Shadow People and Peripheral Vision

**This month is reprints of some of my favorite posts in the past six years of GHT!**



The phenomenon of shadow figures or shadow people seems to be increasing. I’m uncertain if this is because people are talking about it so others are admitting to it, or if it’s something new to our world.

I’m probably most aligned with the theory that our vision is changing as we live in a world with HD TV, computer screens, and other kinds of electronics that constantly update their screens at a high rate of speed. Things we didn’t see in our peripheral vision are now available to us. A spectrum of things that were there all along may now be seen. Amazingly, this does line up, as peripheral vision (up to 90 images per second) is able to handle faster light waves than the central vision (3-4 high quality telescopic images per second), which is slower. (Source). If something is moving in a higher speed spectrum, your peripheral vision would be more likely the place to pick it up.

I’m most intrigued by the consistent reports that shadow people startle when they realize they have been seen and then dart off a.s.a.p. That tells me they really thought they were traveling around unseen and safe, as if it’s always been that way for them. They seem very surprised we can finally see them. Of course, if they were some sort of spiritual presence they couldn’t be hurt by us, so there wouldn’t be such a vulnerable reaction. I am extremely hesitant to say that this is something of a spiritual nature based on the fact that they appear to be equally fearful of us.  It's almost as if they are here on reconnaissance to observe.

Of course, there’s no way to prove any of this yet, but that’s the fun of theories. You find what best fits the parts of the puzzle that most baffle you.

How/where do I run into a shadow person?

Boy, that’s a hard one. I’ve seen a tall slender one on my patio and in my living room, both times taking long legged strides very fast. By the time I got my central vision on him, he disappeared, but as I was moving from peripheral vision to central vision to view him, I capture what looked like a tall slender man who was black, opaque, and had limbs and a head but no clothing details. It was so very realistic that I called out for my son, thinking it was him, but he was away in his bedroom at the computer screen. I won’t tell you this is a spirit. I’m extremely doubtful of that because, although I know people who have seen them in popularly known haunted sites, I’ve also heard of a greater deal of people seeing them in their own brand-new suburban homes, their work places, their patios. I will, however, say that I’ve noticed folks seem to see them most at the end of the day (when they’ve been at computer/tv screens for the greater majority of the day).

I have seen a few of the shorter variety for very brief moments, but one I had a full on study of for a good 3-5 seconds in a supposedly haunted bar I was doing an investigation of. In fact, my son also watched this little fella behind the bar go from one computer to the other and then the one it arrived at, turned on and lit up and the receipt machine started spitting out receipts. 

The descriptions can run the gamut from tall and slender to short and vague, caped, with a hat, even animal-shaped. Almost all the descriptions include the terms “a sense of dread or impending doom” to describe accompanying feelings. People almost universally report first seeing them out of their peripheral vision.

As a medical trancriptionist by profession in the past, when you say “peripheral vision” to me, I become quite intrigued by the visual cortex and its play in this whole scenario. There is something called the Gestalt Effect. It refers to the form-forming capability of our senses, particularly with respect to the visual recognition of figures and whole forms instead of just a collection of simple lines and curves. The word Gestalt in German literally means "shape" or "figure." (see Wikipedia “Gestalt psychology” and “visual perception” for more). Our peripheral vision would be the ideal part of our vision to detect something that could be showing itself in a higher frequency of light. This also explains why capturing them in your peripheral vision is easy, but turning your head and using your foveal (central) vision causes you to “lose” sight of them. If a person had the presence of mind when noticing one, to turn his head, but not look directly at it, he might see more detail longer than if he were to try to stare it down. Another potential experiment would be to run a strobe light which can take things like ceiling fan's speed down to a visible slow speed we can interpret movement in. (Don't do this if you have a seizure disorder or tend to get headaches from light). Strobe lights actually do have their use in ghost hunting kits (I have one myself). When someone has reported seeing shadow people, I'm more often than not going to pull that puppy out and run it, sit in the room and observe for as long as I can stand the blinking light. This could give you the capability to see Mr. Shadow Person head-on.

I’m a logic-based kind of person and for me to say that there might be a life form out there that we can’t see but is aware of us, that we might only glimpse upon occasion if our eyes have been at the screen all day, that startles if we stare it down and rushes away, is a huge step in my explanatory style. In the past, I would have been more likely to say that it’s a visual disturbance and it’s self-limiting to the person involved, but my son and his friend saw the exact same shadow person, with the same encounters with it, seeing it full-on. That intrigues me even more because young people have trained their eyes on these high-speed computers and televisions from a tender age while their visual perceptions are still forming. What has this done to their ability to see these shadow people compared to us “middle-agers” who grew up pre-computer era?

I leave you to continue the theories, but for now, I’d like to sit back and collect people’s descriptions. So, if you have an encounter with one of these, please let me know. I’d like to ask you a few questions and find the commonalities.


Comments

  1. Hi. Couple times during week I can see something moving with my peripheral vision. First, I thought that I am crazy, but I can clear see person passing by.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hello I just had a very good friend he passed away a few weeks ago. Someone shot him while trying to stop a fight he died a few hours later he was taken to a hospital but the bullet wounds were too deep. When another friend of mine had given me a copy of his obitery. As I was looking through the pictures and stuff I felt a sort of energy so since I know that cellphone,tables,and cams are able to capture things that we dont see I started taking pictures and was able to capture a few of a shadow which resembled my friend. At first when it realised I was able to see him he shied a bit but then when towarsd the flash so I could see it better. I got this in pictures and the shadow looks very much of my.friend does anyone have a logical explaination??

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  3. I took a photo of one that lives in my room looks creepy. [IMG]http://i67.tinypic.com/ua25c.jpg[/IMG]



    http://i67.tinypic.com/ua25c.jpg

    try those links XD for all those nonbeliever.

    ReplyDelete
  4. I have seen a shadow person and same one is still around me even though i don't see it all the time I was able to get a picture of it. http://i67.tinypic.com/ua25c.jpg

    [IMG]http://i67.tinypic.com/ua25c.jpg[/IMG]

    ReplyDelete

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