Putting to a Picture

[saevel25]

This was posted by @iacas back in 2019.

He also brough this up in the latest episode of the Spin Axis. 

051: Distance Control and Heads Up Putting with Dr. Sasho MacKenzie | The Spin Axis Podcast - Golf Coaches Discuss Instruction Modern Techniques and Technology

About a few weeks ago, I learned about the term Aphantasia.

Aphantasia is the medical term for the inability to voluntarily create mental images in the "mind's eye," often referred to as having no visual imagination.

I took a test for this, and I am closer to the aphantasia side of things. There is a subset of people who have Hyperphantasia. Extremely vivid mental imagery. 

If I say, close your eyes and envision an apple. Some people can see a bright red apple clear as if it was on a table. While others see nothing at all. I fall into that category. I know I am thinking of an apple. I know it is read, probably because I have been told it is red. I could say, imagine a blue apple. I have a sense there is a blue apple. When I close my eyes all I get it darkness. I don't see anything at all. I can't project a mental image of the apple onto the desk. 

There was an interesting test where you stare intently at an image of greenish apple. The image tricks your eyes to seeing a red apple if you look away from the screen. It is similar to when you stare at a light for too long, and then you get that dark image of the light in your vision when you look away from the light. Instead, of the color being dark its red. It projects the red apple to wherever you look away to. This is to simulate how people who don't have Aphantasia form a mental image of an apple. 

So, I wonder if there is any impact to putting to the picture technique? If I stare at hole and concentrate on that memory. I know I am trying to imagine the image; the memory is there. I just can't actually see it. 

 

 

[Ty_Webb]

This is one of those experiential things that it's virtually impossible to imagine how it is for people on the other side of the spectrum. I can close my eyes and see pictures in my head that are just about as detailed as when my eyes are open although I can only focus on bits of it at a time. So if I look at a picture and focus on something in the middle and that only, when I close my eyes I can see that thing I was focused on but everything else is blurred and more so than when my eyes are open. 

Out of curiosity - when you watch this do you see the distorted faces? 

 

[iacas]

4 hours ago, Ty_Webb said:

Out of curiosity - when you watch this do you see the distorted faces?

Yes, but I don't think that's the same thing.

[iacas]

@saevel25, to what you said above…

Quote

Aphantasics seem to perform normally on spatial navigation and motor tasks. It has a big effect on athletes trying to use imagery in mental training. They would also likely struggle with the "putt to the picture" concept, but their ability to "remember how far away the hole is" should decay at the same rate as others.

You may be a better candidate for actual real HUP than others.

Or, you should really pace off your putts and start to do some of the math — i.e. build a baseline, and base things on that. 15' but uphill? Play it like 16.5'. Etc.

[saevel25]

1 hour ago, iacas said:

@saevel25, to what you said above…

You may be a better candidate for actual real HUP than others.

Or, you should really pace off your putts and start to do some of the math — i.e. build a baseline, and base things on that. 15' but uphill? Play it like 16.5'. Etc.

Yea, that is probably true. 

[colin007]

I've been putting whilst looking at the hole and it's definitely helped my distance control