Ball Color Problem

[Chris Hibner]

Here is a minor thing that I'm hoping FIRST can maybe change.

While I was looking at the manual, my wife asked me what the difference was between the moon rocks and the empty cells. She is slightly color blind and cannot at all distinguish between the blue and the purple on those balls.

Obviously this is a bit of a problem from a spectator standpoint (for those unfortunate to have some degree of color blindness), but I really feel for drivers and coaches that may have this problem.

My wife suggests a red/blue ball rather than the orange purple. She says she can see the difference between the orange and red, but not the blue and purple.

Anyway, just a minor issue.

[gorrilla]

Originally Posted by Chris Hibner

Here is a minor thing that I'm hoping FIRST can maybe change.

While I was looking at the manual, my wife asked me what the difference was between the moon rocks and the empty cells. She is slightly color blind and cannot at all distinguish between the blue and the purple on those balls.

Obviously this is a bit of a problem from a spectator standpoint (for those unfortunate to have some degree of color blindness), but I really feel for drivers and coaches that may have this problem.

My wife suggests a red/blue ball rather than the orange purple. She says she can see the difference between the orange and red, but not the blue and purple.

Anyway, just a minor issue.

some people with color blindness cant see reds either......
but still, they probobly took that int account when they were designing the game.....

[pentau]

Yeah, I noticed this too. I'm red/green color-blind and I couldn't distinguish at all between the blue and purple strips and only very faintly distinguish between the red and orange strips.

Perhaps the empty and super cells' marked in some other way... (since there are only 16 total).

[thefro526]

I thought of this too when I was sitting with some teammates eating lunch.

Our coach is some what color blind so we'll have to see how that plays out.

[DanDon]

Having just bought empty cells and super cells at the local Wal*mart, this turns out to be a not so small issue, not only for people affected by colorblindness, but also for people with perfect vision. Being able to tell if you're carrying more than one empty cell during the heat of the moment, as opposed to one empty cell and one moon rock will be extremely difficult under tournament conditions (i.e. lighting, glare, robot traffic, etc.).

[Swerting]

Originally Posted by DanDon

Having just bought empty cells and super cells at the local Wal*mart, this turns out to be a not so small issue, not only for people affected by colorblindness, but also for people with perfect vision. Being able to tell if you're carrying more than one empty cell during the heat of the moment, as opposed to one empty cell and one moon rock will be extremely difficult under tournament conditions (i.e. lighting, glare, robot traffic, etc.).

I agree. Imagine how hard it would be to see if that is a empty cell or a moon rock at the other end of the field through slightly scratched plexiglass, 6 out-of-control robots, and the fact that you have a stadium of people staring at you with lights above. Plus that great pulsing dance music!

This troubles me since my team apparently has quite a few color blind members.

[Alphabet OJ]

I completely agree that the balls; colors should be changed, but perhaps they should just take away the bicoloredness of the balls. If the balls were one different color each, they would be a lot easier to identify. Something tells me that this may be part of the challenge however...

[rjohnson]

I do agree that the ball color is a problem, but I don't think that there is much FIRST can do at this point. The balls are made commercially in only three color paterns, so they had to use what was available. Maybe they should not have used these balls in the first place, but that is a totally different issue. I guess we will just have to work around this because the game will not change at this point.

[Katy]

Originally Posted by Alphabet OJ

Something tells me that this may be part of the challenge however...

No, I'm pretty sure nobody in their right mind would decide to intentionally prevent a significant proportion of the population from participating in FIRST as a driver for a medical reason as "part of the challenge." The goal is to teach you to be engineers and change the world, not make you feel excluded because of the way you were born. Color blindness affects up to 10% of American males, and considering the overwhelming percentage that population holds of events, that's pretty significant.

Sometimes FIRST doesn't (no pun intended) see everything that can go wrong. That's fine, FIRST is composed of humans, it happens. Now that we have found a problem the professional thing for us to do is to figure out a solution for it.

If anybody has the game pieces handy and a can of spray paint would you be willing to test how well it adheres to the surface of the balls? Please permit the paint to dry and then pick up the pieces and abuse them a little...bang them on the table or something. Does the paint chip? Does the texture vary significantly between the painted and unpainted version? My experience says it shouldn't, but with something like this it is worth testing before we offer it as a valid solution.

If these tests prove to reasonably not alter the game pieces, may I recommend (dark) blue, (medium) red, and white to spray them? Frankly if you don't like those colors I do not care, they can always be changed, provided that the three are chosen to be significantly different shades/values/lightness (God knows every field that deals with it has a different name for the quality).

Once a solution is found a small, (and very polite), petition can be set up (possibly something even as unscientific as a poll here on CD) to express the level of concern this problem has brought about from FIRST members. Maybe the higher-ups will read it, maybe they won't, but the numbers will certainly prove useful for quoting if you want to call your local FIRST offices and the people managing the regionals asking them if they would kindly consider permitting you to tag the game pieces to make them more friendly for the color blind. This isn't something we can demand, regionals are notoriously understaffed (I mean, good volunteers do not grow on trees). However, if we are all willing to pitch in and make a change (yes, that probably means "doing it ourselves") the regionals are probably unlikely to get directly in our way.

That said, we can't request a change until we have a viable solution. Whatever it is it needs to be fast, easy, durable, and not significantly alter the playing pieces.

If nobody can get their hands on the materials to try spray paint well...I'll try to make a trip to the store myself as soon as I can. Keep us all posted with whatever you have. I'm pretty eager to work to resolve this.

[Tim Arnold]

Just throwing in that I too am red/green colorblind and cannot distinguish the ball colors. Picked up 6 orbit balls at Wal-Mart and I have no idea which type I got (with them in front of me to compare).

Perhaps an easy solution would be similar to the white spots on the tracballs last season... just some sort of white iron-on sticker would be perfect.

[smartkid]

I'm not color blind but I am legally blind and I too cannot really tell the difference without being rather close.

[thefro526]

Here's a picture from The Blue Alliance of all the different balls for reference

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3112/...e48bc1.jpg?v=0

[dtengineering]

It seems it wouldn't be too hard to suspend a blinking LED in the middle of a super cell using elastic bands.... although given the rules, perhaps an empty cell would be a better one to have stand out.

It is quite possible that this is an oversight by the GDC that they would like to rectify. Perhaps try redirecting this question to the Q&A forums.

Good point, I hope there is a solution,

Jason

Edit: a lycra cover over the cells might do the trick, too. The fabric ball cover worked last year.

[Branden Ghena]

This could probably be easily fixed by FIRST. They could just wrap some electrical tape in stripes around the ribbons of the empty cells. The stripes should make the balls easy enough to distinguish without changing the balls (i.e. stopping hooks from grabbing them or raising their coefficient of friction)

[flyingcrayons]

yeah our team was discussing this... everything mentioned here was discussed, from the trouble distinguishing the balls for all people, especially color-blind people.

also discussed was the trouble the judges will have since they may not even be able to distinguish the balls... this could be a real hindrance, or it could be an interesting twist to this already very interestong game