth with just your thumb, when standing on the moon. I really pondered this, finally decided just to ask my wife as I didn't feel like looking up the distance and either doing the math or writing a quick program to do it, but she said you can block out the moon with your thumb. She asked how big I thought it was, I said probably around the size of a baseball, given that it can give the illusion of hiding behind a tree, or coming around the corner. That, and when our daughter was really little she would say it looked like a big ball, and tell me "Daddy, I want to reach up and grab it so I can play with it ..."
All this to say I don't really know how much we can grasp, at least those of us who have never seen. And it probably depends on your mentality. My understanding of colors / optical illusions like the horizon don't go beyond the theoretical, since even for the horizon you may get ten different responses. Some make astronomical sense while others do not. But I would never deny their experience, any more than they deny an insect's experience viewing infrared, both very real. For me it's usually about getting them to get to the bottom of what it is they want, so it may be applied; not 'the pretty one' but 'the blue one' or whatever, and perhaps more specific till you know you're gonna get them what it is they want. I have also observed some of what they think is just want is really need; misapplied color is something they cannot get away from, and even though some of them may not see it as need , I think it is. Talk to anyone who's had an otherwise great experience - I'd venture to go so far as sex - in a room with a sixties-style green shag rug, and plaid apholstery, the experience will be totally lost on them because of the pervasiveness of the colors. We can block out sound, even wear headphones, but they cannot wear a glasses or something to dismantle a bad color match; everywhere they look in the room it's ... there.
Not to get sinister, but even torturers know this, and as far back as the Inquisition would deliberately apply colors to a scenario. I think we who have never seen really can't understand their situation; sound and tactile sensation just don't come in that fast. They get thousands - no at least tens of thousands - of frames per second. That's not how they talk about it but technically that's a ghastly amount of input to have to sort - most of that automated - but still. see this article on Wikipedia for some perspective. For all that, it is a pleasure to see it work out, not in the shopping malls where there's general mayhem, but say a sunset or other natural phenomenon which yields a rather high success rate when it comes to color experiences. My wife loves sunsets and at their worst, they're blah, but not mismatched or negative. If you have real emotions about color then don't take my rather straight vivisection of the issue as a lack of concern ... but I'm glad this topic's come up here. As I said I've never really talked to anyone about it. Frankly the hardest part for me is when someone sighted feels they are not understood by me when it comes to color or similar issues; I find that severely unfortunate, because it is quite unintentional.

## Post 26 by Siriusly Severus (The ESTJ 1w9 3w4 6w7 The Taskmaste) on Wednesday, 23-Dec-2009 6:01:25

seeing is not all we make it out to be.

## Post 27 by LeoGuardian (You mean there is something outside of this room with my computer in it?) on Wednesday, 23-Dec-2009 14:01:30

I'm not sure what you mean by that. How are we making it out to be anything? Even if a sighted person denies they're bothered by a color scenario or perhaps roll the eyes and declare that's fine ... that is an exercise of willpower only. Their visual sense is still assailed by a vastly disproportionate amount of sensory data - my apologies to visually artistic people for the drab analyses - but they really cannot get away from it.
Without proper exposure to sunlight, anyone with light perception will be more likely to get depressed: even out here in the Pacific Northwest, when it's drab for months all of us get bummed, but it's particularly challenging when people who can see are only exposed to artificial light, and minimal amounts of sunlight. I've raised birds, and if you shut off the lights, they go right to sleep. It's not because birds are dumb: they're actually quite intelligent. It's just that the visual sense, like it or not, is so profoundly dominating. It's not their mind, it's their biology. Being sensitive to that, to my mind, is equal to being sensitive to the needs of a quadropleigic - sorry medical people if I spelled that wrong - but that is all part of the picture. As I said in my last post, torturers know it - look at what was done in Abu Ghraib ... and hospitals and stores know it too.
Try to compare the simplicity of creating an optical illusion - tricking your parent or teacher , all kids do that - while attempting the same with an audio illusion is far far more difficult. Even hallucinogenics attack the visual senses first, before getting to even one's sense of balance. So I guess my approach to color and visual representation is far closer to the way we approach putting in an accessible wheellchair ramp or bars in bathroom stalls for folks who can't get up on their own feet.
I'll give you a really good example of this:
Before I showed Klango to my wife, I had read their developer's documentation - as much as they had - and the LUA interfaces give the impression of providing a modern-looking interface with buttons, boxes and other controls / widgets. Only problem is, visually all the widgets aren't there. The text is, and a sort of focusable rect moves, but that's like you trying to solve some of these audio captchs where the audio is grossly distorted. Can you? Perhaps, yes. Is it natural at all? Hell no! Or consider the GMA games: I like Doom and Tank Commander, but all anyone sees is a virtually empty space. Since a majority of the world's population (friends, family, our own kids ...) have vision, they are affected, whether you or they or anyone else thinks it or not, by their biology. Aren't we all?
Frankly regarding Klango who wants to include both blind and sighted alike, and whose interface looks modern from a programming standpoint, I find their inaccessibility to sighted people a *huge* disappointment. Reality is, we are equipped to deal with data that's not accessible to us, and find ways around it. Sighted people are at a huge disadvantage in this way, so basically do not have the tools we have. Anyway I digress but I definitely think the visual / color experience is far more about biology than anything else, and needs our consideration in the same way we do for quadropleigics or anyone else. Read Wells's Country of the Blind, where his sight was first assaulted by the gross color mismatches on the clay, then he was forced to work in almost complete darkness to fit in: something akin to us losing both hearing and touch all at once. Might change one's perspective ...

## Post 28 by Miss M (move over school!) on Wednesday, 23-Dec-2009 14:25:37

Gaaaahhh, so much text.
I'm fortunate enough to have enough sight to see and enjoy colors, but I will agree with robo, there are times when it can be an assault to the senses. Certain color combinations can make someone feel disoriented, dizzy, or even nauseous because of the way the light plays with their vision.
For those who are blind, imagine running your hand over the most unpleasantly textured surface. Now, imagine that you are forced to continually run your hand over that surface. That's what looking at a clashing color scheme can be like.

## Post 29 by Eleni21 (I have proven to myself and the world that I need mental help) on Wednesday, 23-Dec-2009 14:29:10

I've been totally blind since I was two-months-old and can't imagine colours. At best, I associate them with things that I've been taught, the blue sky, the red sun, the green tree. But if you were to ask me what that actually means I'd have no clue. I too have had people try to explain them to me. The most common way seems to be with temprature but that makes absolutely no sense to me. How can something look hot or cold? The most interesting and the best way was when someone corelated colours with music. Red is an angry colour so it's like loud music, blue is sad so it's like soft slow notes, etc. I wish we could make some kind of chart like that or that someone could explain more colours that way. It's not exact, I'm sure, but at least it gave me some kind of understanding of what the rest of the world sees. Good points about strangely-named colours. I'd much rather someone be more descriptive as well. I also don't understand shades of colours. How can something be a lighter or darker shade of it's colour? I don't decorate but do realise that it's important to at least match when dressing or when choosing furnature. But I got annoyed when we bought a chair and Mom had Grandma change the covering on it just because she didn't like the colour. I didn't like the new fabric. And I don't get how a colour can look good or bad on someone either. I never realised they do all of these things to one's appearance before reading this thread. To be honest, if I ever do regain my sight, I think I'll go crazy with happiness when I get to see all the different colours out there. I've wanted to see a rainbow ever since I can remember, cause I keep hearing so much about them and they're all the colours at once. But usually, I just don't think of these things or even notice them until someone brings them up. It's like when Mom comes up and leaves the light on and then tells me the next morning that she forgot to turn it off. I wouldn't know that unless she mentioned it. As for Klango, I think it's wonderful that it doesn't have all that visual nonsense in it. Let them deal with something simple and normal for once in their lives. It won't kill them. For us, we literally can't use their pgorams and stuff. For them, it's simply a matter of the program not being pretty. Valley of The Bline is another excellent short story. It really helps us see things from their perspective.

## Post 30 by Miss M (move over school!) on Wednesday, 23-Dec-2009 14:40:31

Well, if you want to think of shades of colors in terms of music, let me try this.
A bright red would be a more lively, upbeat type of angry. Vibrant and making you want to get up and dance. Whereas a dark red would be heavier - possibly more seductive, or possibly darker and heavier music, with harder beats.

## Post 31 by Eleni21 (I have proven to myself and the world that I need mental help) on Wednesday, 23-Dec-2009 15:16:30

Hmm, interesting. *smile* I guess that could work, yeah.

## Post 32 by season (the invisible soul) on Wednesday, 23-Dec-2009 18:49:12

agree with both roboz's post.
lots of people didn't realize, colour is actually light. the frequency and wave of light. it meant the whole big deal to any given sighted person, animals, and basicly all living things.
colours meant alot in the psychology world too. we have a specialty in visual perception, and that involve lights and colours.
there's a colour therapy in counceling, and it is very useful for those whoe can't express their feelings. questions like, "describe your feeling to me in colours, is commonly practice in some of the therapy session.
a 10 year old boy manage to tell the councelor on how he feels and how his mother feels by drawing a picture with different color. he first draw a double layer circle, where, the outter layer he color it with bright yellow, and the inner circle with dark blue.
the councelor ask him to describe the meaning of the colors, he said, "mum looks like a sunshine, warm to others, but her inside is like the dark sky, cold and lonely".
different color represent different mode of different mood. for example, blue usually represent cold, pink cheerful, yellow, orange, and red connect with warmth, etc etc.
there's lots of theory behind colors. lots of people might think color isn't a big deal for a blind person, but it is a great deal for the rest of the world. and at times, what color clothing you wear can reflects the tone of your skin, the mood, and the emotion you in.

## Post 33 by LeoGuardian (You mean there is something outside of this room with my computer in it?) on Thursday, 24-Dec-2009 1:05:28

For anyone else who can't perceive or understand colors with the creative half of the brain - that which sighted people use to perceive, opine, and spend money upon colors, here's my assessment based on the properties of light hope it helps:
The difference between colors is basically a difference in length. Like sound? Yes and most notably no. Music is a lot more an exact science, meaning a g is a g is a g, and we even have meters that show 440 concert pitch. This didn't use to be the case of course and pitch has fluctuated between 415 and 452 at one point but those are extremes that happen over hundreds of years' time - lifetimes.
Instead, think of snakes. If you know snakes, you know a garter can be anywhere between 18 inches and three feet long, while a ball python is about three to 6 and a bermese python is 6 to 9 feet. Generalization yes but bear with.
Now we already know you can have one runt in one species then, which could be smaller than a giant in the next one down: A runt Bermese could be dwarfed by a giant ball python.
Now if all you got were length: no colors, for this argument, no thickness, no texture (those visual properties relate to light's reaction to the matter around it), then even if you know snakes, you would get confused.
And to some people, a 4 foot snake is a *really big* snake! It could be a reasonably sized ball python, a giant garter, or a Bermese that has been ill-cared for or has some other condition which has stunted its growth.
Now imagine all the snakes are writhing in and out of one another in a terrarium, amongst stumps, bowls, rocks and other debris. Believe it or not, light does this. It bends around things, it bounces off of things, and generally creates mayhem and confusion for sighted people if they were trying to logically identify it. Instead, it seems to be wired to the creative side. Mercifully so, I would guess.
And to understand a shade, just imagine you already have the snake length parameters that make up a garter, ball python and Bermese python. The shade is the difference between a big, medium and small of each. That's why color pallets, painting professionals and physicists all alike name these because there have to be exact definitions for certain criteria, but for the average person, they no more comprehend any of that than the baseball pitcher and catcher understand the calculus behind a winning play. Since they basically seem to enjoy it, I'd hate to ruin it for them.

## Post 34 by Siriusly Severus (The ESTJ 1w9 3w4 6w7 The Taskmaste) on Thursday, 24-Dec-2009 20:25:41

No, we as in humanity in general.

## Post 35 by season (the invisible soul) on Friday, 25-Dec-2009 7:21:32

for those that don't know, the primary color is Red Green and Blue, and the secondary color is Cyan, megenta, yellow, and black.
other than this, all other colors beside white is the mixture of all these color

## Post 36 by Miss M (move over school!) on Friday, 25-Dec-2009 16:01:59

Nope, primary colors are Red, Yellow and Blue. Secondary colors are Orange, Green and Purple. Red + Yellow = Orange, Yellow + Blue = Green, Blue + Red = Purple.

## Post 37 by Eleni21 (I have proven to myself and the world that I need mental help) on Friday, 25-Dec-2009 21:51:29

And now that I'm completely and utterly confused... I think I'll go back to my bouzouki. lol

## Post 38 by season (the invisible soul) on Friday, 25-Dec-2009 21:55:25

oops, sorry, i meant to say the primary and secondary printing colours...