Optical Illusion

This is a cool optical illusion by Michael Bach and JL Hilton. Look at the rotating dots and you will only see a pink dot disappearing in motion. Now concentrate on the black plus sign in the centre. Gradually you will see that the moving dot turns green and magically disappears. Cool optical illusion!


Optical Illusion




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    66 Comments »

    1. aljo said

      June 12, 2006 @ 4:01 am

      When I look at it, it turns green right away, almost instantaneously. Is that normal, or do I have an eye problem?



    2. Katana said

      June 12, 2006 @ 7:11 am

      That’s normal :)



    3. Rita said

      October 5, 2006 @ 6:53 am

      This optical illusion is a scam. The dots don’t naturally start turning green and disappearing because of your eyes. Check it out..this picture is a gif. If you copy and paste it into paint, the dots will NOT move. (I’ve tried it)

      The sad thing is, this optical illusion does work. If you look at the plus while the picture is stationary in paint, the dots will disappear. (They don’t turn green though.) It’s just annoying that the person who put this illusion up feels that it can’t stand on it’s own without a trick.

      So to the above person, nothing is wrong with your eyes.



    4. Less Green, More Green said

      October 5, 2006 @ 7:03 am

      I noticed that the green is less noticeable, or invisible, if I follow the rapid motion of the disappearing dot. If I look at the picture as a whole, I can see the green, and when I stare at the black plus, then it is most green.



    5. Eyes said

      October 5, 2006 @ 6:42 pm

      It has to do with the mechanism of our eyes: the color sensitive parts become “fatigued” when we stare at a color for too long. In this case, because the pink dots are there for all except one rotation, we see the complementary color of pink: green, when the pink dot disappears from the gif file’s animation.



    6. Eyes said

      October 5, 2006 @ 6:52 pm

      This illusion works on a principle involving a trait human eyes have: the color sensitive areas actually get “fatigued” if they stare at an area with the same color for too long. As a result, you see the complementary color once you take your eyes off that area. In this case, because the pink dot at one position is there for all but one time when the animation has it disappear, you see the green dot there because you’ve stared at the pink for too long. Simple. If you stare at the picture for a while, then look away, you should see aring of green dots for a split second. Same principle.



    7. nigatron said

      October 5, 2006 @ 7:12 pm

      Well I must say that when I looked at it, all sort of crazy shit happened and I’m sober. There was green, there would be purple dots disappearing, leaving tracers, you name it.



    8. shivey said

      October 9, 2006 @ 2:40 am

      THIS IS A FAKE!!! if u cover up the cross it still moves



    9. o said

      October 9, 2006 @ 9:58 pm

      The dots move because it is an animated gif, but that’s not the illusion. The effects of the illusion are the green colour and the fact that the dots will seem to disappear. That’s NOT part of the animation; that’s your eyes fooling you.



    10. mwa said

      October 13, 2006 @ 9:01 pm

      Its fake



    11. mwa said

      October 13, 2006 @ 9:02 pm

      Its only an animation



    12. Heliologue said

      October 20, 2006 @ 1:40 am

      Rita said This optical illusion is a scam. The dots don’t naturally start turning green and disappearing because of your eyes. Check it out..this picture is a gif. If you copy and paste it into paint, the dots will NOT move. (I’ve tried it)

      Don’t take this the wrong way, but you’re a moron. You can’t view an animated GIF in Paint…. or any other pixel-based editor, for that matter. You need a special program that can handle animated GIFs, like ImageReady.

      Shivey said THIS IS A FAKE!!! if u cover up the cross it still moves

      You, too, are a moron. The rotation of the dots isn’t the optical illusion: the change of color, and the eventual ‘disappearance’ of the pink dots is.

      Of course it’s fake. It’s an optical illusion—emphasis on illusion. But the phenomenon is real. Like Eyes said, the fatigue of the color-sensitive parts of the eyes is expressed by ‘seeing’ an inversion of the colored shape. The disappearance of all the pink dots is due to the brain’s trying to take a shortcut, and ends up combining the inverted pink with the real pink, leaving nothing but the grey background.



    13. Donkz said

      October 22, 2006 @ 5:11 am

      i dont care… it’s cool…



    14. Check This said

      October 26, 2006 @ 1:39 pm

      Yes, it’s a .GIF. But just hit ESC to stop the animation. You won’t see green anymore, but the dots still disappear after stairing in the center.



    15. elliosh said

      October 27, 2006 @ 2:24 am

      i am not sobre, i had seziure from this. i also saw a snow white in the background. i think it is timed when you look it will turn green, and when not pink. i would enjoy the script for the timer on this, it is like a phycic with a crystal ball. thank you.



    16. someone said

      December 1, 2006 @ 3:43 pm

      fake not even real it is a moving photo.



    17. Optical Illusion said

      December 26, 2006 @ 7:44 pm

      [...] Optical Illusion – Hemmy.net, A source of varied interests ( I’ve tried it) The sad thing is, this optical illusion does work. … Scary Maze Game – Final Fantasy Cosplay Pictures – Doraemon Game – Samurai Champloo Game … [...]



    18. Andrew said

      January 10, 2007 @ 4:56 am

      This optical illusion is a scam. The dots don’t naturally start turning green and disappearing because of your eyes. Check it out..this picture is a gif. If you copy and paste it into paint, the dots will NOT move. (I’ve tried it) Don’t take this the wrong way, but you’re a moron. You can’t view an animated GIF in Paint…. or any other pixel-based editor, for that matter. You need a special program that can handle animated GIFs, like ImageReady. Shivey said THIS IS A FAKE!!! if u cover up the cross it still moves You, too, are a moron. The rotation of the dots isn’t the optical illusion: the change of color, and the eventual ‘disappearance’ of the pink dots is. Of course it’s fake. It’s an optical illusion—emphasis on illusion. But the phenomenon is real. Like Eyes said, the fatigue of the color-sensitive parts of the eyes is expressed by ‘seeing’ an inversion of the colored shape. The disappearance of all the pink dots is due to the brain’s trying to take a shortcut, and ends up combining the inverted pink with the real pink, leaving nothing but the grey background.



    19. Jodi said

      January 20, 2007 @ 9:00 am

      My eyes started hurting. anyone get the point of this thing because I sure don’t.. It’s the stupidest one I’ve ever seen and it’s a waste of my time. GOD!



    20. angela said

      February 14, 2007 @ 10:05 pm

      it is green when it hits the circle duhhhh



    21. angela said

      February 14, 2007 @ 10:06 pm

      :( :) >:o



    22. angela said

      February 14, 2007 @ 10:06 pm



    23. angela said

      February 14, 2007 @ 10:07 pm

      but i love it ♥



    24. ellarr said

      March 30, 2007 @ 7:05 pm

      this is my fav optical illution! tis sickkkk!!



    25. andy said

      April 17, 2007 @ 12:46 am

      haha at all the silly people who think its fake! so the computer knows when u stare at the cross and stop staring at it huh and adjusts the gif accordingly huh! lol and the even funnier bit is someone will think they are so right that its a fake they will try and tell me im wrong! Laffin in anticipation! Its meant to be a moving gif else it couldnt work and eyes has it spot on its colour fatigue doing the disappearing.



    26. carmelyne94 said

      May 29, 2007 @ 12:50 am

      if u press ESC and stare at the plus sign for a long time…the pink dots will disappear…this is not a scam



    27. manuel said

      July 18, 2007 @ 12:22 am

      under the eleventh dot there is a little red line, what does that mean?



    28. Optical Illusion said

      August 11, 2007 @ 11:12 am

      [...] Optical Illusion – Hemmy.net, A source of varied interests Scary Maze Game – Final Fantasy Cosplay Pictures – Doraemon Game – Samurai Champloo Game … Illusions (7) Images (42) Interesting Stuffs (84) Internet … [...]



    29. kara said

      August 20, 2007 @ 10:33 pm

      has eny1 tried the one where you see god its kool



    30. paul said

      October 12, 2007 @ 8:52 am

      wow, you guys who says this is fake are really not thinking that much. look and google it, you’ll find soo much illusions like this, and its not fake. so THIS ILLUSION IS NOT FAKE



    31. nathalie said

      December 31, 2007 @ 11:22 am

      aljo said : you are STUPID ! .. colisss de crisss… go check your brain not your eyes! LOL..



    32. tiredguy said

      January 25, 2008 @ 12:48 am

      The people who think this is fake really need to watch some Discovery Kids channel or something and learn how the eye processes color. You people are dumb.



    33. Glyph said

      January 25, 2008 @ 2:44 am

      The people who say this is fake obviously haven’t read the instructions. Stare at the black cross in the middle. Don’t look away from it. The dots in your peripheral (to all said idiots: that word means what you can see besides what you are looking directly at) vision will fade away and disappear. Don’t look away from the cross or it won’t work.



    34. Lucy said

      January 25, 2008 @ 5:12 am

      It’s supposed to be animated you morons. Work on your reading comprehension.



    35. Milexa said

      January 25, 2008 @ 6:05 am

      I know how it works, but I must say, this is still really awesome! :D



    36. Anonymous said

      January 25, 2008 @ 7:43 am

      Where are your brains, people? It’s an optical illusion — THE POINT IS THAT YOUR EYE IS TRICKING YOU INTO SEEING SOMETHING THAT ISN’T THERE.

      If you cover up the cross, you’re missing the point.
      If you take a still image of a MOVING, ANIMATED-FUCKING-GIF, you are missing the point.

      The fucking dot that’s disappearing looks green because you’re not looking directly at it.

      Jesus.



    37. Wtflol said

      January 25, 2008 @ 11:33 am

      Oh my god, I’ve never lol’d so hard at a thread in my life. The optical illusion was great, but the raw stupidity in some of these responses was just delightful.

      Back up, guys, I think the gene pool needs some chlorine.



    38. Erica said

      January 25, 2008 @ 1:28 pm

      Wow. The people commenting on here have to be some of the dumbest people I’ve ever seen in my life.

      “omg! It’s a scam because it’s animated! The illusion has NOTHING to do with the green dot that I see that isn’t really there!”

      Sometimes I wonder if the majority of the world has tumbleweed blowing around in their heads.



    39. K said

      January 25, 2008 @ 1:44 pm

      the illusion was kind of neat, though I saw the green the whole time. But the best part was the idiots that thought this was fake because it was animated! WTF.



    40. » Optical Illusion - ScatteredGenius.com said

      January 25, 2008 @ 2:55 pm

      [...] Illusion This is a cool optical illusion by Michael Bach and JL Hilton. Look at the rotating dots and you will only see a pink dot disappearing in motion. Now concentrate [...]



    41. Faery said

      January 26, 2008 @ 4:28 am

      It’s really sad how many stupid people there are. This Illusion is really cool.



    42. scify said

      January 27, 2008 @ 2:43 am

      Wow… just… wow. I mean, wtf? I seriously hope most of the people who posted the “It’s fake/it’s a scam” bits are just griefers… but I know they aren’t.

      That’s depressing.

      Otherwise, cool illusion.



    43. ACE said

      January 30, 2008 @ 4:39 am

      It’s not a fake. the dots are supposed to move. if you think that its fake, you are probably paranoid to some degree and you are the kind of person who thinks that everything cool is fake or photoshopped.



    44. ACE said

      January 30, 2008 @ 4:39 am

      any1 here in the santa monica area?



    45. ACE said

      January 30, 2008 @ 4:40 am

      oh and rita, ur stupid.



    46. emily said

      February 10, 2008 @ 2:15 am

      this is sweet!!!!!!



    47. bubba said

      February 17, 2008 @ 10:18 am

      Its not fake retards. Just stare at the plus sign really hard…. then let one of your buddies smack you up side the fn head repeatedly while your looking at it. mabe then it will work for you dumbass.



    48. Cl Cl said

      February 27, 2008 @ 3:13 am

      Quote:

      shivey said

      October 9, 2006 @ 2:40 am

      THIS IS A FAKE!!! if u cover up the cross it still moves

      You are a complete fucking retard



    49. john said

      March 29, 2008 @ 12:08 am

      Does anybody know where i might find more information about how this illusion works? I’m trying to create a still image where a colour disappears but need to know if the illusion given simply makes the dots disappear because it’s animated or if it is more to do with our eyes’ colour recognition?



    50. Pete said

      April 3, 2008 @ 2:43 pm

      The pink dots only disappeared a little in my case. Gif, optical illusion what have you, I don’t think it acted on my brain in a normal way.



    51. Lynne said

      April 6, 2008 @ 8:43 am

      This comment section here is better then the illusion.. LMAO!! @ the peeps who thought the animation was the illusion. :)



    52. carlos said

      April 8, 2008 @ 4:14 am

      the pink dots don´t move only the green dot moves around the dots



    53. weird_science said

      May 5, 2008 @ 6:55 am

      This comment explains the visual illusion regarding pink dots that seem to turn green.

      Know this: gray minus pink = green (color theory).

      The combination of pink and gray — seen in rapid juxtapositon — produces the color green, and this fact is well known to painters and to others who work with colors.

      The pink dots are displayed against a gray background. When a pink dot disappears, it turns gray. A dot becomes pink when the gray disappears. Gray minus pink = green.

      I see the “green dots” all of the time, whether or not I focus on the center of the circle. But my eyes are old and tired and they do not focus well.

      Younger eyes need to be “handicapped” — forced to go out of focus — before they can be tricked into seeing green dots.

      Eyeballs have receptors of light that we call cones and rods . Cones are in the center of the eyeballs, and cones detect the wavelenghts that we perceive as colors.

      Rods are positioned around the edges of the eyeballs, and rods detect luminosity, the intensity of the wavelenths — brighter, darker, brigher, darker — but rods cannot see color itself. The rods detect motion — changes in luminosity — better than do the cones.

      When the field of visual focus narrows upon the center of the circle, the cones at the center of the eyeball barely see the dots — the dots are out of focus — and the intensity of the light — the light that comes from the dots — is too weak for the cones to determine the colors with precision. Cones, you see, need lots of light to function properly. Some vague message of “pink and gray” does come through, however.

      .(In the darkness of the night, our eyeballs cannot see colors. Cones need lots of light to function properly.)

      On the other hand, the rods (at the edges of the eyeball) see the dots quite well. But the rods see only “brightness,” — brighter, darker, brighter, darker — not color.

      Now we can use the facts above to deduce the messages that the brain receives from the blinking dots.

      The brain sees motion (brighter, darker, brighter, darker) and the brain sees an average of pink and gray, and gray minus pink = green.

      In this sense, the world of vision is a realm of illusion, a Hollywood movie created by the brain.

      And based upon such evidence, philosphers claim the world itself is merely an illusion, a fabrication of the brain, a dream within a dream. In other words, there is no world.

      But others say there is no brain.

      And I concur with the latter.



    54. sajeed said

      May 18, 2008 @ 8:47 pm

      really amazing and wonderfull…………



    55. Kitty said

      June 2, 2008 @ 2:36 am

      “Jodi Says:
      January 20th, 2007 at 9:00 am

      My eyes started hurting. anyone get the point of this thing because I sure don’t.. It’s the stupidest one I’ve ever seen and it’s a waste of my time. GOD!”

      F***ing b***h! Why the f*** are you looking at optical illusions if they are a waste of your fucking time? Newsflash! They’re for fun, so shut the f*** up moron!



    56. AmyT said

      March 20, 2009 @ 9:29 am

      To those who can’t comprehend this, haven’t you ever closed your eyes when facing the sun (or lightbulb), so that you see a red/orange glow through your lids, then opened your eyes and see greenish circles wherever you looked next? That’s just one example. It’s how our eyes work and it’s VERY cool! Complementary colors take the place of the colors you’ve been staring at. Try it with any image–like a block of solid color, say blue…stare at a blue block for awhile, then look away from it, and you’ll temporarily see a yellow block in the same shape as what you’d been staring at.



    57. Mark said

      July 7, 2009 @ 3:30 pm

      I am stunned by the incredibly low intelligence of so many of the comments. So once again for all the simpletons and cretins out there… This is a moving “gif” you cannot look at it in “paint”! The fact that you are trying to do that is beyond belief. Our eyes perceive colours by specialised cells in the back of our eyes in a layer called the Retina. We use an area called the “macula” for detailed vision. When the cells are triggered by light of the correct wavelength they transmit a their messages by initiating an “action potential ” ( a small electrical current.) They do this by a “chemical” reaction ie: a tiny amount of a substance called a neuro-transmitter is released from the the nerve ending into the junction with the next nerve (synapse). If a nerve is “firing” repeatedly, the neurotransmitter is depleted for milliseconds until the nerve is ready to fire again. SO.. if you look at “Pink” for too long you exhaust the capacity of the pink sensitive cells to transmit and will see the complementary colour-green. Lastly.. when you focus on the centre cross, you are relying on the outer part of the retina to “see”, but the nerve density is much lower there than in the “macula” so the brain compensates by creating this illusion. Brilliant illusion but really stupid people out there. I despair for the human race.



    58. Seencha said

      July 25, 2009 @ 1:40 pm

      July 25, 2009 1:05 PM

      I was searching for one example of optical illusion that will amaze Caleb’s classmates on his scheduled day to reveal a related presentation, when i was motivated to . . . READ SOME COMMENTS, MY GOODNESS!

      Others were appreciative enough to tell that it was really cool, but most reacted as if they really knew about it. We have the eyes to see and the brain to interpret, anyway. Let’s just recognize the joint effort of Mr. Bach and Mr. Hilton of a job well done. Imagine how the two made us all reacting this way?!!!



    59. ham said

      January 27, 2010 @ 10:10 am

      the reason when you put it in paint it doesnt work is because paint doesnt support gif images so it only gets the first frame so it wont work cause its no moving



    60. ahzhgaba said

      March 1, 2010 @ 8:33 am

      To all of you geniuses insulting those who challenge the claims of this illusion, try scrolling the gif up or down on your screen until only one pink dot remains, or even half of one pink dot. You will see that it flashes green at a completely regular interval, whether viewed straight on or peripherally, and without the rest of the dots, or a spot to stare at in the middle. The fatigue of which some of the illusion defenders here write does not occur in this clockwork, brief interval. The green dot is, in fact, actually there in the animation. While other aspects of the illusion occur as claimed, and are interesting on their own, the claim that the green dot is an illusion IS FALSE.



    61. Otto said

      December 1, 2010 @ 11:38 pm

      Received this GIF in an email and the animation was not supported. Tried it and found the following. Even without animation the Pink Dots do dissapear but there is no rotating green dot. What I did find was that if I stared for a long time then moved my head to one side I did get a flash of a complete circle of green dots and then the pink dots came back. I am no scientist but this does in my opinion prove the fatigue theory. I have also looked at the animated GIF version and it does look like the pink dots are overwritten by a green dot. But when I go back and look at the version without animation there is a pink dot missing but it is not replaced with a green dot just the grey background. Only the creators of this OPTICAL ILLUSION or maybe you clever computer guys who can revers engineer functions and look at yhe code structure can give a diffinative on the overwrite of the pink dots…. Is it a GREEN dot or just the GREY background????



    62. Yuna said

      January 3, 2011 @ 7:26 pm

      Cool illusion! When I stare at the plus sign, I see a green dot rotating around the pink dots, than gradually the pin dots go away until I just see the green dot still rotating, if I look at a random pink dot, I see the green dot rotating around the pink dots too. Someone here said they saw a red line underneath the 11th pink dot, I noticed that too, I think that’s just a mistake or something..But anyways, to the people who didn’t understand this illusion or even bother to read the directions carefully…..I suggest you go straight back to your 2nd grade teacher and have him/her teach you again the importance ot reading/understaning directions carefully before claiming it’s dumb or stupid. Thank you.



    63. Dave said

      March 23, 2011 @ 11:49 am

      Lol everyone missed one vital point.

      Cover up all the dots but the very top one with your hands.

      Stare directly at it.

      You will see a brief flash of green (less the 300 hundreths of a second) before the dot disappears.

      Colour fatigue makes the dots dissapear

      BUT

      The brief flashes of green keep it registering in your retna, therefore keep the green visable continuously.

      I used a 60fps Screen Capture program to prove my point. There acually IS GREEN in this animation, your mind does not generate it, just emphasises it.



    64. ImXCoolX said

      April 10, 2011 @ 3:49 am

      WOW! This is really cool! Optical illusions make me go crazy ahhh! ANyways i really liked it Hahaha! Good job this!!!!



    65. Antonio said

      April 30, 2011 @ 5:48 am

      To all the idiots that think its fake take a picture of it and then look at the black cross and then maybe it will knock some sence into your brain



    66. MEofcourse said

      May 23, 2011 @ 3:23 pm

      that. was. COOL at first i thort it was an animation then i was like nahhhh how could they know what part we are looking at i was like O.o !!



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