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Synesthesia



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A documentary about my friend Pat and his synesthesia, a rare neurological condition. Synesthesia essentially means "the joining of the senses". People with this condition often explain sensations in abstracts way such as "hearing colors" or "seeing music".

I'm planning on making a bigger, more expansive version of this film in the future. I would love to hear some suggestions on what to include in it.
McrawfishMMAC

20 responses // Synesthesia

  • An interesting insight. It's always fascinating to see the world through a different perspective.
    mattbrawn
  • Very interesting documentary. I can see why you want to make a more expansive version of it.
    You could perhaps examine the other meanings and nuances of the word itself. "Synaesthesia" as a figure of speech, for example.
    saverio
  • I am absolutley lovin all the radiohead that is put in here. Expecially the fact that the amnesiac is being re-mixed.

    Synethesia is a very interesting phenomena, it does seem as if its a blessing, yet I dont know if seeing everything in color really is of benefit, yet it almost seemed like the color was more mentally assigned and subdued than seeing bright red on the letter T, it would be a shame to be excluded from the gray scale.

    Digging deeper I have also responded to experiences and sounds with colors or smells. For instance, Amnesiac, is a very dark red album for me.
    Silkwerm
    1 response to this
  • amazzzzing. you should definitely make a longer version of this. very interesting !!
    furryjenn
  • its great, i'd like to see the expanded cut.
    parisinla
  • It is so great to hear from another person with synesthesia, since I've never actually met anyone else with it. Thanks for making this pod! It made my morning!

    I've got sound->color broadband (pretty much the same thing as in the pod). Every sound I hear has color, shape, and texture. I didn't really know I had it until two years ago. Wouldn't go so far as to say it's a blessing; it's actually monumentally distracting for me, but I think it's one of the main reasons I've got talent in art/ music/ words.
    Humdrum
  • The piece is very professionally produced - the editing and the narration move the documentary along. For me, the scene with the most impact is the one of him discussing different music genres and then a visually representation of that music genre. As a short documentary piece, I think your pod works perfectly. One of the question that arises from the piece is whether or not similar-looking words (i.e. "be" and "bee") and/or similar-sounding words (i.e. "bear" and "bare") produce the same color. You mention that you want to make it into a larger piece and so I think you would need to include other perspective into the piece (i.e. teacher, parents, etc) so that the audience will have a larger idea of how people with synesthesia function in society. Lastly, and this is a minor point, Pat comments that he is uncertain as to whether or not synesthesia is a gift, but at the very end, he comments that it is like "being high" all the time. That comment negates his ambivalence and suggests that he sees it as a gift. I look forward to the larger, expansive piece. Great job!
    MickeyLin
  • This was great, very well done, especially as a person who also has synesthesia. I'm always excited to hear anything more about this little-known condition. Like the guy in the story, growing up I just assumed everyone associated letters and numbers with colors. I've also experienced some sounds as colors. Just a couple weeks ago at the dentist a certain painful sensation immediately made me taste red jello. I still have trouble convincing other people what goes on in my brain. But I definitely think it probably explains my artistic abilities. Overall, I think it just makes me life that much more....well...colorful! I'd love to see this expanded.
    teamterrific
  • Brilliantly done!! I have the common kind of synesthesia, where numbers and letters have colors assigned. Hand-painting each character in jumpy, washed-out colors produced a visualization I could relate to. I like the pod's pacing and storytelling. I do think your friend is overplaying the whole thing by asking if it's a gift or not... but maybe his version is more intense than mine.

    I hope to see this on the air.
    rekha6
  • Great pod. And very interesting. I'd like to see/hear if it has been difficult for him in any way. Most of the points were positive in that words and numbers can be more easily separated into color categories, sometimes I had that kind of help with spelling and certain words =)
    sabkl
  • Please, put this one on the Current tv schedule.
    huntre
  • This is such a fascinating topic. I have spacial form synesthesia, meaning I visualize time (calendar, years, centuries, hours), numbers, and the alphabet. I have a mental map of where each month/year/hour is in space. No colors for me. I always thought I was crazy until recently when I found out about synesthesia - maybe that's why I was a history major:)
    julietp
  • julie -

    I did not know seeing time as a visual thing was a form of synesthesia. It makes sense now that I think about it. I have always perceived days/weeks/months/years/centuries/etc. as cyclic swells, the middle of each (summer or midday, for example) being a gold-yellow, smoothly rising spike, while the transitional part is "low" and blue-gray-bland. History rolls back in on a huge plane, with the transition between BC and AD being the hugest spike of all (inverted there for some reason).

    Sorry; coffee + random cool-ass thing = ramble.
    Humdrum
  • It's so great to know there are others out there who have it too!! I see the year as a circle with January on top and then the months rotating counter clock-wise, each month has its precise spot. Centuries for me are columns going backwards, the earliest years at the bottom going up... I don't really see BC anymore which is why everything before 0 is much more of a blurr...:)

    Also this was so engrained in my head, i only realized a few years ago that I had a very particular way of seeing time... Anyway I'm rambing too, this is fascinating though..
    julietp
    1 response to this
  • You're case, julietp, is a curious one. When I did my research for this video, I found out that some of the greatest mathematicians and physicists had the spacial form of synesthesia.

    I'm interested if you have a particular number line in your head. That is, when you visualize the numbers from one to ten or beyond if you can visualize their position in front of you. I would try it. Where is the number one in relation to other numbers? When you count (like you did the months), what form do the string of numbers take on?

    It was said the reason why Albert Einstein could calculate such large numbers and matrices in his head. He had a very set spacial number line, and he could link larger numbers together in equations he had to figure out because he could "see" them being worked out. Almost like making wormholes between the numbers in his brain.

    I want to know who else has synesthesia!! Is it a gift? Is it a sixth sense? I know when I make films, I tap into the feelings I get when I see, smell, touch, and feel things. Who else does? What musicians, filmmakers, artists, scientists living in our world have this mysterious condition? Good documentary fodder, don't you think?
    McrawfishMMAC
  • http://rhythmiclight.com/archives/images/Visual Music.j...
    this is really exciting to find you guys and begin this dialogue--Juliet and I even work together and went on a snowboarding trip together and I had no idea that she had it!! Synaesthesia is one of my main interests right now, as my yoga and meditation practice (which i just got serious about this year) are developing greater awareness of the nature of perception, and i'm also being exposed to a lot of ideas about the affects of color and sound on our bodies--people who are using color and sound as healing methodologies. i was given a great synaesthetic color meditation which i can share, it would be fascinating to hear your experiences.

    i have visual -> sound synaesthesia. sounds have color, shape, texture, and are animated. my visual sense is uber developed--i had some natural inclinations as a kid, and was trained as an artist (color and composition theory etc) from elementary school through college, and since then have been working as a designer and experimenting in film/video with connecting visuals and music. i perceive visual patterns naturally, which is why my work as a designer is very intuitive to me, why i know the right shot when i look through the viewfinder, and why i feel crazy if the room is a mess (the perception of the lack of patterns is so strong, it permeates me). i'm not sure when the color--sound relationship started or when i became aware of it, but i think for me it may be a result of having such a strong visual sense, that that sense just imposed itself on the aural sense.

    i think it's really interesting to think about how we all got this way--i wonder how much of it is learned and how much is purely neurological. i feel like it's fairly common for artists or musicians i've met to "see music," yet we don't all see the same thing. i see it in my head, and its not overwhelming or like tripping. i think mine is pretty mild.

    i've been looking for a synaesthesia community online, found a few but haven't really investigated. i'd love to continue this discussion somewhere tho.

    i'm also really interested in finding people who smell color, have any of you experienced that?

    as far as art goes-- i have this amazing book, which is a catalog for an art show that featured a bunch of this work. i'd highly recommend finding a copy. it chronicles the history of artists who have dealt with connections between visual and aural senses, and there is some really cool work in there, it's also really interesting to hear what drove these artists. Stan Brakhage is the first one i got into--he made abstract colorful films that he thought of structurally like pieces of music.
    regina
  • It's so interesting to see how each person has their own type of synesthesia and it also feels great to know that there are many others out there. No one seems to know about synesthesia, even those who have it. I myself only found out about synesthesia a month ago , and was so excited to discover I wasn't a wack job. I also wish I had known about it earlier, because I'm sure I could have used it more in school - and become a great mathematician as McrawfishMMAC alluded to;) Although I'm convinced that it was because of my synesthesia that I was good at history. I would also love to find an online community...
    julietp
  • http://current.com/items/89042945_see_sounds_hear_color...
    This is the pod that I was watching that made me discover that I have spatial form synesthesia, just like the girls talking about how they see the calendar.
    julietp

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