

EnChroma: Color for the Color Blind - GuiA
http://enchroma.com

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dietrichepp
Quick summary of how it works: it's a passive filter, no electronic
components. Nothing magical, but it is designed in a very clever way.

Our eyes have three types of cones, call them L, M, and S (you might think
"RGB" but it's really not, but that's not a bad lie to believe). Between L and
M, for example, there is a fair bit of overlap. So, these glasses filter out
the colors in the middle, where L and M overlap the most. This means that the
only colors which make it through are the colors which your eye can
distinguish better, making the colors more vibrant.

This works because most colors are a mix of a bunch of different frequencies
of light. Say, ROYGBIV. Maybe you have color blindness and a ROY mix looks the
same as an OYG mix. These glasses will filter out OY, so you are left with R
in one mix, and G in the other mix. These are easier to tell apart.

So, obviously not perfect, but it doesn't need to be. It just needs to be
better than what nature gave you (if you're colorblind). It also doesn't work
for people with, say, 100% deuteranopia, but most people with color blindness
aren't that severe.

~~~
pluma
This means they're more like a hearing aid (shifting frequencies you're unable
to hear into the spectrum your ear can process and simply adjusting loudness)
than a "cure".

I'd want to try one out for the kick of it, but I can't imagine using it the
way I would use regular vision-correcting glasses (or contact lenses).
Possibly as an aid for driving (where colour vision can be critical) but not
as a part of my everyday life -- much like Gunnar glasses, which I only use at
work.

I guess I'll have to wait for gene therapy or bionic technologies to advance
to the point where I can actually get something that lets me _see_ colours
properly.

Or, heck, tweak these so they shift IR or UV into the visual spectrum and
they'd have my attention.

EDIT: Emulating "normal" colour vision is interesting but emulating mantis
shrimp colour vision would make the glasses worth the price tag.

~~~
xom
Explanatory note: Most humans have three types of color receptive cones; a few
have four. Mantis shrimp have sixteen.

~~~
nerfhammer
Fewer cones may be better for low-light vision. Apparently mammals grew out of
a evolutionary niche where this was important, and they generally only have
two cones while other vertebrates have four. Remember how dogs have poor color
vision? That's true of almost all mammals. Primates are unusual among mammals
in having 3 types of cones and better color vision. Meanwhile reptiles, birds,
amphibians, insects have 4 types of cones and much better color vision than
us.

~~~
dietrichepp
The eye has a limited amount of real estate for light sensitive cells, and
animals have a limited amount of energy to dedicate towards eye growth. More
cones generally means fewer rods, which means poorer night vision. You can see
this for yourself at night, because cones are concentrated at the center of
the field of vision and rods are more common at the periphery. A common trick
in astronomy is to look next to a star rather than directly at a star, it is
not too hard to find stars which are invisible when you look at them directly
but which become visible when you look to the side. Various nocturnal and deep
sea creatures also feature a number of different adaptations, such as the
tapetum lucidum (which reflects light to pass through the retina a second
time) and special inverted rods which increase light sensitivity. These
structures come with their own various tradeoffs. For example, the tapetum
lucidum reduces image sharpness.

In spite of this, humans have very good eyes, with a balance of good low-light
vision, good color vision, and good image sharpness. There are other animals
better at each of these, but humans are still pretty amazing.

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MegaDeKay
I have a pair of Enchroma CX Receptors and blogged a while back about my
experience.

[http://madscientistlabs.blogspot.ca/2014/06/i-want-to-see-
vi...](http://madscientistlabs.blogspot.ca/2014/06/i-want-to-see-violet.html)

Basically, I knew I was colorblind from a very young age. I've refrained from
describing things by color since then because sometimes I'd get it wrong and
people would look at me like I was insane. Never bothered to learn the
resistor color code despite being an electrical engineer. Bombed my geology
labs because I couldn't distinuish rocks by their color (and because didn't
know there was an exemption available for people like me).

The first time I tried the Enchomas on was a very emotional experience.
Chickweed exploded from my lawn. Some red cars were a red I could never have
imagined. I saw a distant dead brown tree in my yard that would have been
almost invisible before. I suddenly understood why my wife liked a burgundy
shirt I had never cared for before.

The reactions of some of the people in the videos linked here probably
undersell the effect in some cases. Why? Several of the shots were taken
indoors. The Enchromas work best in bright, full spectrum sunlight. I noticed
in a few of the videos that people gravitate to the windows or head outside
where the effect is more pronounced. Enchroma is very up front about this on
their site.

The downside with the CX Receptors I have is their weight. The Receptors fit
over my (rather strong) prescription glasses and aren't that comfortable when
I'm bouncing around doing something physical. They are great for driving
though. I just don't like when I have to take them off - the world dies a
little when I do.

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kenferry
This is an amazing video:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WCcxwieuDH0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WCcxwieuDH0)

A colorblind person tries these glasses on without knowing what they are. :-)

~~~
themartorana
It's funny, because when he sees "purple" you have no idea if he sees the
_same_ purple people without color blindness do (and other commenters seem to
confirm it _isn 't_) but it's still enough of an upgrade that he's emotionally
moved.

You can't beat that with a stick.

~~~
jquery
> and other commenters seem to confirm it isn't

Color isn't in the eyes, it's in the brain. Since these glasses help the brain
receive the right balance of RGB, I see no reason to believe he isn't seeing
purple. I'm colorblind and trying these on was a mind-blowing trip.

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chime
Would it be possible to apply the same filter to a sample video to make the
colors pop for a color blind person? Maybe apply this filter
[http://i.imgur.com/EILB2lW.png](http://i.imgur.com/EILB2lW.png) via a VLC
plugin?

If so, that would be a fantastic way to demo this product online. And also
could be a great way for potential users to know if it would work for them or
not.

~~~
the8472
Video only dictates the intensity of the 3 components (RGB), the spectral
distribution of the components is dictated by the color filters in the TFT and
its lightsource.

I.e. on the software side you don't have much influence over the spectrum that
reaches the eye.

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tommyd
According to their test, I am a "strong pro-tan" and an unlikely to get much
benefit from the glasses - I would have been curious to try the effect, but it
would have been something rather special for me to consider parting with that
much money for them! I can't say being colour blind has really affected my
life (since I was a kid and used to colour the sky in purple anyway!) although
I do sometimes worry when retouching images that I might get the colours way
off. It would be interesting to see colour how other people do - as it is, it
usually ends up coming in conversation, we have a good laugh at me trying to
read the numbers on the test, and then I forget all about it again!

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Herdinger
A good friend of mine is colorblind and I did a bunch of research on the topic
of colorblindness a while back.

The problem(I'm sure it's great nevertheless) is that their technique doesn't
add any new colors and doesn't work for full dichromats.

Today we've got the technology too supply different color information to each
eye, it's even commonplace in the form of 3d television. I did a bit of
testing on how the brain interprets this (fun party trick, use complementary
colors for each frame and the resulting picture is grey without the glasses
and can be psychedelic shenanigans with.)

How stable the resulting color is seems to be connected to object recognition,
for a fruitstand there certainly were colors I didn't see before, for a
fullscreen it oscillated between colors irregularly.

I would love to reverse engineer the interpolation function the brain is
using. Since it's subjective it's difficult, even with a big sample size you
can't match to control colors.

If anybody wants to get into this topic I don't have any papers since it was a
while back, but topics such as MacAdam ellipse, color confusion lines and
image daltonization should be good starting points.

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mcdoh
I'm colorblind and thought theirs was one of the best online tests available,
but it seems they've changed it. I took their old test a few times and it
seemed quite accurate to me (based on the symptoms they list). With their
current test I keep getting "inconclusive". Here are my results from the
"good" test, I agree 100% with the symptoms but I don't agree with the
simulation: [http://enchroma.com/test/result/strong-
protan/?completed=1&r...](http://enchroma.com/test/result/strong-
protan/?completed=1&result=strong+protan&pts=1.85&dts=0.8745&tts=0.225)

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danieltillett
What would be the equivalent design for people with normal color vision?

~~~
MegaDeKay
From the Enchroma website:

"Do these glasses work with normal color vision also?"

"The EnChroma Cx lens causes a very powerful “super-color enhancement” effect.
The same “boost” that it gives to the vision of a person with color blindness
can be appreciated with normal color vision as well. In addition, the lens
also has a neutral color balance, which means that your sense of color
accuracy is not compromised or disturbed.

We have received testimonials from some customers who have normal color vision
that the glasses have beneficial effects on their mood, such as from seasonal
affective disorder. While this is an interesting potential application, this
particular use case has not been studied in detail yet and we do not have any
official claims that can be made regarding this use.

The EnChroma Team all wears the Cx Sunglasses, even though most of us are not
color deficient–and we love wearing them!"

~~~
Eric_WVGG
Yup. Apparently they weren't even invented for colorblind people; they were
popular among surgeons because the glasses would enable them to better
differentiate what's going on in a pool of guts.

The story is that a colorblind friend of a surgeon thought they looked cool
and just asked if he could try them on.

