What It's Like To Be Colour Blind: Fascinating Images Reveal How The World Appears To People

What it's like to be colour blind: Fascinating images reveal how the world appears to people with the condition

• One in 20 people suffer from colour blindness, a condition that makes the world a duller place
• The four kinds of colour blindness are protanopia, dueteranopia, tritanopia and achromatopsia
• New images give an idea what the four types of colour blindness people experience actually look like
• A separate test will also tell you whether you can see the world in all the colours available to to the human eye

Around one in 20 people suffer from colour blindness, a condition that can make the world a duller place.

But for people who don't, it can be difficult to imagine what a 'colour blind world' looks like.

Now new images released from Colblindor, a blog run by Daniel Flück from Zurich, give an idea of what the four types of colour blindness people experience actually look like.







People with protanopia lack the long-wavelength sensitive retinal cones needed to recognise and distinguish between colours in the green, yellow and red spectrum. Dueteranopia affects the same part of the spectrum, but sufferers lack medium-wavelength retinal cones meaning the differences can be more pronounced






People with colour blindness that affects the short-wavelength cone system have what's known as tritanopia. Total colour blindness makes people see everything in black and white, and is a visual disorder that affects one in every 33,000 people



While many sufferers are aware if they have a significant form of the condition, some may not realise their colour perception is not particularly good

COLOUR BLINDNESS

Approximately one in 20 people suffer from colour blindness, a condition that makes the world a duller place to look at.

According to the NHS, it affects 1 in 200 women in the world and 1 in 12 men.

There are four kinds of colour blindness known as protanopia, dueteranopia, tritanopia and achromatopsia.

The retina of the eye has two types of light-sensitive cells; rods and cones.

Both are found the layer at the back of your eye which processes images.

Rods work in low light conditions, but cones work in daylight and are responsible for colour. People who have colour blindness have a problem with the cones in their retina.



Approximately one in 20 people suffer from colour blindness, a condition that makes the world a duller place to look at. But if you have not got the condition, it might be difficult to imagine how the world looks through someone else's eyes. Pictured are four different types of colour blindness and how they look like to people who suffer from these variants of the condition

Meanwhile, people with colour blindness that affects the short-wavelength cone system have what's known as tritanopia.

This is the second rarest kind - affecting 0.003 per cent of males and females - and tritanopes confuse light blues with greys, purples with black, mid-greens with blues and oranges with reds.

The effects of colour vision deficiency can be classified as mild, moderate or severe.

Total colour blindness makes people see everything in black and white, and is a visual disorder that affects one in every 33,000 people.

This type of monochromacy, called achromatopsia, is rare and is the most severe form of colour blindness.

Figures from Colour Blindness Awareness suggest approximately 40 per cent of colour blind pupils leaving secondary school are unaware they are colour blind, while 60 per cent of sufferers experience many problems in everyday life.

TYPES OF COLOUR BLINDESS



Figures from Colour Blindness Awareness suggest approximately 40 per cent of colour blind pupils leaving secondary school are unaware they are colour blind

Protanopia

Protanopes are more likely to confuse:

1. Black with many shades of red

2. Dark brown with dark green, dark orange and dark red

2. Some blues with some reds, purples and dark pinks

3. Mid-greens with some oranges

Deuteranopia

Deuteranopes are more likely to confuse:

1. Mid-reds with mid-greens

2. Blue-greens with grey and mid-pinks

3. Bright greens with yellows

4. Pale pinks with light grey

Tritanopia

Tritanopes are more likely to confuse:

1. Light blues with greys

2. Dark purples with black

3. Mid-greens with blues

4. Oranges with reds

Achromatopsia

Can only see black and white



The second rarest kind of colour blindness - affecting 0.003 per cent of males and females - tritanopes confuse light blues with greys, purples with black, mid-greens with blues and oranges with reds




Figures from Colour Blindness Awareness suggest approximately 40 per cent of colour blind pupils leaving secondary school are unaware they are colour blind

 

It is believed around 60 per cent of people who are colour blind experience many problems in everyday life


A firm called EnChroma - that makes glasses designed to give the colour blind 'normal' vision - has created an online test to reveal whether a person is able to see the world in all the colours available to to the human eye.

To complete the test, users must identify a coloured number on a different coloured, circular background. A keypad to the right of the circle is used to select the number, or they can choose to select 'Unsure' or 'Nothing'.

Hitting these keys automatically generates the next number, and the colours and contrast differ as the test continues while a bar along the top of the screen tracks the user's progress.

At the end of the test the user is either told they have normal vision, or which form of colour blindness they suffer from.

EnChroma's online test is based on the original Ishihara color blindness test which uses 38 'Ishihara Plates' to assess how a person sees colours but also how these colours are seen in relation to others.

Named after its Japanese inventor Dr Shinobu Ishihara, it has been used to identify colour vision deficiencies since they were first published in 1917.


EnChroma is based in Berkeley and has designed a system called Digital Colour Boost.





The original Ishihara color blindness test which uses 38 'Ishihara Plates' to assess how a person sees colours but also how these colours are seen in relation to others





Named after its Japanese inventor Dr Shinobu Ishihara, it has been used to identify colour vision deficiencies since they were first published in 1917





Andrew Cocks, who suffers from tritanopia, told MailOnline he sees predominantly brown across the range of pencils but the blue pencils on the right have very little contrast and appear as various shades of grey

This consists of frames fitted to glasses and sunglases that work using a series of precise 'cutouts' along the spectrum of light.

By removing the wavelengths of light between the primary colours, Digital Color Boost amplifies the colour signal sent to the brain and for wearers, colours appear brighter and more saturated.

People report that their colour discrimination is faster and more accurate and they are able to see more vibrant colours when wearing the glasses.

They are more likely to notice objects that are differentiated against a background based on colour, such as a flower against background of leaves, whereas without the lens those objects would have been overlooked.

When people with normal colour vision wear the EnChroma Cx glasses, they also see a 'colour boost' effect: colours appear to 'pop' with a 'super-ordinary vibrance'.





A firm called EnChroma - that makes glasses designed to give the colour blind 'normal' vision - has created an online test to reveal whether a person is able to see the world in all the colours available to to the human eye





To complete the test, users have to identify a coloured number on a different coloured, circular background





The colours and contrast differ as the test continues (pictured). A keypad is used to select the number, or they can choose to select 'Unsure' or 'Nothing'





There is also a colour blindness simulator, designed by a firm called etre that lets people see how images appear to people with all three types of colour blindness. This image shows the colours and brightness of Times Square in New York to someone with normal vision











The left image shows how the same scene appears to people with protanopia, the centre image is similar and shows how dueteranopes see the picture. The right-hand image is how someone with tritanopia sees Times Square











This collection of images shows a selection of the flags of the world and how they appear to a person with normal colour vision (left), a person with protanopia and dueteranopia (centre) and tritanopia (right)

An animation spotted by IFL Science reveals how coloured pencils appear to people with normal vision and along the colour blindness scale.

Andrew Cocks, who suffers from tritanopia, told MailOnline he sees predominantly brown across the range of pencils but the blue pencils on the right have very little contrast and appear as various shades of grey.

There is also a colour blindness simulator, designed by a firm called etre that lets people see how images appear to people with all three types of colour blindness.


An animation (above) spotted by IFL Science reveals how coloured pencils appear to people with normal vision and along the colour blindness scale











This is a topography image of Elysium Mons, a volcano on Mars located in the volcanic province Elysium. The left-hand image is the original. The centre image is how it appears to protanopes, and the right is how it appears to tritanopes











The same effect for this photo is shown, using the etre tool (normal vision left, protoanopia centre and tritanopia right). Figures from Colour Blindness Awareness suggest that approximately 40% of colour blind pupils leaving secondary school are unaware they are colour blind, while 60% of sufferers experience many problems in everyday life

The free version lets users compare low-resolution images that are 100kb or smaller and have a maximum of 1,000 by 1,000 pixels. Alternatively people can pay a pound to upload higher resolution images or websites.

'Many images and resources on the web are coloured in such a way that it's difficult for users with vision deficiencies to comprehend them,' explained etre.

'We've seen many examples in our time, including theatre seating plans where colour blind users couldn't differentiate one section of seating from another.'

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