Optical Illusions

[Adam_F_Collins]

Do you feel that with so much modern focus on the definition of yardage marked on sprinkler heads, cart paths, etc. Combined with technology like gps and rangefinders is having an effect on golf course architects' use of illusion?

I've been caught so badly by illusion a couple of times that I was just blown away - and so positively impressed. Is the art in danger at all? Or can we still rely safely on the golfers' failure to read the signs?

[THuckaby2]

Adam:

Great question.  My feeling is the more information is available, the greater the effect the really good optical illusions have.  That is, you're sitting there with 15 different things telling you a shot is 150, and dammit it just plain doesn't LOOK that way, so the quandary is greater and thus the effect works even better.  Before, playing by feel, you had nothing to go against... so the "hot damn that was weird" phenomenon wouldn't have been so strong.

I hope modern designers keep trying to fool us... it is really neat when it works.

TH

[Tommy_Naccarato]

Adam, Yes absolutely yes! I think the quest for yardage while on the course has made the game slower to play as well as taken away its charm in this regard.

I think yardage books should be disallowed from all humanity other then being sold in the pro shop for reference and dreaming when at home! I think sprinkler head yardages are also a bad thing, and I blame this on the early to mid-1980's when the trend really got started. It has slowed the Sport of Golf down immensely, and harmed it the same way one goes about covering their body in tattoos, thinking its going to make them look good.

And just like a tattoo, its irreversable, so, this is why its probably best to keep on designing for illusion for the few out there that can respect it as well as praise it; the few that don't want the beautiful body of Golf marked and defaced. Stay true to your path, stay true to Golf.

(All in all, probably a horrible analogy, but one the mood that I woke-up in this morning!)

[peter_p]

Yardage books and markers take the eyes and the intuitive part side of the brain away from us. But I've seen it work in reverse at Pacific Dunes 10 (lower). When told a sprinkler marker was wrong by 25 yards, the player insisted the fairway created an optical illusion, then proceeded to leave the ball 20 yards short of the green with a good shot.

[paul cowley]

the game is much more glorious when played without yardage references.

[TEPaul]

"I've been caught so badly by illusion a couple of times that I was just blown away - and so positively impressed. Is the art in danger at all? Or can we still rely safely on the golfers' failure to read the signs?"

Adam:

It seem like most on this thread have just picked up on the use (or not) of yardage aids while you seem to be asking about the use of architectural optical illusion.

I can't cite you a whole lot of examples only because I don't know his courses all that well (although I can cite some very good examples of those I do know) but one architect who certainly talks about optical illusion in architecture all the time and obviously uses it a lot and very well is, is, is....sit down boys this will only hurt for a second----Tom Fazio!

[Adam_F_Collins]

Interesting. I've not played a Fazio course.

I've never played a course with no yardage markers either - Just imagine the game of old! So much more a game of feel - so much more intuition and sensitivity required.

I remember playing last year in the dark. I was at a course on a really warm summer evening and we played down the last three holes in the dark.

I was so interested in how much I could tell about the shot without being able to see.

I'd love to play a course I've never been on with no markers and see how it played. It would be so interesting to see how the use of illusion - especially more subtle uses - would rise to the surface - and a whole aspect of the game could reappear.

(romantic, I know but what the heck)

[TEPaul]

"I've never played a course with no yardage markers either - Just imagine the game of old! So much more a game of feel - so much more intuition and sensitivity required."

Adam:

In that regard--playing by feel, do you want to hear something really amazing? Tommy Armour played his entire competitve career with only one eye! Do you know how screwed up sight in only one eye makes your depth perception? And of course in his day they sure didn't rely on all this exact yardage stuff---they basically played by eye and by feel!

[Adam_F_Collins]

TEP,

And from what I understand, many players back in the day could estimate yardage with amazing accuracy. It seems that the players of old would have to have more of any eye on the work of the architect at that time (and perhaps more respect).

If you're so reliant on your senses for yardage - then you would have to stay more wary of your adversary - the architect - and how he might be trying to trick you. Now, many can be so focused on the numbers, that they ignore the subtleties.

[paul cowley]

...for me there is no greater enjoyment of the game than playing a links course for the first time without the benefit of yardage markers [or a caddy for that matter]....once i stop looking for yardage references and start looking at the hole for feedback, i find myself coming up with a whole new array of 3/4 ,punch ,hard or soft this or that,shots.....maybe its because i'm forced to play more by feel.

and when i pull these off ,the satisfaction is,well,almost squared......!