can't photograph this

[cos]

One advantage of living here: I thought the fireworks were at 9:15 and I'd missed them, but I heard them start at 10:30 so I stepped outside and walked over. I could see them from the park a block away, and then all the way down Mass Ave.

I'm very nearsighted. There are a few things I sometimes enjoy looking at without my glasses on, and fireworks are among them.

I wish I could photograph, or video, what I see, for those of you with good vision. I don't know what special lens or contorted photoshop manipulation could make a picture of it; I don't think I've ever seen one. Out of focus, but not in a way that makes it blurry, exactly. It's more like the lens reflections you sometimes see when the sun or streetlights are in a photograph, but these more discrete, compact points of light make smaller, tighter patterns, with bits of moiré.

You see a sudden pinpoint bright flash, then a slowly exanding sphere of dimmer little lights starting from that point; I see a sudden circular/hexagonal pattern of light so large it takes whole seconds before the sphere expands to fill up the area taken up by its afterimage.

You see sparkly weeping willow glitter patterns slowly falling; for me they set smooth gradient background colors for the sky. Bright points of red and blue and white shooting around evoke old Atari 800 video games and Commodore 64 sprite graphics. Bright lights shooting slowly upward to detonate, are semicircular flying saucers taking off. Standard fireworks, where many lights of the same size and color form the surface of a sphere, appear to me as giant richly-connected multicolored glowing volvox colonies. And when lights from neighboring fireworks lost their thrust and start falling together, red & blue alternating, I get overlapping patterns, venn diagrams of red and blue and violet.

Comments

[awfief.livejournal.com]

Actually, if you take your glasses and put them in front of the lens it will fake it pretty well -- because it corrects your vision, it pretty much "corrects the other way" for folks with good vision. I know this because I have contacts and glasses, and I've put both on, and it's similarly blurry to when I have no vision correction.

Don't know how that would work with a camera lens -- if your eyes are about the same "bad" in each eye, it will work. I'm -7 in one eye and -5.5 in another, so it likely won't work for mine exactly.....but yeah. Pretty much I'll give my glasses to someone if they want to know 'how blind' I am (I believe -8 is legally blind, so I'm quite close in one eye....sigh).

[bloodstones.livejournal.com]

I think that's different for different people depending on the problem they have with their vision. I've never been able to explain how the world looks fuzzy but not really when I don't have my contacts in, and putting on my glasses when I'm wearing contacts doesn't replicate it.

[superfinemind.livejournal.com]

I'm curious whether you would shoot it so you can see through one lens, or pull back so you can see it's shot through glasses...

Definitely an interesting prospect.

[cos]

I don't think it works that way for me. The "backwards" correction of other people's glasses doesn't look the same. I've never tried contacts + glasses, though (I don't have contacts).

[darth-velma.livejournal.com]

You put that so beautifully and I'm not up to your standard of eloquence tonight. The best I can manage is to tell you I absolutely adore your brain. :)

[mackelzinzie.livejournal.com]

I'll just go with what this one said. beautiful. I was just going to tell you that's beautiful.

[charolastra00.livejournal.com]

I would know exactly what you were talking about if fireworks did not upset me. Loud noises and pyrotechnics are not my things.

However, I really believe that some of the most beautiful moments of my life were the Monet-esque softness of nature in the years before my parents discovered just how horrific my eyesight really was. Even now, without my contacts I can barely see what I'm typing even from a few inches away- but I look out my window to the sky and watch clouds float by and it's so much more enjoyable than when I can see them clearly. I get too dizzy walking around parks or taking hikes now without my glasses or contacts, but I really miss the way things looked then.

[mhaille.livejournal.com]

I've seen the effects you describe with my own eyes, most often if I've been resting my head on my arm or otherwise smooshing my eyes. I have a horrible time driving at night in the rain because of it- everything is covered in bright hexagonal sparkles. It's not as bad if I wear contacts, but then they don't correct for my astigmatism any more.

(I'm also nearsighted, though my vision has improved in the last several years, and I've always been able to navigate a familiar area without glasses. These days I can manage unfamiliar areas too.)

[superfinemind.livejournal.com]

If you ever figure it out, let me know; I am utterly fascinated.

my post about corrected vision and fireworks. I was going to post it anyway, but reading this cemented it for me. ^_^

I wonder if it'd work if I wore your glasses...

[ron_newman]

I get: "Error: You are not authorized to view this protected entry."

[superfinemind.livejournal.com]

Yes; my whole journal is friends-only.

The content runs roughly thus: I have above-average vision, but last night I watched fireworks in the rain through my brother's glasses, so they were distorted and fuzzed in unusual ways. It was really cool.

[cos]

Yay. I read your post and thought wow, what a coincidence :)

I wrote this partly hoping to inspire other people to try to figure it out. If you ever hear of someone figuring it out tell me.

[mollybzz.livejournal.com]

I see what you mean when I squint my eyes tightly or have water in them.