Comments on: Who let the invisible man in here?

Who let the invisible man in here?

psmealey — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 15:25:16 -0800

Entoptic phenomenanotographs [via Flickr]. Entoptic phenomena are visual effects whose source is within the eye itself. This is a photo set of nothing but entoptic phenomena... as well as a few invisible men.

By: flatluigi

flatluigi — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 15:38:08 -0800

All I see are people jumping under sheets.

By: evilgenius

evilgenius — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 15:40:43 -0800

while there are some interesting shots there, how are they "entoptic phenomena"? Yes, ok, they are tagged as such on flickr, but then I could tag the post with accurate. Tagging does not make it so.

By: lupus_yonderboy

lupus_yonderboy — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 15:47:12 -0800

It isn't actually just people jumping under sheets -- I suspect a little Photoshop trickery too.

By: psmealey

psmealey — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 15:49:31 -0800

Flagged as I thought it was a cool set and I was too fucking tired to come up with a name other than what the Flickr member supplied.

By: never used baby shoes

never used baby shoes — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 15:51:53 -0800

I'm just not seeing (ha!) how these photos count as "entoptic phenomena". Nothing in them seems to relate to floaters or phosphenes or the other types.

By: never used baby shoes

never used baby shoes — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 15:54:01 -0800

I don't think you needed to flag it, psmealey. I think we could have an interesting discussion on why Flickr has tagged them so, and they are cool photos.

By: quin

quin — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 16:04:00 -0800

A friend of mine once said, "The best mind game you can play with someone, is to start messing with them, let them notice, stop, and never let on that you aren't doing it anymore." These photos reminded me of that concept. Because I stared at this one for five minutes or so, trying to see what clever eye trickery was going on. Then I realized that, sometimes someone under a sheet is just someone under a sheet, nothing more, nothing less.

By: DU

DU — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 16:24:54 -0800

Based on the comments in this thread, I was expecting some serious underwhelmation. But they are actually weirdly awesome. Like photos from an alternate reality where bacteria are the size of men.

By: slogger

slogger — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 16:51:58 -0800

There were some neat shots there, but I would've preferred a small handful of well-chosen pictures rather than dozens. On preview, kinda what quin said.

By: nickyskye

nickyskye — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 17:04:56 -0800

Just love this post. I get the feeling the idea may have been these images of mid-air people jumping under linens look like they are floating, floaters. And when the photographer looked up floaters they probably came across the totally fun phrase Entoptic Phenomena. They reminded me of that wonderful bit in American Beauty where the pot dealing creative kid films the plastic bag floating/dancing in a small whirl wind and says it's the most beautiful thing he's ever seen. And I never knew what those flies in the eyes were medically called. A well known Buddhist teacher discussed them as part of an advanced meditation and I was always curious what the medical reasons were that these exist. Flying flies, "mouches volantes".

By: MetaMonkey

MetaMonkey — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 17:10:38 -0800

While we're on the subject: A post about entoptic phenomena and the origin of art I made a while ago. Not many pics though.

By: blaneyphoto

blaneyphoto — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 17:12:10 -0800

I've looked through this a few times and I'm just not excited about it like some of those flickr folks are. I'd kind of liked the photographer to have used a really shallow DOF in many of them to further separate the subject from its background. All in all a fun idea, but mediocre execution.

By: rooftop secrets

rooftop secrets — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 17:29:37 -0800

seconding what slogger said... could have used some paring down in the photo selection process. Cool idea bogged down by some filler.

By: TechnoLustLuddite

TechnoLustLuddite — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 17:50:58 -0800

how would one go about photographing REAL entoptic phenomena, anyway? That was my first thought...

By: StickyCarpet

StickyCarpet — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 18:26:38 -0800

Simulated glare caused in the eye.

By: yohko

yohko — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 18:40:34 -0800

Kinetic phenomena.

By: dreamsign

dreamsign — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 18:48:01 -0800

I was all excited about whatever crazy technology someone came up with to somehow photograph EP. Blargh.

By: Tube

Tube — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 20:32:52 -0800

The March 1985 issue of Vanity Fair magazine had an article on autoerotic asphyxia victim Clarey Faye. Clarey kept a journal, composed of a secret language consisting of Arabic, Sanskrit, and Greek characters. Repeatedly written on a page was the single word "phosphene". I was hoping that the Flickr set would contain art based on hypoxic euphoria, but it did not...