Visualisation

[Nick Burrows]

I believe the ability to visualise clearly is an extremely important factor in chess strength. Yet, it is discussed in chess improvement manuals relatively rarely. Many grandmasters stare into middle distance whilst calculating, and can of course play games blindfolded. It seems to be an innate ability that the top players are blessed with.

I find accurately visualising a chessboard and different arrangements of pieces very difficult and during games use the squares of the board as a visual aid, whilst trying to make the actual pieces on the board dissapear?! This is obviously not ideal and quite regularly leads to hallucinations.

I am seriously trying to improve my game, and to my mind this is a crucial area i need to address.

So far i have come across the method of visualising bishops and knights on different squares and moving them around mentally noting the colour of the squares. Also moving a knight in the quickest way from one point to another.
Tidsall also mentions the 'stepping stone' technique, which involves burning each new critical position carefully onto the minds eye before calculating from the new position. I find this difficult.

Can anybody help me with this? Any tips on how to exercise my 'visual muscles' and learn to see more clearly?

Thanks, Nick.

[Roger de Coverly]

Can anybody help me with this? Any tips on how to exercise my 'visual muscles' and learn to see more clearly?

You could try naming a square in algebraic and saying what colour square it is. So c4 - white square, a7 black square etc.
Helpful if you're trying to figure out what to do with your Bishops, or that a Bishop on e3 threatens a7.

[Rob Thompson]

I vaguely recollect reading in a Rowson book (I think it was one of his) that as the players got stronger, that which they were visualising became increasingly more abstract until it became nothing like a board or set at all, but more a map of interlinking ideas. Without the passage to hand, i can't quote (for obvious reasons) but that seems to me to explain how strong players often don't look at the board - because they don't "see" a board at all

[Christopher Kreuzer]

I vaguely recollect reading in a Rowson book (I think it was one of his) that as the players got stronger, that which they were visualising became increasingly more abstract until it became nothing like a board or set at all, but more a map of interlinking ideas. Without the passage to hand, i can't quote (for obvious reasons) but that seems to me to explain how strong players often don't look at the board - because they don't "see" a board at all

I must admit, when I'm thinking very general strategy, I sometimes find it helpful to not look at the board, and to try desperately to remember what I've read about something, but that usually involves me putting my head in my hands and trying to remember something, rather than gazing into the middle distance and pretending to be thinking abstract thoughts.

About GMs visualising stuff, Magnus Carlsen does well in tablebase positions (I read somewhere that he may have something like a photographic memory for stuff like that). Ivanchuk, I think, is the super-GM that is famous for his abstract expressions. It does sound like something that would have been mentioned in one of the Rowson books.

[Christopher Kreuzer]

Can anybody help me with this? Any tips on how to exercise my 'visual muscles' and learn to see more clearly?

You could try naming a square in algebraic and saying what colour square it is. So c4 - white square, a7 black square etc.
Helpful if you're trying to figure out what to do with your Bishops, or that a Bishop on e3 threatens a7.

Do a Knight's Tour blindfold. That will help with visualisation. In fact, do it on the board first, and then try it blindfold.

[Paul McKeown]

Try playing blindfold. Once you reach a certain level (say 150 "new grades"?) it becomes possible. No one should try to visualise actual pieces and squares in their head. It's more knowing where the pieces are and what they make possible - a collection of force fields, if you like.

[Paul Littlewood]

Try playing blindfold. Once you reach a certain level (say 150 "new grades"?) it becomes possible. No one should try to visualise actual pieces and squares in their head. It's more knowing where the pieces are and what they make possible - a collection of force fields, if you like.

I am not sure that playing Blindfold actually helps you with visualisation...it is rather the other way round i.e if you have excellent visualisation then you are able to do well at Blindfold Chess.

As you may be aware I have played Simultaneous Blindfold Chess and there are times when my visualisation of the board becomes hazy. The way I then recall the position is to re-construct the game in my head and this then leads me to the right position.

Therefore I would suggest that as an aid to visualisation a good technique is to memorise a game and then try + play through the game in your mind.

You can then check over the board to see how well you visualised the various ideas that were involved.

Another thing I often do is to go over a game I have played before going to sleep at night ( without a set of course ). This can lead to a sleepless session but it does allow me to consider various alternative moves and it can produce some interesting thoughts.

[Alan Walton]

I have to agree with Paul, I normally tell our juniors at 3Cs to try and go through the game before going to sleep for 15 mins without using the scoresheet if possible, this should help memory and assist visualisation

[Arshad Ali]

I vaguely recollect reading in a Rowson book (I think it was one of his) that as the players got stronger, that which they were visualising became increasingly more abstract until it became nothing like a board or set at all, but more a map of interlinking ideas. Without the passage to hand, i can't quote (for obvious reasons) but that seems to me to explain how strong players often don't look at the board - because they don't "see" a board at all

Yes, Rowson said that (Seven Deadly Chess Sins? Chess for Zebras?) Tal said something along the same lines. There's a book by someone called Buckley who advises one to be able to visualise the color of all the squares, and be able to visualise the pieces on the board. I tried it for a while. I don't think it works. A player playing blindfold "sees" something more abstract -- for lack of better words, an abstract configuration of forces and relations, at least partly based on memory, associations from previous games, and tactical and positional patterns. Trying to visualise the board and the pieces would distract one from seeing and manipulating this abstract configuration.

[stevencarr]

Try playing blindfold. Once you reach a certain level (say 150 "new grades"?) it becomes possible. No one should try to visualise actual pieces and squares in their head. It's more knowing where the pieces are and what they make possible - a collection of force fields, if you like.

I do try to visualise actual pieces, rather than a collection of force fields. Not in huge detail, but something that looks a bit like a Queen or a Knight.

This helps to fix the position in my mind, and then I revert to the 'force fields' technique.

I am not sure that playing Blindfold actually helps you with visualisation...it is rather the other way round i.e if you have excellent visualisation then you are able to do well at Blindfold Chess.

As you may be aware I have played Simultaneous Blindfold Chess and there are times when my visualisation of the board becomes hazy. The way I then recall the position is to re-construct the game in my head and this then leads me to the right position.

When I was younger, there was basically no difference between playing blindfold and seeing a board. Seeing the pieces on the board was often a distraction from where they were in my analysis.


I could play 4 simultaneous blindfold games pretty easily. Sometimes I too had to reconstruct a game though.

But now that I am older, I find visualisation a lot harder.

Is this one of the first skills to go as you get older?

[Christopher Kreuzer]

I'm not sure where I read it, but I'm sure someone somewhere once said that playing blindfold chess is a sure way to go mad. I think the quote was something along the lines of a certain number of blindfold games is OK, but try and do too many at the same time and it can overwhelm the brain. I think the quote was in part related to some grandmaster who tried this saying that he couldn't get the games out of his head for days afterwards or something.

[stevencarr]

I'm not sure where I read it, but I'm sure someone somewhere once said that playing blindfold chess is a sure way to go mad. I think the quote was something along the lines of a certain number of blindfold games is OK, but try and do too many at the same time and it can overwhelm the brain. I think the quote was in part related to some grandmaster who tried this saying that he couldn't get the games out of his head for days afterwards or something.

I think the quote was in relation to Pillsbury.

But I think the syphilis was worse for his mental health than the blindfold chess.

[PeterFarr]

I'm not sure where I read it, but I'm sure someone somewhere once said that playing blindfold chess is a sure way to go mad. I think the quote was something along the lines of a certain number of blindfold games is OK, but try and do too many at the same time and it can overwhelm the brain. I think the quote was in part related to some grandmaster who tried this saying that he couldn't get the games out of his head for days afterwards or something.

Perhaps this too; William Winter, quoted in Chess Notes 1197:

"Blindfold play I have never attempted seriously. I once played six, but spent so many sleepless nights trying to drive the positions out of my head that i gave it up."

Couldn't help noticing in the same note, another quote from Winter having a huge rant about The Times chess correspondent:

"...He carried on for nearly thirty years! Uncouth and almost uneducated, he made The Times reports a laughing stock all over the chess playing world, but, by a mixture of bluff and bluster, maintained his position until his own death in 1936".

The S&B bloggers might enjoy that.

[Geoff Chandler]

Hi Nick.

Go outside during the day and look up in the sky. You will see the Sun.
It's 93 million miles away. How far do you want to see?

OK gag out of the way.

Hi Nick

For once I'd advocate listening to what everyone says on this matter because what
they have said will have worked for them.

We all think and imagine differently so you will get a good mixture of answers.

You need to do some serious brain-push up's.

Not just your run of the mill 'White to play find the mate ego boosters.' but Stinkers.

I have no hesitation at all in rec'ing Chess Schools – Manual of Chess Combinations No.3.
The cover makes it look like a kid's book. Far from it.

You will find an excellent review here with some examples.

http://www.iamcoach.com/chess/products/ ... Chess3.htm

I try a few every now and then. I set the position up on the board and I find after
I'm finished my brain is knacked the same way it feels sometimes after a game. Excellent.

I must stress that I firmly believe that you must set up on the board the positions
you are about to study and solve to get the eye muscles working in conjunction with the brain.

The intro to Chapter V is mouth watering and you cannot wait to get stuck in.
(it also seems to address your question about Visualisation.)

Chapter V (that's a 5) kicks off with:

"The solving of the tests in this section should help in the elimination of the 3rd and 4th typical mistakes.
(Position poorly depicated in the mind, a strong continuation overlooked during calculation)

You should not only demonstrate the ability to follow clearly the movements of the pieces,
but also be fully ready to meet any attempt by the opponent to change the result in his favour."

No1. in chapter 5 is a simple warmer upper. White to play. (they get a lot tougher.)

8/7Q/6p1/7p/6qk/8/7K/8 w - - 0 1
The not so clever ones will be solving this from the diagram and be wrong.

Now you a can be a snazz and download it for free from some sites. But honestly that won't work.
You have to dip your hand into your pocket and buy it. The thinking being if you get something
for nothing you don't appreciate it. You paid for it so you will look at and study it.

(of course this has failed with 99% of us other posters and the books we have bought.
But that is because 99% of the other books we have bought are crap. This one is good.)

Also it's a good sturdy hardback book. Well worth having.
Awful cover, but then again it's not a sitting on the bus solving cartoons type of book.
It's a genuine work book. You will leave a study sesssion thinking and feeling like you have just played a game.

So it's up to you?

""I am seriously trying to improve my game..."

Does that translates to 'I am prepared to put some effort in. '

'The not so clever ones will be solving this from the diagram and be wrong."
(1.Qe7+ 1...Qg5 2.Qe1+ does not win. Look again.)

[stevencarr]

Is 1 Qe7+ Qg5 2 Qe4+ Qg4 3 Qe3 the winner?