Vision/Vizualization/Calculation training rant with questions

Hi guys, just recently I  started to play again after years of hiatus. More mature then I used to be, I decided to depart from my comfort zone and tackle all of my sticking points, deliberately practicing the most troublesome elements of my game.

 

Long story short, when trying to calculate things  on the board, I am rather lousy at it. No matter how much I am trying to do it, I cannot see the whole board  with my mind's eye, rather I rely on theoretical knowledge (colors of the squares, diagonals, typical pawn, knight and bishop developing squares etc.) to form the blurry, ever-fleeting image of the one part of the  position (not the whole board). What's more, when I am trying to calculate without moving the pieces, the pieces which move within my head clearly don't move on the board, which annoys me and often confuses me to the point I have to start all over again.

 

Of course, I  started practicing with many of the visualization apps out there, solving simple tactical puzzles without moving or seeing the pieces etc. Of course, I am aware that these things get better with practice.

 

But, I am still wondering whether the process of the board visualization has to be so difficult at first? Am I not the visual type of person? I would hate to use lack of particular talent as an excuse. Am I, on the other hand, just overly ambitious and impatient, wanting to see the whole board in my head before I have even bothered to learn by heart all the squares which form each possible diagonal, all the possible knight move from each square etc. After all, these are patterns which would help me visualize inter-relations between squares and pieces.

 

Bottom line, will my visualization improve by practicing chess vision, calculation and board awareness alone or should I concentrate on the very process of seeing things with your mind's eye, regardless of whether this is in a chess context or not?

 

Heck, I have even trouble visualizing a cup of coffee or a chair! I see the damn thing clearly one moment, then it flickers and I lose it. I just cannot stabilize things I am seeing by envisioning.

 

The peculiar thing is, sometimes before falling asleep (and after having played way to much chess for the day), on the very threshold of the consciousness before dozing off, I sometimes involuntary examine chess positions, subconsciously almost. Or dream about them. And then I see the board with great clarity. How can that be possible? It means that my visual talents aren't that underdeveloped after all.

 

So, even though blindfold games are off limits for now (I can follow about 10-12 plies from the start position before it gets blurry) I would really appreciate more experienced players to help by sharing their methods, experiences and hopefully, advice.

 

 

I can't answer your main question with certainty, but I've heard and I assume that visualization ability increases with practice.

I'm posting mostly to caution you about one thing: the word "visualization" is misleading. Evidently most humans don't recall photographically when visualizing chess or anything else, but instead understand relationships between things, probably partly with topology. For example, to visualize a ball rolling down a hallway you probably don't have a picture in your mind of the ball's color, the pictures and doorways on the side of the hallway, etc., but rather you understand the relationship that the ball goes in essentially a straight line that avoids the walls, and eventually reaches the end, the same as a rook reaching the far edge of the board. All those visual details I mentioned are irrelevant to the goal at hand, and the brain knows this, so the brain ignores the details, too.

I'm not the more experienced player you want to hear from, but i have a few thoughts you could consider.

I think calculation isn't the same thing as observation. Meaning, one could have really good ability to visualize exchanges, etc, yet still be prone not to notice a hanging queen. But i think doing tactics improves both.

An interesting thing about visualization is the way really gifted players 'remember' positions.. Most GMs can reproduce a position after glancing at it once. You could show them a chess board, and they could set it up for you a few minutes later, getting it perfect. But only if the position could reasonably be arrived at via a normal chess game. If you set the pieces up randomly they can't do it much better than anyone else. The reason they can visualize it is from pattern recognition. They see segments of the board based on how it could have been arrived at, and/or what the possibilities are for playing on from there.

I think that doing tactics like you mentioned - calculate first, then move pieces - is one of the best ways to improve all of this..

blastforme, the thing about GMs and pattern recognition, I think that's it. When you have a database so vast, board awareness so developed, nothing is a novelty. Position, yes, it is always a bit unique - but it's building blocks are the same and limited - finite number of squares, finite number of pieces, finite geometrical patterns and tactical motifs...

 

Anyway thanks guys, very interesting insights... If someone who can envision the whole board in detail stumbles upon this thread... please, kind syre, do not hesitate to share your pearls of wisdom here.

 

see blast's answer for the disclaimer

but I had an experience I think is relevant.   I have been working on playing chess wiht a board and no peices against a weak chess computer.  many times I would get to the point at which I could NOT figure out the position and after a couple dozen moves have to stop.

 

one of the games, though, I made ALOT of notes about all the diagonals and squares and which side controlled them,etc.

 

I was able to see a small winning combination and I won!

 

I felt like I experienced a small taste of what strong players "see" when they use superior board vision to calculate variations. it Didn't seem to me- to be the same thing as a "mental" image of What the board looked like... instead it was more like I could understand what all the peices were doing and how they coordinate,etc.

 

SO

 

my feeling is NO, visualizing stuff in your head Is NOT going to help with board vision.   Instead the best "exercise" for board vision is all the zillions of tactical puzzles chess coaches tell you to do... and ofc, instructive chess endgames.

 

and that really is the biggest advice for getting stronger too.

IMHO.

personally I feel like the visual trainer is quite useless