Speed Ramp

The effect is well known by now, copied and retread over and over. I don’t know when it was first done, but one of the times it was done best was in Zack Snyder’s 2006 film  “300.”  Our protagonists, a band of Spartans, perfect physical specimens all, are taking the fight to the Persian king Xerxes and his elite soldiers he’s dubbed the “immortals.” The camera slides from right to left speeding up to give the impression of the Spartans moving with inhuman speed, only slowing down to emphasize their strike’s bone-crunching force against their enemies.

This technique is called a speed ramp. It became a staple of early 2000’s cinema and almost every other scene in Snyder’s movies moving forward. One of the times I watched it, I said to my partner at the time, “It can feel like that sometimes.”

I don’t know the first time it happened, but I was pretty young. When I mentioned to my mother I was writing this, she said “you started talking about it as young as nine, I think…It was pretty weird.” Here’s what I know: everything in the world would speed up for a while, moving faster than usual… just enough to freak me out. I would try explaining it to my parents, and it sounded like I was spewing gibberish, even to me. So I mostly kept it to myself from then on. Well, that is until I was 22, and I accidentally overdosed on my antidepressant and experienced a full-on psychotic break. While that’s a story for another time, one of the symptoms was a complete loss of my perception of the speed and flow of time. After those and the other symptoms passed (like the bugs under the skin. Again, another time). I was cleared to return to work, which I did. 

A few days later, while I was driving home, suddenly everything started moving faster; unnaturally so…and it wasn’t as subtle as usual. I couldn’t tell how fast I was going in relation to the other cars on the road. There was no way to know when to brake and not slam into the car in front of me. The scariest bit was there was no shoulder to pull off on. My only hope was to just to hold steady and pray. Fortunately, there was enough time for the moment to pass before traffic slowed or we had to stop, but it was scary enough for me to call the doc.

I would come to find out that during periods of peak stress, the symptoms would come back for the next four to six months. To varying degrees, they have ever since under similar conditions, but I doubt that has anything to do with that overdose.

I hope it has nothing to do with that overdose.

What’s fantastic is that even after all those years, my explanation still sounded like gibberish. When I decided that’s what I wanted to talk about today, I knew that it was going yet again be, what’s the technical term? Oh yes: gobblety-gook. So I did some digging, and here’s what I found

A few days later, while I was driving home, suddenly everything got faster, and it wasn’t as subtle as usual. I couldn’t tell how fast I was going in relation to the other cars on the road. There was no way to know when to brake and not slam into the car in front of me. The scariest bit was there was no shoulder to pull off on. My only hope was to just to hold steady and pray. Fortunately, there was enough time for the moment to pass before traffic slowed or we had to stop, but it was scary enough for me to call the doc.

I would come to find out that during periods of peak stress, the symptoms would come back for the next four to six months. To varying degrees, they have ever since under similar conditions, but I doubt that has anything to do with that overdose.

I hope it has nothing to do with that overdose.

What’s fantastic is that even after all those years, my explanation still sounded like gibberish. When I decided that’s what I wanted to talk about today, I knew that it was going yet again be, what’s the technical term? Oh yes: gobblety-gook. So I did some digging, and here’s what I found

Anyone who’s ever seen an episode of “Star Trek” involving time travel will have heard the words “Tachyon Particles.”  That’s useful, because the sensation of “fast feeling” is called Tachysensia. It can last a variable length of time, but usually no more than 20 minutes. During that time, body movements can seem to speed up to 1.5 to 3 times faster than their usual speed. When I was younger, I apparently would have had better traction with my doctors if I had called it “Alice in Wonderland Syndrome,”  which can also lead to distortions of body form, size, and color.

No wonder I feel like I’m falling down the rabbit hole every time I go digging for information when I write these things.

Most of the details above came from Psychology Today. According to a few of the articles I’ve referenced below, Tachysensia and Alice in Wonderland Syndrome are pretty rare. That said, there have been a few recent ones suggesting that they are beginning to think it may be more common than originally thought.

It’s been a while since I’ve experienced the sensation of the world speeding up like that. Now it’s just the day-to-day experience of time flying by as kids grow up too fast and getting older before I’m ready. Perhaps the next time I get that 300-style speed ramp, I’ll yell “THIS. IS. SPARTA,” turn around, and kick somebody off a curb; as there are rarely any bottomless pits around when you need them. Then again, that’s probably a bad idea. Not only do I not want to hurt anyone, I don’t have anywhere near the physique of a Spartan to deal with the consequences. Nah, I think I’ll leave it to Zack and his movies.

Until next time.

References