The Watercolor illusion or watercolor effect was the discovery of Baingio Pinna who came upon it in 1987. However, he wasn’t the only one who stumbled upon the optical illusion, but Gavin Brelstaff and Lothar Spillmann published their findings in 2001. Since the optical illusion has become well known, several scientific experiments have been conducted to understand the phenomenon of the watercolor effect. The phenomenon is quite amazing.

Watercolor Illusion: The Phenomenon of Melting Colors
A dark chromatic color outlines a figure flanked in the brighter chromatic color. The brighter color spreads into all the enclosed area, thus the use of the phrase “melting colors,” as you see the color fill up the enclosed shape.
Most often, you will see purple and orange grouped together, as it is the most complementary pair. The watercolor illusion depends on the combination of color contrast and luminance of the outlines in order to perceive the watercolor effect.
In order to get to the bottom of this illusion and to find out how it occurs, researchers, as we already mentioned before, have conducted experiments. But out of all the experiments, the watercolor effect’s comparison to the Gestalt principles stands out.

The Comparison of the Watercolor Illusion to the Gestalt Principles
The introduction of the watercolor effect in the circles of researchers and scientists led to many comparisons, but one comparison that held the most weight against others was the Gestalt principles. People were quick to associate the effect to the figure-ground perception.
According to the figure-ground perception, elements are combined together based on size, brightness, color, and shape.  The seven principles of the figure-ground perception were used as the primary basis for the comparison. These seven include continuation, symmetry, closure, amodal completion, convexity, and previous experience. Using the seven principles, researchers began to run tests.

The Tests
However, it wasn’t until 2006 that Reeves and Pinna were finally able to provide the world with some insight on the watercolor illusion. Together, they conducted experiments to determine the thirteen elements of the coloration effect of the watercolor illusion. The elements include uniform, stimulus, solid, perception on black, white, and colored surface, the orange shade on wiggly lines, its ability to work with basic shades, and it working better on lines with a higher luminance contrast.
The other remaining elements state that the line with a decreased luminance will always create the coloration effect, reversing the lines with the orange on the outside with the purple outline on the inside would appear as if the orange shade is spreading outward.
The coloration effect will extend approximately 45 visual degrees, it is completed by the smallest measurable unit, the line width created the most optimal effect, the color will spread in different directions than the line, and finally, it can stimulate a complementary shade when one of the line is chromatic and the other is achromatic.

What is Responsible for this Phenomenon?
In your brain, there are two stages of parallel processing, parallel boundary processing and feature processing. The feature processing stage the surface around the lines creates tiny interactions between lines, leading the color to spread. The second stage manages the stimulus’s geometrical structure found in color spreading. to edit.

It is safe to say that almost everyone has heard of View Master, seen, had, and used one during its hay days. If you are not a 90s kid, you may have used one, but there is no way possible that you have never come across one. If your memory cannot seem to recall seeing one, we will nudge your memory into the right direction, prompting it to dig deep and remember.

View Master:  Early Beginnings 
Edwin Eugene Mayer, an Army veteran, began to work as a pharmacist in Portland, Oregon after his tenure as a soldier ended. Soon after, Mayor developed another interest and with the help of his family members, he opened a photo-finishing business in 1919. His entrepreneurial efforts paid off, as his photo-finishing business reached new heights.

Harold Graves, his partner, had a big hand in his business’s popularity. In 1926, Graves revolutionized the photo-finishing business when he introduced Mayor to album sets and photographic greeting cards and postcards. Soon, Mayor’s business became the largest producer of photographic greeting and post cards in the 1920s. This gave way to the invention of the View Master.

Plans to Invent the View Master Were Set in Motion 
Mayor and Graves, together, dreamt of great things for their company, and the fulfillment of being the most popular photo-finishing business in the nation was not enough. Both of them visited William Gruber, an organ maker by profession and photographer by passion. They needed help to make their viewing device just as successful as their other products, and Gruber had the answer of how they could.

Earlier, Gruber had designed and manufactured a stereo imaging rig using a pair of Kodak Bantam Specials joined on a tripod. He inserted small pieces of Kodachrome color transparency film inside the reels. Along with the film, a special viewer to view the film was designed as well.

The View Master Has Arrived 
The View Master is made up of seven stereoscopic pictures. Viewers can view each film concurrently, resulting in a reproducing binocular depth perception. After all the legalities of the device were met, Mayer and Gruber unveiled the View Master in 1939 at the New York World’s Fair. 

Quickly, it became available at stationary stores, gift shops, photography stores, and it even took over the postcard and greeting business at Mayor’s stores. Through the View Master, people could see pictures of the Grand Canyon, Carlsbad Caverns, and later, Disney characters. 

The Future of the View Master 
The View Master will undergo a 3D makeover in 2015, an initiative taken on by Mattel. The company has joined forces with Google, and will begin to remodel the View Master to make it appealing for this generation. People will be able to slide their smart phone into the headset to scan the plastic cards to see a 3D picture form.

Were you able to recall what a View Master is? Are you excited to view 3D images using the View Master made for this century?

© opticalspy 2015

Patrick Hughes is an acclaimed British artist who was born in Birmingham, but now works in London. He aspired to create a name for himself in his field, which he did when he invented the optical illusion reverspective. Reverspective is an illusion designed on a three dimensional surface where the farthest parts of the picture are actually the nearest.

Life before the Reverspective Optical Illusion 
Hughes became an independent much later on in life. Before he created his reputation as the man behind the reverspective optical illusion, he taught students in Leeds College of Art. Since he wanted to play a more active role in the art industry, he quit teaching to become a full time independent artist.

Patrick Hughes Accomplishments 
He credits his success as an artist to several artists he admires such as the Lilliput, Paul Klee, N.F. Simpson, Rene Magritte, Anthony Earnshaw  Marcel Marien, and Giorgio de Chirico. You might recognize that most of the artists mentioned are surrealists. Other people’s work inspired him to create work of his own.

As an independent artist, he began to experiment with different techniques of creating things, often changing places of object and flattening them. Refer to his creation of the Clown in 1963 and Liquorice Allsorts in 1960 to get an idea of his earlier work.

Additionally, another design of his that is worth checking out is the One Two in 1962. In that painting, he set the words against the pictures or against themselves such as in the Tick Tock created the same year. Later on, he began to take interest in visual oxymoron, paradoxes, and perspective optical illusions.

In Milan, Duchy of Milan in the year 1526 or 1527, an acclaimed artist was born. You know the Italian painter by the name of Giuseppe Arcimboldo. The artist, like his father before, possessed a gift of the fine arts. With time, he become known for imaginative portraits using objects such as vegetables, fish, books, and fruits. His glory days did not come until 1592.

Giuseppe Arcimboldo—the Royal Painter 
Gradually, Giuseppe Arcimboldo’s popularity in Italy had begun to grow, and Ferdinand I, the reigning king, noticed it. The king appointed him as the court portraitist at the Habsburg court situated in Vienna. Later, Maximilian II and Rudolf II approached him and appointed him as the court portraitist at Prague court.

However, painting portraits of people were not his only talents, as he served as a costume designer and court decorator. Even when he was pursuing different careers, he did not let up on his paintings.

Giuseppe Arcimboldo’s Paintings Were a Source of Mystery 
The Italian painter produced several masterpieces in his life, but only the most unconventional and mysterious gained lifelong fame. His paintings on religious subjects failed to get a positive response from people, leading them to disappear entirely. His paintings that did garner a response were his portraits of human heads compromised of odd items such as plants, tree roots, vegetables, fruits, and plants.

The Hermann grid illusion, not to be confused with the scintillating grid illusion, is a marvelous optical illusion. Ludimar Hermann, who the illusion is named after, reported its discovery in 1870. He described the illusion as having the appearance of a ghost. You do not have anything to fear though, as the optical illusion is more wondrous than frightening. Perhaps, a little frightening, as it makes you see tiny grey spots jumping from place to place. What is the scary part? They do not exist, just as ghosts do not exist, unless you have proof to show us otherwise.

The Hermann Grid Illusion—Tricks the Eye 
Ludimar Hermann, a German speech scientist and physiologist, noticed something extraordinary taking place before his eyes. He was quick to announce his discovery, and people were quick to listen. After the Hermann Grid illusion became known worldwide, people began to try it. The newly discovered optical illusion left people amazed, as they saw grey dots appear randomly in the white spaces left between the tiny black, square shaped boxes.

What amazed them further about the Hermann grid illusion was knowing that the grey dots they were seeing were not actually there, but their mind somehow had constructed them in their head, making them see the grey dots. The mind was up to no good, tricking the eye into seeing things that were clearly not there because when they concentrated on a white space, the grey dot vanished, just as a ghost would vanish when you catch them off guard.

What Spell Did the Hermann Grid Illusion Cast on You? 
Lateral inhibition is responsible for the fading in and out grey dots in the optical illusion. More than one receptor is involved in tricking your receptive field to seeing the unseen. The receptive field is found at the intersection of the cross.

It has an increased amount of light focused on its inhibitory than the receptive field in the middle of the small black squares. This results in the response on the excitatory center of the receptive field to become stronger versus the intersection where the white cross intersects. In short, you see grey dots in your peripheral vision, even when you focus on one single white space.

So, What is the Trick? 
There is no trick, just your mind playing games with you. If you do not believe it, you can stand up, move away from the computer, and watch the optical illusion. What do you see? You should be seeing grey dots even at your distance.

The Hermann grid illusion was and is still a magnificent discovery. It messes with your head in the most amazing ways. It lets you perceive images that are not there. If you have never seen a Hermann grid illusion, look at it now. Trick your mind, and then introduce others to it to trick their mind.

Do not stare at the optical illusion too long, as it makes you feel as if you are cross-eyed.

Sometimes, it is remarkable how people stumble upon optical illusions. Optical illusions either accidentally appear to a person or when they are in the midst of their researching efforts in a particular field. For Professor Edward H. Adleson, the appearance of the Checker Shadow illusion was not accidental.

Studying anything mildly related to the field of visual perception was of great interest to him. During his research, he came upon the Checker Shadow illusion, and after carrying on an in-depth study of his own on the unusual finding, he published it for readers, scientists, professors, and his students so they too, could gain exposure to this optical illusion.

The Illusionary Effect of the Checker Shadow Illusion 
When he published the optical illusion, it appeared to be a checkerboard thus the name. In the picture, you will see that it is made up of both dark and light color squares. One square will appear darker in color than the other. Even though the two boxes appear to be a different color from each other, they are, in fact, the same shade. If you do not believe it, open it up in an image editing software.

The Proof of the Two Colors Being the Same
Copy the Checker Shadow illusion and paste it in an image editing software. Next, use the eyedropper tool to confirm that the two colors are the same. If you are upset over being proven wrong, take your frustration out on the illusion. 
You can take the effect of the optical illusion away by viewing patches of the black and white squares without the context surrounding it. You can even separate the squares from each other to eliminate the Checker Shadow illusion. Now, that you know that the colors are the same, you should know the working behind the optical illusion.

The Checker Shadow Illusion—the Explanation
According to Adelson, the visual system has one sole purpose—to distinguish the colors of the world. In his explanation, he writes that a cast shadow will dim an area in order to let a white area in a shadow reflect less light than a dark surface in complete brightness. In the Checker Shadow illusion, the light checkered boxes are surrounded by darker checkered boxes. Even if a checkered box is considerably darker, it is lighter when compared to its surrounding boxes and vice versa.  

Your visual system is ignoring the changes in the light level in order to determine the shade of the area without having the shadows misled it to thinking otherwise. Your visual system is breaking down the picture information into parts to view the nature of the object in front of it. 

The Checker Shadow illusion is one of the most sensational illusions, as it lets viewers perceive all the boxes as a different color when all of them are the same. You can feel free to dissect the optical illusion apart to see for yourself that the checkerboard is indeed one color.

Salvador Dalí, a Spanish painter and sculptor, has crafted several mesmerizing pieces in his lifetime, but one that stands out from the rest is the Hallucinogenic Toreador. The year was 1970 when the artist revealed his oil painting to the world. Just like his other artwork before this, the Hallucinogenic Toreador did not fail to impress the audiences. For art enthusiasts and fans of Dalí, there was something unusual about the oil painting, but in an artistic way.

The Hallucinogenic Toreador, One of Dalí’s Most Acclaimed Pieces 
Dalí’s inspiration for the subject of the painting was his wife. She loathed the idea of bull fighting, and Dalí used her hate as the basis for his painting. Using the paranoiac critical technique, he combined optical illusion, motifs, and symbolism. Once the oil painting was completed, it was time to share his unusual way of thinking with others.

The Hallucinogenic Toreador and How it Amazed People? 
Have you ever seen a bullfighting ring in real life? Perhaps, you have seen it in a movie or cartoon. If you really want to see a realistic depiction of a bullfighting ring, look no further than Dalí’s oil painting.

Since he used his wife’s hate for the sport of bull fighting, he drew her picture in the upper left corner of the painting. Her expression in the small portrait is rigid to show her hatred towards the sport. Every element of the oil painting is drawn inside a bullfighting ring. Through his painting, he also wanted to honor the Spanish flag. Hence, he ended up using yellow and red tones throughout the painting.

When the Painting Really Baffles You?
Those aspects of the painting do not stop the viewer dead in their tracks. It is the exaggerated version of blood and saliva dripping from the bull’s head that lies dying on the ground. In order for the viewer to look at the head as soon as they view the painting, Dalí drew a pattern of different colors, which force you to look down to see the bull’s agony. In front of your eyes, you see the blood transform into a bay. From the bay, arises a human sitting on a yellow colored raft. Below the bay, a visible outline of a Dalmatian appears.

The Peculiarity of the Painting Continues
However, that is not all, there’s more. The bull gradually transforms into the landscapes of Cap de Creus, which is where the painter resided with his wife. It is speculated that Dalí wanted to increase tourism in the area so he decided to paint the surroundings of the place he called home.

All the aspects of Dalí’s painting amazed people, as it was unlike any other painting they had ever come across. To this day, the Hallucinogenic Toreador attracts several visitors that come around from all over the world to look at it.

You can view the painting at Salvador Dalí Museum in St. Petersburg, Florida. The museum is dedicated to the work of Dalí and you will find plenty of his other thought provoking pieces on display. 

© opticalspy 2015