Being an Artist with Partial Aphantasia

November 5, 2024 - Published

Aphantasia is the condition of being unable to visualize images in one's head. While it's technically been known about for a while, it's pretty poorly researched as of the time of writing, but has had some attention in recent years due to various viral posts. I found out a bit earlier than most of these posts due to a Youtube video that got pretty big, which is mainly about the struggles of being an artist with aphantasia. With the viral apple scale, where 1 is being able to visualize things realistically, and 5 is nothing at all, the video covers an artist who's a 5 while I'm around a 4.

Forenote

Aphantasia is a rough topic that I'm actually hesitant to bring up to people, because for some people it's news they really don't enjoy. One friend said it made them feel "disabled, or wrong" after finding out that almost everyone around them could just visualize things in their head while they couldn't. When one of my siblings found out I had partial aphantasia, they actually got angry as if I had lost a basic right. This isn't a part of the topic I wanted to discuss for this article, but I didn't want to leave it out either, for those finding out about the condition for the first time. 

I would recommend doing more research if you wanted to learn more about the subject, but I will also mention this: there are pros and cons to both sides of the spectrum. My friend found out a family member had hyperphantasia, the condition to imagine things extremely vividly, and this could apparently be very rough on them -- if you've ever had intrusive thoughts, you can have an idea of how stressful it would be to also get assaulted by extremely vivid images of those thoughts. 

Even for more minor side effects, things like "my drawings don't come out as I imagine them to" would be exclusive to people without aphantasia. Aphantasia needs a lot more research to create many conclusions, but I do encourage anyone struggling with it to not get down on themselves for having the condition. It was most likely not researched until recently because ultimately, it doesn't massively affect people's lives and how they're able to function. 

Still, I wanted to make this article since I feel most of the discussion surrounds people 100% with or without aphantasia, so I wanted to give some idea of what partial aphantasia was like.

How does your partial aphantasia work?

The most I ever "experimented" with my aphantasia was essentially getting quizzed by one friend who was curious. I don't want to redo the tests since it can be rather stressful to force myself to imagine things, so I'll go with the answers I gave him, which should be fairly accurate. It's difficult to be 100% accurate for something so nebulous, anyway.

What happens if you try to envision an apple?

• I can make out a vague shape, but it's very hard to sustain it for more than a second. It starts out at about 10% visibility, then disappears, though 10% is still a bit generous.

Can you add details to it?

• Kind of, but I can usually only focus on 1 thing at a time, maybe 2 things at most. If I add something, then the other things will disappear.

Can you imagine actions?

• Yes, I can imagine actions pretty well, but I won't be able to name any specific details. If I focus really hard, I can almost visualize a full walk cycle by tracking hands and feet since I know how a walk cycle works. However, I can't add color, tell you their expression, or even imagine all the clothes at the same time.

Can you imagine something like a beach?

• Yes, but not a very interesting one. Since I can only imagine 2 things at most, that would be the sand and water, and adding any elements would cause them to disappear.

What is it like to visually recall memories?

• Very dark, barely visible, and smaller the more I try to focus on it. Outer scenery isn't visible, only what I focus on, but I can remember it.

In summary, I can imagine things, but they're generally very dim images without details or shading. I can imagine vague color, but only if I focus very hard with my eyes closed. I can't imagine more than a few details at once, but as a result, it allows me to imagine general motions very well, which is helpful for animations.

There is a possibility that my internal visualization was slightly improved during my more intense art studies, but it's difficult to quantify. Most likely, it's just specialized memorization about details rather than actually being able to form more shapes and details in my head.

If you want a visual example of how my imagination looks, I often pointed people to my sketches several years ago. The easiest example to fetch would be my sketches for Draco's sprites, since they intersected the perfect features of being 1) an old sketch, 2) rushed out by necessity, and 3) a file I could access easily, since I'm still using many of these sprites. Note how the lines are broad and undetailed, but ultimately do happen to be a generally "correct" representation. 

(Normally after this sketch is finished, I would refine it to make sure that everything looked correct, but since each character had ~50+ sprites, I did go straight into lineart/color for the sake of saving time. Past Vec being unhinged like usual!)

How does your art process work?

Of course, note that my art process might not be due to aphantasia itself, and it might just be my own quirks -- other people with partial aphantasia most likely have very different processes. Either way, I think the thing that makes my process strikingly different from other artists is its emphasis on subtraction for details, rather than addition. Since my mental images were vague and messy, it made more sense to follow those broad strokes before honing in on the actual drawing.

These are some screenshots from a very old speedart of mine. Note how it starts off with huge broad strokes, and actually becomes more fleshed out once I erase large sections, allowing me to add in more details. Once I narrow it down enough, it becomes more clear where I'm meant to put down the lineart. The first sketch is essentially putting my brain out on paper, and the rest is about making sure that what's on the page looks correct.

If I can't come up with a good pose, another technique I'll use sometimes is thumbnailing, which is essentially just making very small sketches to figure out a drawing. While I don't have any good examples of this on-hand, here's some examples of sketches I did while figuring out how to do this drawing. Scyther has rather unique anatomy so I wanted to do something interesting, but I couldn't tell if a pose would look good until I had it on paper.

There is one last technique, but there's a bit more I have to explain.

How to draw without imagining anything at all

Something that I think many long-time artists will be familiar with is drawing something over and over to the point that you just memorize the lines. Now, when I'm teaching anyone art, I will always tell them NOT to "just follow the lines" because it's not very good for learning. If you don't know why those lines exist, it will hurt your ability to grow and draw in different styles.

However, if you're 1) just building a sketch, 2) want to maintain a consistent style, or 3) are just feeling particularly lazy, it's totally OK! This has been incredibly handy for me as someone that can't imagine things very clearly -- since I've drawn the same things in the same style for so long, I don't have to imagine what a "3/4ths angle digitigrade leg" looks like in my head; I can literally just draw the lines as I've always drawn them, because I've always drawn them the same. It's basically like a form of muscle memory! I also have similarly highly-specific features I've memorized: cat-like faces at multiple angles, certain paw-hand positions, neckerchiefs, hoodies, and more!

This has been a huge help for DracoFighter because most of the characters are really simple shapes which aren't hard to figure out rotations. I don't need a complex internal visualization system to tell me that when looking to the right, the pointy bits of Draco's horns point to the left, so that's why those rough lines in the sketch can easily be translated into highly specific thinner-lined shapes. Of course, having vectors to account for bad proportions always helps too.

So, with all those techniques in mind, my partial aphantasia hasn't been a huge issue for my art! Sometimes it does stink a bit to not be able to imagine a full piece clearly, but ultimately I don't think it affects my ability by much -- if anything, it makes the art process more rewarding, because it allows me to create something more vivid than my mind ever could on its own.

As a side note, something I omitted was drawing 3D shapes/anatomical figures, but I figured that was just a general art thing I did on top of what was already mentioned. Either way, whether you have aphantasia or not, do practice your forms!

• Vecderg