Noah Scalin likes skulls. He is the founder of the Skull-A-Day project. Now in its sixth year, the project features a new image of a skull every day. In 2012, Scalin created the following anamorphic skull using 497 VHS cassette tapes as a commission of the TCC Visual Arts Center in Tidewater Virginia. The skull […]
Anyone who owns a camera can create their own optical illusions using forced perspective. In the photograph below, which looks to be from the 1940’s, a woman sitting on the beach holds two of her miniature friends in the palms of her hands. She really seems to be enjoying herself, doesn’t she? Who knew camera […]
A series of balls appear to roll up hill. However, as you will quickly suspect, everything is not always what it appears to be. Once the camera moves to a different angle, the true shape of these ramps are revealed. Through an anamorphic trick in their design, the ramps appear to be angled upward […]
In this sculpture created by Japanese artist Kumi Yamashita, the shadows cast by a group of carved wooden letters form the profile of a face when lit by a single light source (from the right). Her artwork frequently uses simple objects, light and shadow to form human profiles and other likenesses. More of her artwork […]
When it comes to creating motion illusions, Akiyoshi Kitaoka is in a league of his own. In one of his latest examples below, titled Beating Heart, the pink and red heart appears to move on top of a green background. If you slowly scroll the page up and down while looking at the image, it […]
Looking back through the archives, I was surprised that something from the late Japanese artist Shigeo Fukuda had not been featured on An Optical Illusion yet. During his lifetime, Fukuda produced well over a thousand poster designs (among other artistic endeavors that I am sure we will explore at a later time). Many of his […]
In this square, the corridor part (in between the green lines) appears to be tinted a light green. In reality, this section of the square is entirely white. This image was drawn by Professor Akiyoshi Kitaoka in 2007 for Visiome.
