Page 1 of 2

Dreams

PostPosted: Wed May 20, 2009 3:43 am
by madlights
Do you dream in Black and White or in Color?

Re: Dreams

PostPosted: Wed May 20, 2009 5:34 am
by soenda
I dream exclusively in color. I also seem to colorize black & white movies in my memory, recalling colors that I cannot actually have seen.

Funny, eh?

Re: Dreams

PostPosted: Wed May 20, 2009 2:47 pm
by shawnkraus
I believe I dream in color, but am not absolutely sure.

I like the question and will be thinking about this question as I drift off to sleep tonight.

I anxiously await the answers of others to this question.

--Shawn

Re: Dreams

PostPosted: Fri May 22, 2009 3:35 am
by amoxtli
Interesting question. I dream in color, never black and white.

I think I used to dream in black and white back when I developed my own film, but I can't remember...

Re: Dreams

PostPosted: Fri May 22, 2009 8:04 pm
by madlights
amoxtli said:
I think I used to dream in black and white back when I developed my own film, but I can't remember...
:D :D :D
I think that could have a bearing on things....
It is strange that I've met people who swear they dream in B&W, yet we see in color. I've also had someone tell me that more creative people dream in color...I don't know if that's true
also don't know, I think I dream in both sometimes...but like shawn...don't exactly remember...I know I've had sepia nightmares :twisted: :wink:

Re: Dreams

PostPosted: Mon Jun 01, 2009 4:47 pm
by mardoli
I dream in colours, but sometimes they are very dark, it’s a matter of light, not of black and white.
Sometimes I dream night images, sometimes day-light images.
I have occasionally very bright colours in my dreams.
I think we might dream in black and white only if we dream of an old movie....
The question is very amusing and unusual...it opens the door toward the mysterious world of dreams and the uncertain perception we might have of it.
It would be intriguing to take photos of our dreams, probably we would not recognize them....

Re: Dreams

PostPosted: Tue Jun 02, 2009 7:17 am
by soenda
I used to have nightmares about "things" that lived in the basement.

Image

Re: Dreams

PostPosted: Sat Aug 15, 2009 10:35 pm
by genghis45
madlights wrote:Do you dream in Black and White or in Color?


The surreal ones are of course, in black and white.

Image

Re: Dreams

PostPosted: Sun Aug 16, 2009 12:11 am
by sean_mcr
You'd be hard pressed to find a writer or historian that spoke of dreaming in black and white before the advent of photography and film. I am not aware of most of my dreams but I would say that I have grown up in the age of colour images from TV & film and I cant recall having dreamnt in black and white.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/scie ... reams.html

Re: Dreams

PostPosted: Sun Aug 16, 2009 9:30 am
by genghis45
Sometimes in color, particularly nightmares......

Image

Re: Dreams

PostPosted: Mon Aug 17, 2009 10:33 pm
by soenda
sean_mcr wrote:You'd be hard pressed to find a writer or historian that spoke of dreaming in black and white before the advent of photography and film. I am not aware of most of my dreams but I would say that I have grown up in the age of colour images from TV & film and I cant recall having dreamnt in black and white.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/scie ... reams.html


That's an interesting study. It would be fascinating to compare the dreams of people from the developing world who had no exposure to TV or movies as children whatsoever.

There's another context for black/white versus color in dreams---the human eye's rods and cones. Rods are involved only with black/white vision, while cones are responsible for different kinds of color. I bet that there are dream studies using EEGs, which might tell whether both BW and color cells were firing during dreams. Or whether they even fire at all, since dreams might happen entirely within the cerebral cortex and not involve the optic nerves. Because of the role of rapid eye movements in dream sleep, it's hard to predict.

Intriguing to think about, though.

Re: Dreams

PostPosted: Mon Aug 17, 2009 10:46 pm
by soenda
genghis45 wrote:Sometimes in color, particularly nightmares......


"What dreams may come?"

http://www.pbase.com/soenda/image/86539940/original.jpg

Re: Dreams

PostPosted: Tue Aug 18, 2009 8:41 am
by genghis45
soenda wrote:
genghis45 wrote:Sometimes in color, particularly nightmares......


"What dreams may come?"



The theme of pairs appears frequenbtly. It's very Freudian.

Image

Re: Dreams

PostPosted: Wed Aug 19, 2009 12:38 pm
by sean_mcr
soenda wrote:
sean_mcr wrote:You'd be hard pressed to find a writer or historian that spoke of dreaming in black and white before the advent of photography and film. I am not aware of most of my dreams but I would say that I have grown up in the age of colour images from TV & film and I cant recall having dreamnt in black and white.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/scie ... reams.html


That's an interesting study. It would be fascinating to compare the dreams of people from the developing world who had no exposure to TV or movies as children whatsoever.

There's another context for black/white versus color in dreams---the human eye's rods and cones. Rods are involved only with black/white vision, while cones are responsible for different kinds of color. I bet that there are dream studies using EEGs, which might tell whether both BW and color cells were firing during dreams. Or whether they even fire at all, since dreams might happen entirely within the cerebral cortex and not involve the optic nerves. Because of the role of rapid eye movements in dream sleep, it's hard to predict.

Intriguing to think about, though.


This might answer that question, Sue.

"During dreaming, the primary visual cortex is inactive, while secondary areas are active. This is similar to when subjects are asked to imagine or recall a visual scene, and different from what happens when they are actually seeing the scene"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rapid_eye_movement_sleep


People who are blind from birth see nothing at all in dreams but other senses like touch etc will be present. People who become blind after seeing can still dream with vision yet they can not see in their everyday lives. The world as we experience it must be the biggest factor in our dreams.

Re: Dreams

PostPosted: Fri Aug 21, 2009 12:11 pm
by madlights
I was really tired last night, so fell asleep in my chair...I awoke from a dream and it was in really vivid color. I get going in streaks of working in color, or working in B&W and find my dreams are often what I'm working at the time with...I think that can influence things a bit too. The studies were probably done on people who don't work with visual images (except probably as would apply randomly to any group as a whole, and if not I missed it ) I would think many variables could apply in specific instances. An interesting study (the B&W TV generation study) for sure though, and probably true for the most part.