optical illusions

In which direction does it spin??

January 19, 2010 by Vurdlak

Shown optical illusion just laid there on my hard disk for years. When I opened it today, I couldn’t remember why I placed it in my illusions folder in the first place? After some puzzling, finally I managed to see its visual phenomenon!

Ok, here’s what I want you to do: concentrate on the animated .gif on your right. You’ll quickly realize it represents some sort of see-through sphere, constructed of many dots rotating in one direction. Dots in front make the front face of the sphere, while “background” dots belong to sphere’s back. It’s logical they rotate in opposite directions. Now try and switch with front-face ones. Notice any change?

If you manage to visualize this, your able to change the direction in which sphere rotates. With some practice, you’ll be able to switch the direction back and forth in very short time fragments. Don’t underestimate yourselves – many individuals have difficulty seeing this type of illusions. It’s not that they’re less worthy, it’s just that their brain operates differently… Which reminded me – did you know that more than 1/3 of all people who went to see Avatar in 3D couldn’t see the image in 3D?

There are many optical illusions of this type available; one of the more popular being Spinning Dancer Optical Illusion. Your best shot of finding more, would be browsing through our Animations category.

disappearing act illusion

April 17, 2006 by Vurdlak

Allright, stare intently at the red dot in the center of the left block for a minute. Once you’ve done this, look over to the center of the right square. It should act weird – by fading out and ‘flickering’. If you move your head closer and further from the monitor (while focussing in the center), you should see some interesting interference effects too. This optical Illusions does the same to you, as the “Baby Illusion”, “Vanishing Haze”, “Disappearing Dots” and “Disappearing Colors” normally do.

I can't get the top one to change directions.

bobrob2004 wrote:

I can't get the top one to change directions.

stare at it, all the sudden it seems to go the opposite way.

Spinning Dancer Optical Illusion
June 24, 2007 by Vurdlak


This animation was on my laptop for quite some time. I had it for almost a year. Today anonymous user submitted me this gif version, and when I opened it, only then I realized how great this illusion actually is. If you look at the spinning girl’s silhouette below, you will think it is spinning clockwise, probably. When you check her shadow below, momentarily the spinning direction changes in your mind, and now the girl is spinning counter-clockwise. It can be quite hard at the beginning to notice switch of the spinning direction, but eventually you’ll manage. I posted more simple illusion of this kind while ago, and you can see it here. Now, be honest – how long did it take you to see it spin in both directions? Not as easy as the hidden tiger, ayeh? I lost the link to the original artist, but best I could come up with is the place I found it on.