2. TABLE OF CONTENTS
What are Optical Illusions? ………………………………………………………………………………………….1
History Of Optical Illusions………….......................................................................................2
Famous Examples of optical illusions………………………………………........................................3
Facial Illusions/ Ambiguous Illusions……………………………………………………………………………..4
Examples Of Facial Illusion/ Ambiguous Illusions…………………………………………………………..5
3D Illusions……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………6
Impossible Figures………………………………………………………………............................................7
Impossible Figure’s History…………………………………………………………………………………………….8
After Images………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….9
Examples Of After Image……………………………………………………………………………………………..10
Distortion Illusions……………………………………………………………………………………………………....11
Color Illusions………………………………………………………………………………………………………………12
Fun Facts………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………13
Self Reflection………………………………………………………………………………………………………………14
Bibliography………………………………………………………………………………………………………………...15
3. What Are Optical Illusions
Optical illusions (Also called visual illusions) are when we perceive a reality
incorrectly. Optical illusions are pictures that use colors, lights, and patterns which
mislead our minds. As you know everything that our eyes see will be send to the
brain, then our brain will give a perception about that thing. Sometimes our brain
can’t understand or centrifuge everything we see. This cause us to see a picture the
way it isn’t exactly.
1. Do you think the colors of A and B are the same?
The answer is yes, the colors and patterns used in the picture causes your brain to
think the color of A and B are different. You can see A is I n the color of light gray
and B in the color of dark gray. This is only because A is located near 3 dark squares
and A near 3 light squares. This is how colors fool your mind.
2. Do you think the stairs are going up or down?
When you look at this picture it’s hard for you to realize if the stairs are going up or
down. The patterns in the pictures fool your minds, this cause you to see the stairs
connected. The stairs are actually going up.
4. History Of Optical Illusions
The person who first invented optical illusions is
unknown, but scientists have found out that Optical
illusions were first used by the Greeks. From many years
ago Greeks were the first ones who started making
slanted roofs for their temples. This gave the illusion
that the temples were standing straight.
Egyptians were also one of the first ones who used
optical illusions. They made the thousand years old
pyramids (the first one, the Great Pyramid of Giza). They
are really famous because of being really huge and manmade. Pyramids were also one of the first optical
illusions. The shape of pyramids are like the Penrose
triangles (impossible figures).
6. Facial illusions/ Ambiguous Illusions
Facial illusions show pictures of emotion. They are drawn to create two figures. It’s
usually hard to see both pictures in facial illusions. Your eyes can only see them one at
a time. One of the famous example of facial illusion is My Mother In Law" illusion.
Ambiguous Illusions are pretty similar to facial illusions, they are pictures that have
one or more figures. The only difference is that you can see the two figures at a same
time.
Do you see an old lady or a young woman?
Your mind can not see both at a same time,
but both images are there.
7. Some Examples of Facial Illusion/ Ambiguous Illusions
3
1
1.Do you see a picture of man or woman?
2. Do you see a face or a person in park?
2
3. Do you see an eskimo or an Indian chief? 4
4. Do you see an old cowboy or a young
cowboy?
8. Some Examples of Facial Illusion/ Ambiguous Illusions
5
6
7
1. Do you see sheep or a bridge?
2. Do you see old woman and man or
two people playing guitar?
8
3. Do you see a lion’s face or 10
zebras?
4. Do you see a rabbit or a duck?
9. 3D Illusions
It is said that humans see an object in 3D because of the difference and separation between
humans’ right and left eyes. The light that reaches our eyes comes from different directions,
so humans can’t see a picture clearly. That’s why we use special glasses to watch 3D movies.
These glasses have special lenses which control the direction of light that reaches the right
and left eyes and project to separate image for each eye. Most of the 3D images aren’t clear
at first, but when you bring them close to your eyes you can see them deeper and in 3D.
This is because the visual axis meet each other and also the patterns in the picture cause
our brain and eyes to see the picture in 3D. (Usually this works if the 3D picture is on paper)
10. impossible figures
An impossible object is a kind of optical illusion. Impossible objects are also known as
impossible figure or undecidable figure. This illusions is made of two-dimensional
figure. Our brain and visual system interpret the illusions as a three- dimensional
object. When you look at the images bellow, it’s impossible to find how the sides of
the objects are connected to each other.
Some examples of undecidable figures:
Impossible cubes
Penrose stairs
Penrose triangle
Bilvet (or Devil’s Tuning Fork)
11. History Of Impossible figures
Many artists work with impossible figures including Oscar
Reutersavara, Jos de Mey, Shigeo Funkudo, Sandro del Prete, Is tavan
Orosz, Guido Moretti, Tomas F. Farkas, Mathieu Hamaekers, and M.C.
Escher. Oscar Reutersavara and M.C. Escher are one of the most
famous ones of all. Oscar Reutersavara is a Swedish artist. He was the
first person who designed an impossible objects. He has been called
the father of impossible figures". In 1934 he drew the Penrose
triangle. M.C. Escher started producing impossible figure drawing
including cube with magic ribbon in 1957.
12. Afterimages
Afterimages are also known as ghost images and image burn-in. Afterimages are pictures
that continue appear after you look them for 20-60 seconds for a short time, on a white
object (such as wall). Usually the color in the pictures or objects cause the images to
continue appearing.
There are three type of afterimages. The first one, when you look at the picture then on a
white object you see the exact picture but the colors in the pictures exchange places.
The second one, when you look on the white object you only see the colors in the picture
or object that you looked at. It usually happens when you look at really bright objects like
sun and light bulb, and pictures that have bright colors in them.
The third one, sometimes when you look at a image (that you have seen before) like
Canada’s flag for 20-60 seconds, then on a white object, you see the same picture but the
colors are different. The colors are the same as the object or picture that you have seen
before. So the color of the flag is red and white. Scientists believe that the reason to this
is that your brain uses your past experience to interpret what your eyes see.
13. Examples of Afterimages
By looking at these pictures you will understand Afterimages better. Look at
the pictures for 20-60 seconds then look on the wall.
1. same picture only the 2.only colors 3. Same picture but different colors
colors exchanged places
14. Distortion Illusions
Distortion illusions are one kind of optical illusions. They’re all about the
patterns in an object or a picture which makes something look smaller,
bigger, longer, shorter, or a different shape.
Three of the most famous examples of Distortion Illusions are “LJFE”,
“Which Line Is Longer?”, and “Slope Lines Or Parallel Lines?”. The
patterns in these three pictures fool our minds to think:
1. The lines aren’t straight, but they actually are straight. If we try to
look at each letter/ line separately we can see that all of them are
straight.
2. The first line looks longer, but both lines are same.
If you use a ruler you can see, the both lines have same height.
3. The patterns are misleading you minds to see them sloping. They’re
actually parallel. The lines are parallel but if you look at it accurately
enough you see the picture in 3D, this is because some lines are
herniated.
15. Color Illusion
Color Illusions are one type of optical Illusions. One type of
Color Illusion is when we see colors in a picture or object
incorrectly, because of the light and dark colors set next to
each other.
The checker shadow illusion is a famous example of Color
Illusion. Checker shadow Illusion was invented by Edward
Adelson, The professor of Vision Science, in 1995. This
image includes light and dark squares. The optical illusion is
that the area of the image labeled A appears to be a
darker color than the area of the image labeled B. However,
they are actually exactly the same color.
16. Color Illusion
Have you ever heard that if you wear dark colors (black) you look thinner/
skinnier than wearing light colors (white)?
Usually dark color objects look smaller/ thinner than light color objects. This is
because dark colors attract the light as they attract heat, but light colors
reflect the light, this cause you to see light colored objects bigger.
This is one type of color Illusions. Sometimes the colors of object or… cause
you to see two objects that have same sizes, in different volumes. (As you
know these are all brain’s prediction, our eyes see them correctly but the color
and patterns are the ones that mislead our brain to see things incorrectly.
Which circle is bigger?
17. Fun Facts
1. The pictures in the TV don’t really move. There are separate
pictures which come after each other really fast that our brain
can’t comprehend each individual picture.
2. In computers, magazines, and TV we see millions of colors but it
is really just dots colored red, green, and blue. If you look closely
enough at a magazine or TV or computer screen you can see the
little dots.
3. Optical illusions were used as magic tricks when they first
appeared in China
4. Scientists first found out that the reason of seeing pictures
incorrectly is because of humans’ brain (not eyes), when they
asked the people who never saw the outside world, what they see
in the American flag afterimage picture, they didn’t see the
picture the way we did. They saw the exact picture on a white
object.
18. Self reflection
My project is on Optical Illusions because I thought it’s a really interesting topic to work on and there were a lot of
things I could learn. Last year, we were supposed to find out the connection between optical illusions with math, in Math
Challenge. I was really interested in optical illusions, that’s why I chose Optical Illusions for my Personal Passion Project.
Optical illusions are about our eyes and brains. They are the patterns and colors in pictures or objects that mislead our
minds to see a reality incorrectly. During these two month I was working hard on my project. I chose to do my project on
different types of optical illusions including Facial, Ambiguous, Distortion Illusions, Afterimages, and Impossible Figures. I
learned a lot of new and interesting things about these illusions. In the articles I read, there were some interesting
paragraphs about “Humans Seeing Optical Illusions Everyday”, which I included I included in the Fun Fact part of my
project. These are the reason I chose Optical Illusion and I learned a lot of new things about it!
I think I did great on my project. I chose Optical Illusions because I thought it was an interesting and new thing to
learn, when I started the project and learned more about the topic, I even got more interested in Optical Illusion. First, I
found a lot of new and interesting things about my topic from different websites. Second, I found all the answers to my
questions, and the things I wanted to include in my project, although there were a lot of scientific and medical words in
each website. Third, I worked hard to make each part clear for people to understand by including pictures, examples and
detailed paragraphs for each part of my project. Third, I worked on my project over the holiday and weekends to finish
everything before the due day, so I can read it over 3 or 4 times to make any changes to my project to make it more
interesting and clear. Overall, I think I did great on my project, by working hard and following all the instructions from the
sheet (for our P3 projects) and I think I deserve a fully meeting or exceed expectation.
19. Bibliography
1."3D Manhattan." 3D-ANAGLYPH.COM. N.p., n.d. Web. 29 Dec. 2013. <http://www.3d-anaglyph.com/3d-manhattan/>. This picture was interesting, but it didn't answer my question. I liked the
way this site had two pictures both 3D, one that you could see with 3D glasses and one with your own eyes. The picture made the articles I read about 3D more clear. I think the image
was interesting so I included it in my project.
2. Adamovic, Jan. "Scary Optical Illusions." BrainDen. Jan Adamovic, 2012. Web. 29 Dec. 2013. This picture didn't really answer my question. This picture is an Facial/Ambiguous Illusions which
includes two figures. It shows face of a cat and a mouse. This image was interesting so I included it in my project.
3. Adelson, Edward. "Grey square optical illusion." Wikipedia The Free Encyclopedia. Adrian Pingstone, Jan. 2004. Web. 29 Dec. 2013.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Grey_square_optical_illusion.PNG>. This picture was pretty interesting, but it didn't answer my question. I liked how the this site had two pictures. One
picture which didn't move and a one which did. The moving picture showed that the colours and the patterns in the first picture (not moving) mislead our brain to think the colour of the
little squares aren't the same, but they actually are. The picture was a great example of the article so I used it as an example in my project too.
4. Afterimage. Feedio.Net. N.p., n.d. Web. 29 Dec. 2013. <http://quotes-pictures.feedio.net/canada-flag-afterimage-mighty-opticalillusions/photos1.blogger.com*blogger*5639*2020*1600*Canada%20Illusion.jpg/>. I think this picture was really interesting because when you look at it then on a white object you don't
see the same colours in the picture, you see Canada's flag (red and white). The picture answered my question which was "is it our brain or eyes which cause us to see the image like this"
A: our brain. The picture also made the articles that I read about Afterimages much more clear.
5."Afterimage." Wikipedia The Free Encyclopedia. Moxfyre, 17 Apr. 2009. Web. 29 Dec. 2013. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Afterimagenpov.svg>. This picture did not answer my question,
but it helped me to understand the article better and write the things I saw from it,in my project. It is type of Afterimage. It was an interesting picture so I included it in my project.
6."AfterImage." Wikipedia The Free Encyclopedia. N.p., 12 Dec. 2013. Web. 28 Dec. 2013. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afterimage>. Wikipedia is a good website to get information from. Some
parts of this website were hard to understand because it wasn't at my level, but there were some great information, pictures, and examples which helped me to understand the main idea
much more easier, the pictures and examples made the whole point easy for me to understand, so I included this in my project so that the project become more interesting and easy for
people to understand too. This website explained Afterimages in great details, answered my question, and explained the things that I wanted to include in my project.
7. Coetzee, Derrick. "Impossible Objects." Wikipedia The Free Encyclopedia. Derrick Coetzee, Feb. 2006. Web. 29 Dec. 2013. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Impossible_objects.svg>. This
picture answered my question and showed me how the impossible objects work and what are they like. It made the article more clear. It was interesting so I included it in my project.
8. "Distortion Illusion." ORACLE Think Quest. Education Foundation, n.d. Web. 29 Dec. 2013. <http://library.thinkquest.org/J0110336/distort.htm>. This pictures didn't answer my question. These
picture is an Distortion illusions picture which the patterns in them trick our minds. The pictures made the article more clear. There were two pictures that I used from this site. Both
images were interesting so I included them in my project.
9. "Distortion Illusions." ORACCLE Think Quest. Education Foundation, n.d. Web. 28 Dec. 2013. <http://library.thinkquest.org/J0110336/distort.htm>. This website was great. First, it was at grade
7 level. I understand everything from this website. Second,it included many great pictures and an example which made the whole thing easy for me to understand. Third, the article
answered all my questions and the examples were really good, so I included them in my project. The article was short but very detailed and helpful for me.
10. "Facial Illusions." ORACLE Think Quest. Education Foundation, n.d. Web. 28 Dec. 2013. <http://library.thinkquest.org/J0110336/facial.htm>. This website was really good and helpful. It
answered all of my questions and it had everything that I planned to include in my project. The written was at a grade 7 level, so it was really easy to understand. It was short but really
clear and detailed. It had many pictures and examples which made the article easy to understand. the pictures and examples grab the readers' attention much more than only an article.
20. Bibliography
11. "History Of Optical Illusions." Illusion Coaster. N.p., n.d. Web. 28 Dec. 2013. <http://library.thinkquest.org/J0112786/illusions.htm>. This website was easy to understand. It was in a
grade 7 level. It didn't include any pictures. Pictures are really important, they can help the reader to understand the article easier. I found the information I wanted, including 2
fun facts. at the end of the article, there was a paragraph really interesting about pictures inn TV. computers, and magazines.
12. "How Does Your Brain Process 3D?" Brain Athlete. N.p., 2013. Web. 29 Dec. 2013. <http://brainathlete.com/brain-process-3d/>. This image didn't answer my question, but it was
pretty interesting. It was a 3D image which wasn't really clear at first, but when I bring it close to your eyes you can see the picture in 3D because our eyes axis meet each other. I
included this picture in my project to make my paragraph more clear and interesting as the picture made the article for me.
13. "Impossible Object." Wikipedia The Free Encyclopedia. N.p., 13 Dec. 2013. Web. 28 Dec. 2013. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impossible_object>. This website was really helpful for
me. First, it included many great information, pictures, and examples. Second, it answered all of my questions. Third, it talked about the history of Impossible Figures which was
really interesting so I added a new slide about it. Fourth, some parts of the article was hard to understand but some parts were really clear, the pictures and examples even made
it more clear.
14. "Jesus Illusion." Eye Tricks. BWH Ventures, n.d. Web. 29 Dec. 2013. <http://www.eyetricks.com/jesus.htm>. This picture answered my question and made the article easier for me to
understand. When followed the things mentioned in the article I saw the same thing it said in the article. It was really interesting and I included it in my project and explained
everything I saw.
15. "Optical Illusion." Wikipedia The Free Encyclopedia. N.p., 11 Dec. 2013. Web. 28 Dec. 2013. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optical_illusion>. This website was great, although all the
article wasn't at grade 7 level, some parts were hard but some parts were really clear and easy to understand. It included many great pictures and examples to make the article
more interesting and easier to understand.This website helped me to answer my questions and helped me to include some examples in my project. There were many information
in this website and all of them were related to my topic. This website was really helpful for me.
16. "Optical Illusion Painting." The Awesomer. N.p., n.d. Web. 29 Dec. 2013. <http://theawesomer.com/optical-illusion-paintings/250017/>. This image didn't answer my question, but it
showed me what the Ambiguous images are like. It is an image with two figures in them. This picture helped me understand the Facial/ Ambiguous Illusions better.
17. Peczek, Darwin. "Types-Facial Illusions." Optical Illusion. Erskine Park High School, n.d. Web. 29 Dec. 2013. <http://opticalillusions.koalawebsitedesign.com/facial.htm>. I think this
picture was really interesting because it included more than one figure. The picture didn't answer my question, but it was a great example and made the article more clear. It was a
picture Of a person in a park and a human's face.I included this picture in my project because I thought it was interesting.
18. "Pictographic Ambiguity." Grand Illusions. N.p., n.d. Web. 29 Dec. 2013. <http://www.grand-illusions.com/opticalillusions/woman/>. This picture didn't really answer my question, but
it showed me what the facial illusions are like. It is really clear and it's one of the most famous example of Facial Illusions. It was helpful for me to understand the Facial illusions
better.
19. Why can we see images in 3D? Fugifilm Global. Fugifilm Corporation, 15 Mar. 2012. Web. 28 Dec. 2013. <http://faq.fujifilm.com/digitalcamera/faq_detail.html?id=110200021>. This
website was at a grade 7 level, so it was easy for me to understand. There were some scientific words in the article but the main idea of the article was clear. This website
answered my questions and it had everything I wanted to include in the 3D part of my project. This website didn't have any images, I think images are a really important part of a
