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Literal NPC with no mind's eye wants to be a fiction writer

https://old.reddit.com/r/writing/comments/10bvwyq/i_have_total_aphantasia_which_means_my_minds_eye

								

								

I have total aphantasia, which means my minds eye is dark. I have 0 senses up in my brains. Any tips for writing detailed scenes without the senses? :marseyblind:

I’ve always wanted to write, but always struggled writing detail into the story. I love writing stories themselves, but loathe the detail in creating a scene around the story. I think I don’t focus on it because it does absolutely nothing for me. Even when I read books, I basically gloss over the setting. I just need to know an overview of the setting and I’ll be good.

As usual, the comments give moderately decent, superficial advice while eluding the fundamental problem: You can't describe a scene if you can't imagine one.


Choose actual photos for your scenes. Describe the photos :marseyneat:

Some kinda reverse midjourney human being


Well that’s simple. Write what you would want to read. If setting isn’t that important to you then just give an overview. If you try and write detailed descriptions of things you’ll find it boring, it’ll sound pretentious and you’ll lose your own uniqueness, which is what people want to read. Focus on whatever you find interesting and fun.

The Chad summarizer


Go through published books and try to identify what kind of tone scenes have (e.g. scary, sad, cosy) and write down how they're described. Make a list of recurring details and use them when you want to generate that effect.

Here are some that I've noticed:

Warmth normally seems positive and safe. E.g. a fire crackling in the hearth, or a steaming mug of hot chocolate.

You can also make places seem even more inviting by adding cooking smells to your description, if appropriate. :marseysnappyautism:

Beep boop. It appears the organic beings are drawn to the olfactory sensations correlated with the preparation of food. I shall investigate further.


R/writing is the absolute worst hobby/artistic sub. Imagine if half of the music sub posts were about being tone-deaf or deaf-deaf and everyone was just sucking each other off about how valid that is. Or talking about how you don't need to listen to music to be a musician.

Also check out my previous post, in which an neurodivergent train wants to be a writer despite being completely unable to concentrate on reading:

https://rdrama.net/post/139302/marseybrainlet-giga-r-slur-asks-if-she

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I knew someone who said they had 'aphantasia'. One night, after a few drinks, I asked her to describe a sun and she described some basic b-word clipart sun (:marseyyawn:). I asked her what color it was (yellow) and after a bit more prompting she realised that she was describing an image of a sun in her minds eye.

Turns out she had a minds eye all along, she just suffered from the classic women's disease - lack of introspection.

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:marseysquint: "where is the 4k tv in my brain? when I close my eyes really hard all I see is staticky darkness maybe a few patterns"

:marseyveryworried: "oh no oh frick I'm disabled I don't got a 4k tv in my brain to show me pictures"


most of the time this is literally what happened when people decide they have "aphantasia"

plenty of people cite imagination in Toy Story, Backyardigans, and children's TV where the environment literally changes as to why they believe they have "no imagination", they think it's a whole butt voluntary and shareable hallucinogenic delusion experience that they are missing out on :marseyfacepalm:

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he doesn't have a 4k tv in his brain

NGMI

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I have a flickering Bell and Howell Super 8MM 346A :marseyitsover:

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you have aphantasia

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:ohgodwhy:

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I have aphantasia, I can describe the sun because I know what it looks like in words , I just can't picture it with my brain

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Life hack: Instead of trying to picture it, remember it.

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Yeah a lot of them are trying to draw an image in their head from scratch rather than just recalling a memory. I have a hard time believing true aphantasia exists because then they'll definitely have trouble remembering faces, which is not an associated condition here.

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nah its not a linked brain function in the way you think it is, like i cant picture my parents faces no matter how hard i try but i can recognize them easily, i also have normal spacial reasoning and can do things like navigate an area, i just dont use imagery to do it, or if i do its not conscious to me

when i close my eyes all i see is my eyelids but the only thing it seems to really effect is my autobiographical memory because i have no visual memory at all

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Just take a good look at the sun so you remember what it looks like.

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it's a giant fireball that gives you cancer. better to avoid it.

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