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The Goggles, They Do Nothing

Posted by michael on from the do-not-view-while-operating-machinery dept.

Suchetha writes "In anticipation of a slow news day i would like to direct the Slashdot hordes to Akiyoshi Kitaoka's Optical Illusions page. The page also has explanations on why/how they occur (in icky PDF format). The page is on a .jp uni server so they SHOULD be able to handle the herd of rhinos that is ./."

6 of 321 comments (clear)

  1. Exploratorium by Jadsky · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Some of these are on display on out-of-the-way doors in the Exploratorium science museum in San Francisco. It looked like some of the staff members had printed them out and posted them there for their own personal satisfaction, but a lot of the visitors were finding themselves distracted from the bigger attractions to stare at these.

    It was trippy to have the spinning snakes one as my wallpaper for some time, but at six by four feet, it really does begin to make you a little dizzy.

  2. Question by RiotXIX · · Score: 4, Interesting
    Is staring at these bad for your eyes? Ie. More than staring at a normal picture for say, one minute?


    Because I could...nay..have found myself staring at these for periods, and assummed I will get a bit of headache, of that they are bad for my vision (thus forcing myself to stop).

    --
    "You know you don't act like a scientist, you're more like a game show host." Dana Barret
  3. Dale Purves at the Duke Medical Center by maceo1023 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The laboratory of Dale Purves at the Duke University Medical Center is also researching visual illusions. Check out www.purveslab.net for interactive animations (yes, it's a Flash site).

    He's also written a book entitled Why We See What We Do: An Empirical Theory of Vision.

  4. A practical use... by EmbeddedJanitor · · Score: 4, Interesting
    My son is a field hockey goalkeeper which, some while ago, lead me to think about things one could do to provide "optical diversions" to favour the goalkeeper. One of the things I considered was the use of camoflage techniques as done with navy ships of old, and soldiers through the ages, to break up the lines and confuse the oposition. Camoflage can be used to not only *hide* the person/object but can also be used to confuse the senses (eg. make it hard to tell which direction the objct is moving and what its features are) thus making it hard for someone aiming at a target. A delay of a second or so is often enough to give the edge. Anyway, back to the goalkeeper... if one could confuse the striker as to where the goalkeeper's arms etc are then it will take the striker a bit longer to get a shot off or cause them to miss their aim.

    These optical devices could potentially be quite useful... going to have a play :-).

    --
    Engineering is the art of compromise.
  5. Cool illusion: motion-induced blindness by FleaPlus · · Score: 5, Interesting

    A very cool illusion is available here. Try looking inside of the triangle defined by the yellow dots, as the blue dots wander around. After a few moments, the yellow dots begin to blink in and out of your visual consciousness. It's quite a powerful effect.

  6. My favorite optical illusion by TrentL · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Check out this image. The squares marked "A" and "B" are the same shade of grey. If you don't believe me, open the page in a paint program and check out the colors.