Since I was a teenager I've always known I have some form of mild color blindness.  I've never really taken the time to do much research on it.  I've known several people who were completely color blind and they were unable to tell the difference between a red light and a green light.  I on the other hand can see every color in the spectrum.  You put a red, green or blue marker in front of me and I can easily tell you which is which.  So it has always baffled me that I failed color blindness tests like the Ishihara test. 

Take for example the dot filled circle to the right.  This is an Ishihara test that I fail.  You most likely see a "2" in the middle of it.  I see nothing but random dots.  The odd thing for me is that I see all of the colors.  The only time its ever been an issue is with the "mixing of colors."  For example, I might see a bright purple as blue, until you put it next to a blue object and then I realize my mistake.

Yesterday, I decided to figure out exactly what was wrong with my eyes.  There is an amazing abundance of tests and information on the web about color blindness.  The problem is that every test I took gave me different results.  Some would say I was one type of colorblind and another would say I was something else.  I determined quickly that they just plain weren't accurate, or I had a more rare type of color blindness that wasn't documented well.  I tend to think the tests just aren't accurate.  I finally found a piece of software on the Web called Visolve.  Visolve allows you to correct the colors on your monitor if you are colorblind.  So what I did was keep adjusting the settings until I could read all of the numbers in the Ishihara tests!  Presto!  I am diagnosed.  And it didn't require a visit to a Doctor!

My diagnosis: I have a type of color blindness called Protanomaly.  Protanomaly is a form of color blindness that results from having weak (malfunctioning) red cones in your eyes.  The average person has three types cones in their eyes.  These cones sense light on different wavelengths: Red, Green and Blue.  This explains why I can see all colors, but sometimes mistake a bright purple for a blue.  Through my testing it looks like my eyes sense red light about 30% weaker than green and blue.  My world is a little bit less red looking than everyone else in the world!  To give you an understanding of what this means, look at the three pictures posted below.  The first picture is a normal picture with normal coloring.  The second picture is the way the world looks to me.  The third picture is color corrected so that I can see how the normal person views the world.

How a Normal person sees it.	How I see it.	Corrected so I can see what you see.

I'm sure as you look at the middle picture you say "wow...  it is not red enough!" and when you look at the right picture you say "Wow... it is way too red."  Of course, I say the same thing about these pictures, because I've seen the world since birth without the normal amount of red that everyone else sees.  It is interesting to see how the world looks to a normal person.  Everyone always says how they love the fall colors.  They've always seemed dull and drab to me.  But when I take a picture of a fall tree and add +30 red to it (Highlights, shadows and midtones) I can immediately see why people think it's beautiful!  Look at all of the red in the leaves that I've never seen!

Lastly, I have my mother to thank for this.  Protanomaly is passed on to you from one of your mother's X chromosomes.  Women are carriers of the genetic defect, but since women have two X chromosomes (one defective and one not) they do not experience the problem because the good X chromosome will cancel the bad one out.  Since I am a man, I have one X and one Y.  It just so happens I got her bad X.  It is a 50/50 chance.  Thanks Mom!