What do you see when you close your eyes?

I see afterimages, when applicable, and phosphenes the rest of the time.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen nothing or blackness, even though I think I have stage 4 aphantasia, but that’s just for image recall or imagination, rather than involuntary pre-sleep imagery or “closed-eye visuals” (CEV).

Phosphenes if i rub my eyes

Afterimages only if i was looking at a bright light before

Aphantasia if i just close my eyes

Nothing

the first 3 options

It’s absolutely wild to me that people can think of any object and it just?? Appears in their head??? Y’all are God’s favorites.

I see nothing lol

same. Like I can sort of see flickers of an image, if I try really hard, but definitely can’t “see” it or hold an image in my mind. I’ve always gotten bored or frustrated doing guided meditation style activities, because I didn’t realize that the whole “picture yourself on a beach” thing was actually possible for most people. Meanwhile, I’m over here just internally repeating “I’m a beach” while staring at blackness 😅

First 4.

I used to see phosphenes a lot as a child. I would entertain myself by closing my eyes and watching them lol

Mostly 4 but sometimes 2

I find it hard to believe that people can’t create images in their head. Like if you’re standing in a white room you can’t imagine what it’d be like with blue walls?

very cool! I’m an interior designer and I can visualize things in my head like the blue walls.

I definitely could not visualize a different wall colour. I’d have to hold up a swatch or use one of those “view in your room” features like they have on the Benjamin Moore website.

Like, I obviously know what blue looks like, but I couldn’t conjure up an image of the space with blue walls.

got it got it! Thanks for responding.

I say 4 because I see brief snippets, but not like the grey outline in the image above. More like the picture almost starts to form but as soon as I “look at it” it’s gone. That only happens when I’m trying to recall an image. Conjuring up an image from scratch is level 5.

I have no problem reading, but always tend to gloss over descriptions of scenery or people’s appearance (unless it seems relevant to the plot like a Chekhov’s gun situation), lol.

I couldn’t get through the first chapter of Les Miserable because he spends like 4 pages describing the interior of a church.

how interesting! I like reading because it IS like seeing a movie in my head. So you can’t picture peoples’ faces in your mind? Or maybe you can because you’ve seen them before.

I can’t really picture it, but I could describe someone I know from memory. Like I know my husband has long brown hair, blue eyes, and is about 6 inches taller than I am.

What I can’t do is take a description from a page and turn it into an image. Like reading this “His appearance is wild, with long, tangled black hair and beard hiding most of his face, beetle-black eyes, and hands the size of trash can lids. His feet are described as being like baby dolphins in their leather boots…” my brain is like “ok, giant guy with a bushy beard, got it!”