Is the hand-print embossed or extruded (Convex or Concave)? I would like to know how you see it, so please place your opinion in comments, below. Thanks! As a kid I always found optical illusions to be fascinating. Do you know how this effect works?
(2 votes)
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It’s concave, pushed in, like movie stars do in front of the Mann Chinese Theater in Hollwood. The sun is on the left. You can tell by the shadow on the pebbles and the stick to the right of the handprint.
This is obviously extruded. You can clearly see it’s showdow on the left side of the print. The thumb also casts a small shadow. If you examine the rest of the picture you can also see that the other smaller shadows are facing the same direction…..
I’ve been studying the image again, and noone has yet mentioned the shadow cast by the “straw” in the upper right-hand corner of the image: it’s definitely from the “north-northwest”. yet, objects in the center-lower right area seem to be shawowed from the “west”.
I think the whole thing is a fabrication, not a “natural” photo at all!
Convex for me
i think that it is contruded. it is a mix of both worlds.
Post some new illusions man. Its been so long. and do post this!!!!!!!
The hand is going in (=convex).
On the upper right there is a small wooden thing coming out of the sand. It’s shadow is to the right, indicating that the light comes from the left.
The hand is going in (=concave). On the upper right there is a small wooden thing coming out from the sand with its shadow to the right, indicating that the light comes from the left…
Looking at the stick in the upper right, it would appear that the light is coming from the left. This makes me believe it’s convex.
it looks convex. if it’s concave, it’s great work by the illusionist.
It’s convex. If you see the little holes on the right of the picture, you can see their shadows to the left, which means that the sun is coming from the right! And if you see the hand, it also has shadows on its left side! It’s coming out of the sand! Case solved!
It’s concave.
See the tiny bit of wood, top right corner? Its shadow goes to the right… So the hand can’t be convex.
it’s definately convex.
convex
EMBOSSED
I would have to go with concave, it seems as if the back of the hand is being imprinted in the sand.
Convex in my sight, Extruded.
If the light is coming from about 3:30/4:00, it hits the wrist which is lighter, and the shadow falls past the fingers
I don’t see any way to see it as Concave unless you look at it and think the finger tips are laying in shadow rather than the shadows laying past them.
It’s concave.
Your brain tends to put light sources that cannot be directly seen on the top-right of a photo. Because the light source here is actually on the left (look at the shadow off the little piece of drift wood near the top right corner of the photo), your mind misinterpets the shadows. This may be easier to see if you rotate the photo 180 degrees.
its concave. much like the einstein face illusion.
It’s convex. From observing the small holes in the ground to the right it can be observeed that the light source also lies to the right. If it was concave then there would not be the dark shadow at the pinky finger side of the hand. From that observation it has to be convex, withstanding that there was no graphic editing(photoshop) involved or that the shodows are real and aren’t coloured in to fool the viewer.
The handprint is a depression. you can look at the items on the right and their shadows are cast to the right. The reason so many people think otherwise is because when the print was made, some sand was forces upward around the edge of the print, and as for the shiny part around the heel of the palm that is from the sand being particularly smooth.
in my opinion, its got to be convex. like somebody else said, when pressing in a handprint into the sand, you don’t get such details as the palm lines. also, take a look at the shadows to the right… in all of them, there is a big difference between the sun and shade. most of the posts that i’ve read above state that the shadows are on the right, thus the sun must be on the left and the hand is thus concave… however, this makes the assumption that all the little things to the right are themselves convex and thus would cast a shadow to the right with the sun on the left. However, if you think about it and look at the picture, it seems to me that all the shadows are being cast from concave holes rather than convex piles. There are several reasons that I believe this to be true: 1: This is at the beech… small round holes always occur, whether it be from people poking sticks, or rocks being moved. 2:Go to the beech yourself, and make a small hole in the ground and a small pile of sand. Then look at the shadows. With the hole, you’ll get a sharp contrast between shadow and light. With the pile, not so much. Since the surrounding sand is bright, even on the “dark side”, light gets reflected back, and for a pile, hits the dark side, thus making the shadows seem not as dark. For a hole, however, light does not get reflected into the shadow, since there is no line of sight with the other “bright sand”. You can also see a very sharp edge to the shadow line… this highly suggests them being holes in the ground, as if it was a raised pile, there wouldn’t be a sharp shadow line but rather a gradual gradiant as the pile fell back down on the far side, unless one side of the pile had a cliff. In which case, every little pile in the picture would need a cliff on the right side for the shadow to look like this. With a hole, however, you do get this sharp shadow line, as thats the point where, on one side of the line, light gets blocked by the lip of the hole coming down at an angle, and on the other side, light just above the lip goes into the hole.
Now, if you’re following what i’ve said above and agree with me that they’re holes on the right, then for the shadow to be on the right side, the sun has to be coming from the right side, as the lip causing the shade is closer to the sun than the shade is. Thus, since shadows on the hand are on the left of it rather than the right, this means the hand must be convex, sticking out of the sand.
Now if we assume that the hand is sticking out of the sand, lets confirm it. The shadows falling off the left of the hand do appear to be slightly lighter than the darker holes on the right of the image. This is supportive of the reflection part I stated above. Also, there is more of a gradient to the right side of the shadows, as would be expected from a rounded object sticking out with the sun at an angle. and looking at the bottom right part of the hand (the pad area below the thumb), we can see that it is brighter than the rest, because if the sun was on the right as we assumed, it would receive the most direct sunlight out of any part of the hand.
what steave said….
=^.^=
look at the objects next to it, they all have shadows on the right side, so light comes from the left…
Perhaps we are seeing the negative.
look at it upside down
does it change your mind
I see it as Convex. But, that’s me.
its wierd… by looking at the wrist, it is going in…but by looking at the fingers, it is going out…like i said before, its weird
embossed
compare the hand’s shadow with the other shadows on the sand.
i’ve seen an illusion like this before. it’s cocave but looks convex because of the position of the light and stuff like that. compare it to the other shadows in the picture.
wow pretty cool. but the stuff on the right….those are holes they dont have shadows, the light is coming from the right side and the shadow on the hand is on the left for people who said you can tell by the shadows on the stuff at the right. ha. i win!
no no no.. its concave. the sun is clearly coming from the left, as shown by the small pieces of sand at the right of the pic.. so what makes sense is that it is an impression, the shadow is along the edge walls, and there even looks like there is a bit of a raised lip
this sux… i have a headache trying to figure out what it look like, so i really dont know!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Either it’s concave and an easy thing to do, or convex and an amazing sculpture.
After careful study I will settle this once and for all.
the little yellowish stick in the upper right hand corner of the image clearly has it’s shadow falling to the right, so the sun is absolutly coming from the left side of the image.
Therefor the hand is concave, an impression pressed down into the sand.
hand is dug in to the ground, not sticking out
you can tell because the twigs and rocks on the right side of the picture have shadows to the right, while the hand shadow is to the left
It must be convex:
Look closely at the picture and you’ll see that there are many small bumps of sand whose shadows are all to the left, the same as the handprint, indicating that the handprint is a “bump”. Also look at the holes in the right side of the picture. Their shadows are to the right, the opposite of the handprint. So the hand can’t be a hole.
Look at the lines between the fingers. That would be almost impossible to reproduce in a concave print.
Do you remember when you stand at the water’s edge at the beach, and when the waves come they wash away some of the sand around your feet, but not the sand that you’re actually standing on? It leaves a convex print of your foot.
The sn would be almost directly overhead, which would mean that small things have shadows that are a bit different from bigger and wider things like this print.
this easy trick could be done many ways…i agrre its concave but you have to open your mind to the possibilities…it could have been sculpted or a photo trick…i think someone got a shallow pan or something put sand in it with water…made there hand pint turned it over and BAM…a concave hand outpirnt from the sand…
someone imprinted there hand in wet sand in a sallow bucket or pan and flipped it over…simple
jetuser you sound like a know it all,but i have no idea witch is witch,so i would say it is coming out(i think that is concave).
for me it’s embossed. just notice the shadows around the figure (e.g. the brown leaf/stick, and some stones.) they are to the right, so it means that the light comes from the left part so shadows must fall to the other side. =)
For all you people who keep saying it’s convex, yes, it is possible, but it would be so much easier to make the illusion out of a concave print. Forget shadows and which way the sun shines. Just do this:
VIEW THE IMAGE UPSIDE-DOWN!!!
It’s a concave image flipped.
Alright, the whole point of illusions like these is to see if your brain can perceive BOTH concave and convex. Therefore, the hand is both, it is just a matter of how your brain percieves it. It’s basic Psychology.
I know it is concave only because I know this trick. It defenatly apears to be convex.
At first, I could only see it as an imprint. After re-focusing, it looks as if it is embossed. This is amazing!
it looks convex but maybe it is just a good illusion and it’s actually concave… anyway, that’s not important. what really matters is that quite a few people here clearly do not know the difference between concave and convex. you have the internet. look it up!!!
i can see why people think that it is sticking out, and what steve said is very valid, although it is clearly pressed in the way, steve was saying that the “piles” on the left are in fact holes, but, look at the stick/twig above it…
it would be impossible to create a shadow like this if itr was below the surface. the light is clearly coming fromthe left, thus, the hand print is pressed in the way :)
btw, this was very hard for me 2 type as my name is also steve and it was morally wrong to contradict my namesake, but i did uit anyway :)
in conclusion, it is pressed in, but it does look like it is being pressed out, good illusion :)
I think it is convex, meaning it comes out of the sand. Based on the shadow arguements used earlier. The wrist part could have been created too for those of you who think is the reason to be an imprint. Some of you need to learn the difference between concave and convex cause you make arguements for the opposite reasons :P
It is definately coming OUT of the sand, I am 100% sure.
Look to the right of the picture, the pock marks in the sand have shadow on the right, and light on the left.If the light is coming from the right hand side, then the right side of the CONVEX hand will be light, and the left side of the CONCAVE dips will be light, as they are.
I see it as extruded but as with the spinning woman I’m sure I could see it both ways if I looked hard enough