Visual Focus, explained

What it is for

Attention is part of how loud tinnitus feels. A calm picture paired with a comfortable sound gives attention somewhere else to go, and studies of virtual nature scenes found that sound and visuals together relax people more than either alone. That is the whole claim: relaxation and a place to rest your attention. Visual Focus does not treat tinnitus, and it is not a substitute for a dark, quiet room when you want one.

Suggested environments

The quickest way in is a suggested environment. One tap sets both the sound and the picture, and you can change either afterwards:

• Deep Ocean — brown noise with ocean waves.
• Rain Window — pink noise and rain, with the rain-on-a-window visual.
• Night Float — brown noise with night sounds under a night sky.
• Soft Ripple — pink noise with slow ripples.
• Deep Focus — your personal sound from Help Me Find My Sound, with Abstract Flow.
• Fireside — a fireplace over a low bed of brown noise.

All visuals

Below the suggestions the whole library is grouped by what the visual does:

• Nature — Underwater (the starting visual), Deep Ocean, Rain Window, Forest Breeze, Waterfall, Flowing River, clouds, a night sky, a fireplace.
• Abstract — Abstract Flow, Slow Geometry, Slow Waves, Flowing Colours, Soft Light, Expanding Circles, Floating Particles, Gentle Tunnel.
• Sound Reactive — visuals that move with the sound you are playing: Audio Spectrum, Moving Waveform, Sound Ripples, Reactive Particles, Pulsating Rings, Sound Field, Synced Scene, and Frequency Bloom, which blooms around the tone of the frequency generator.
• Interactive — visuals that respond to a touch or a slow drag, such as touch circles and gentle followers.
• Breathing — a breathing circle that expands and contracts in a steady rhythm, with optional “Breathe in / out” text. Its pace follows the Movement setting: about 15 seconds a breath at Medium, slower at Low, much faster at High, and still at Still.
• Focus Activities — Follow the Light, Floating Bubble, Ripple, Colour Flow and Living Pattern: gentle things to rest attention on, with no scores or timers. The Attention Focus experiment uses the first three plus Notice the Change.

Movement and motion settings

• Movement — Still, Low, Medium or High sets how much every visual moves. Still keeps a picture almost completely static; it is a good choice at night or if movement tires your eyes.
• Reduce motion — a switch that calms all movement further. It starts from your device’s own reduce-motion setting; once you change it here, your choice is kept.
• “Breathe in / out” text — on or off for the breathing visual.

Nothing in Visual Focus flashes, and everything eases in and out rather than jumping.

Enter Focus

Enter Focus opens the chosen environment full screen (tapping a visual tile also opens it after a moment). The controls fade away; tap anywhere to bring them back, change the sound or visual, pause the visual, set a timer, or adjust movement. On a computer you can also go truly full screen. To leave, use Stop visual, which keeps the sound playing and returns you to the Sounds page, or Stop everything; Escape and Back also close it.

Saving and coming back

Save environment keeps the current sound and visual together under My Saved Sessions, so a combination you like is one tap away next time. If you have completed Help Me Find My Sound, the app also recommends a visual that suits your taste, and the Your Focus Moment on the Sounds page starts your personal sound with the visual you last used here (Underwater until you pick one). Saved sessions stay on your device.

Visual Focus and Sleep Mode

Visual Focus is for when you are awake and looking at the screen. For bedtime, Sleep Mode is the better fit: a darker, simpler screen with a timer that fades the sound out gently. The Sound + Visual Journey experiment sits between the two — a picture and a sound that evolve together over twenty to forty minutes and end soft.

Open Visual Focus →

Important: Find My Quiet Sound is designed for sound masking, relaxation and tinnitus management support. It does not diagnose, treat or cure tinnitus and is not a substitute for professional medical care. If your tinnitus is new, in one ear only, pulsing with your heartbeat, or comes with hearing loss or dizziness, see a doctor or audiologist.

Written from the sources above by the Find My Quiet Sound project; no clinician has reviewed this page. See Research & Sources and the medical disclaimer.