Color blindness and surveying

Red/green colorblind here. Never really thought about pink flagging, but I do find it much harder to see in the forest than fluorescent orange. Not sure it really affects me more than others, other than that. But where I did seem to have a lot of difficulty is in identifying the mottles in deep hole test pits.

I'm not color blind, but a friend of mine in college was red/green color blind.?ÿ We would always let him pick out the flagging for labs.

Worked with a couple of folks who were colorblind. Don't think I have any stories from the field, but one fellow in the office was tasked with creating a slide/powerpoint presentation and picked the most godawful (to the rest of us) color combinations of text and background. Drafting and CAD hadn't been an issue for him since he could get by with the template colors, and the final product was in black and white.

I'm red green colorblind.?ÿ Anecdotally have run into many fellow surveyors who share this trait.

Some of the challenges are pink paint on dirt, CAD colors - why so many?, utility markings,?ÿ and a unique sense of fashion.?ÿ I like oranges and yellows.?ÿ ?ÿ ?ÿ

Utilities are the only big deal and I got a few tricks - sometimes I can see the texture of paint instead of the color, sometimes I have someone walk a site with me, sometimes I'll drone it and get another set of eyes post process.?ÿ ?ÿBest case I'm on site the same time as locators and can ask them dumb questions. It also makes a guy more observant of other signs of utilities, like surface features, potential old trenching, etc.

Red/Green colorblind. For some reason I can see the blue flagging in the woods very well, same with pink and black striped.?ÿ

I have had comments regarding the colors I use in cad work. I always plot black and white so what's the problem?

I have really considered buying a pair of the glasses that will correct the issue. I wish I could find a pair to try out before I pay the money.

The wife always picks out my clothing for church and other important events. Work days I pick my own clothes and have been asked a few questions through the years. I miss the Marine Corps days when they told me how to dress.

I stick with the lime green vests.

?ÿ

BTW orange is out of the question for me , especially as fall draws near.

I'm red/green as well and pink paint on dirt or pink flagging give me the most problems. I see orange and white flagging the best.?ÿ

@michael-geiger I bought a pair of those glasses and certain colors were more vibrant when I wore them, but definitely not life changing like the advertisements show. I ended up returning them and got a full refund without any hassle.

Although not color blind myself, I do know quite a few in this profession.?ÿ One mentor couldn't see red and had problems with pink.?ÿ His remedy was to use the multi-colored flagging (pink/black barber pole) when the situation called for pink.?ÿ He would also cuss the authors for those reference books that used colored text instead of italics and bold text, to highlight captions.

Not colorblind, but have a hard time seeing yellow or blue flagging in the woods.?ÿ Same with the hi-viz yellow that everyone's switched to - doesn't stand out at all.?ÿ I see orange great, though

Red/Green also. I like blue and/or white in the forest. Red keel on pavement is almost invisible to me. But once I find it I can see it okay, it just doesn't stand out. Same with pink and orange.

Also, my wife picks out matching clothes for me when I have to dress up.

I worked with a color blind guy in the 70's. He could find a nail in the asphalt much faster than anyone else as long as there was no paint around it. He was worried about getting drafted to Viet Nam since he heard that color blindness was an advantage for snipers because they weren't fooled by camoflage and could pick out shapes.?ÿ

@ Larry Best

?ÿ

That's true, from what I've read. Also, Monte Roberts they guy who wrote about horses language, in his book "the man who listens to horses" was color blind. This helped him in his endeavor.

Nate

My son is CB and I have noticed a few interesting things over the years. When he got a summer job in high school building out networks, I have no idea how he was able to build an RJ45 cable or jack. But he made it work. The other day he called me on Duo while he was hooking up the running lights on his camp trailer. Pointed the camera at the wires and asked me what colors they were (I think they were both whiteish to him). He marked the white one with one sharpie tick and the yellow one with two sharpie ticks and then a while later sent me a picture of all the lights turned on.

Many years ago I worked on a survey crew with two CB guys. One could see notches and stone markings much better than I could (it was actually amazing) and the other could not see them at all. So, I suspect that the answer here is "it depends on the task at hand and the actual type of CB".

During my senior year of high school we were fortunate enough to have available a class in basic electronics.?ÿ We handled resistors and capacitors and such daily.?ÿ The color banding on resistors to know their resistance value was covered at length.?ÿ The instructor one day made a comment about those with color blindness would have one heck of a time with this.?ÿ A buddy raised his hand and asked the instructor to help him with this because he was color blind and would hold the sample card showing the numbers in one hand and then somewhat guess that whatever color he saw on the card in a certain position was the same on the resistor in the other hand.?ÿ As I recall there were two colors that were virtually identical to him.

A kid I worked with was CB and couldn't see pink but couldn't miss blue.?ÿ As much as I hated maps that used color gradients to separate features, such as voting districts or counties, he loved them.

Color blindness affects men more than women.?ÿ Women, on average, see a wider spectrum of light and greater?ÿ variations within it.?ÿ Tetrachromacy is rare and seems to be present only in females.?ÿ Since many birds species have four color cones in their eyes, and the resulting difficulty seeing in low light conditions, I wonder if CB men notice the opposite.

Have any of you color blind fellows noticed that you can see better in low light than the average Joe?

?ÿ

?ÿ

I remember when I was a little kid and the subject of color blindness came up, my dad saying it was easy to distinguish traffic light colors: the green light is on top and the red light is on the bottom, with the orange in between.?ÿ

I had a Party Chief that could not find evidence of a boundary line.?ÿ I went to the site and took pictures of a well painted red line and came back to the office to dress him down. I was surprised by this as he was a very good Party Chief. After a few minutes, he blew up and let me know he was color blind. I called in his I-Man and showed him the pictures. so this would not be repeated. I felt a little bad about this. However, He should have let us know, so we could help him. We did some training with all the field crew member identifying property evidence, which helped in the long run.

Not color blind, but when I after had my cataract surgery, I could see ultra violet spectrum for a few days.

Very strange!