By Vurdlak on February 5, 2010, with 187 Comments
Ever seen something so dumb, that it’s actually good? If you don’t know what I’m talking about, you obviously missed Evil Dead trilogy, and haven’t seen a single SNL episode. Well, when I opened my mailbox to see some optical illusion trends, I was amazed to see how popular this photo became in such a short notice. It still bugs me, but I decided to share it with you! Could this instead be the most complex magic trick ever? I surely doubt so… Watch how this dude pulls an optical illusion, sort off.
(150 votes)
Is it just a blob on the ground beside him?
What’s the big deal? The guy is standing next to a wet spot on the sidewalk on a cloudy day.
i’d say its just an oil spot on the ground? it does however look like a shadow.. good pick
Come on.. This is a new low. A dude standing next to an oil spot on the road on a cloudy day is an illusion? Do you maybe have a different one you can post before too many people see this one?
And yes, I enjoyed the evil dead trilogy and the OLD SNL’s.
when you just glance at it it looks like he is levitating but when you look closer you will see that he is just standing next to a dark spot on the ground
Cool! Very clever, and in Google gadget you can see the illusion better…
lol this is my first ever post
it is ment to look like he is floating but it is pretty obvious to spot, lol
This photo actually works better when in widget size. Once opened to full size the illusion is lost.
read tags: “Tags: Comedy, Dude, Fly, funny, Illusion, Levitation”
What are people complaining about? This illusion is cool because it’s so simple. You’re all just angry because you didn’t think of it yourself… And now I want to try it :)
i was staring at it until i saw it! i looks like he’s standing on a small bulge in the roead!
Kathy, youre right
I opened a random illusion of yours and it turned out to be one of those ‘scare you with a sudden pop-out monster face’ type of low-taste juvenile thing. You know what? I trusted you! Now I have second thought. I am deleting your web site from my bookmark.
It’s a pretty cool double-take sort of illusion when your not expecting an illusion. Not quite on a par with Evil Dead, but maybe as not great as SNL is on a bad week.
Actually the trick only works precisely because it isn’t sunny, so no natural shadow is present, which would have prevented the optical illusion from working. I LIKE it. Very creative.
The small version through iGoogle makes it look like he’s floating, but as soon as you see the larger one on this page you can’t even tell it’s supposed to be anything special.
its so cool, easy to spot but really really cool
XD
It’s so bad, it’s good…exactly like the Evil Dead serious you mentioned.
it looks better at a distance, but it’s still nothing fantastic.
Is in Romania :)
Must be a Dracula son :)
Wow! the famous “spot in the road illusion”.COOL!!
Variety is the spice of life and we take the good with the bad and all those other cliches.
This one was worth looking at for the laugh-thanks for that!
It looks pretty decent in the smaller picture before you open the link, but once the bigger picture is there it’s clearly just a puddle of some sort.
This is about as stupid as anything you have ever posted. I saw a dude standing next to a spot, and it didn’t look a thing like he was hovering above it.
Maybe you should just skip posting some of this borderline crap that gets through from time to time.. You don’t HAVE to post a new one everyday..
Quality of Quantity.
You haters need to calm down. It’s a funny joke!
But
- Yeah the juvenile “sudden pop up screamer” illusions need to go.
- iriso i think you were going for “quality OVER quantity”? and this is a refreshing change of pace. lighten up.
Keep up the good work man, but delete the screamers
Awesome just brilliant. Simple yet effective and I bet you all fell for it immediately, granted you are all right, it is easy to spot its not real after a second. Keep it up.
If you guys think it’s a cloudy day, look at the stroller and the shadow underneath it.
I’d like to apologize for the negative tone of my previous post. Inspired by other posts, I shrank down the picture to 50%, and they were right, the quality of the illusion is better when the picture is smaller. As it is, the picture is too big to completely fit on my screen. It takes away something of the illusion when you have to scroll down to see the whole picture. Although it is obvious how the illusion is done, it is somewhat clever.
For some reason the size of the picture makes a big difference. The small picture in the sidebar is quite convincing, the large picture on the website is very unconvincing.
I wonder why? My guess is its the extra detail you can see in the surface of what he is standing on that makes the difference.
Excellent!
lol
so simple yet good on an igoogle gadget
Are y’all Seriously upset about this? This is pretty funny. It’s so simple, but someone had to think outside of the box for this one. Y’all see a puddle, I see a man floating.
Geez how do y’all follow this wonderful site and not think out side of the box.
I agree with Anon, Delete the posts that are just people screaming at you, because you think our of the box. You do wonderful work here, don’t listen to them.
Illusion definitely works when viewed in smaller size, looks like the guy is levitating. Don’t understand why you have to blow up the photo 100% and get disappointed.
I think you all are just being too serious. It’s a simple, effective illusion. I rate a five out of five.
I went through all of the 186 pages of illusions, and after a while, you just have to say to yourself… Yeah, I’ve seen that before like a hundred-dozen times or so.
I mean really, once you see a sidewalk chalk drawing using vanishing points created in the viewfinder of a camera, the Twisted Triangle Illusion, the Offset Checkerboard Illusion, and the Endless Staircase for the billionth time… you’ve pretty much have had your fill.
You should really prune the duplicate images and photos that show the same trick/illusion. It’s not worth going through nearly 200 pages when close to 50% are duplicates.
And yeah, I have to agree with iriso, you don’t need to add a new illusion daily. Just update if it’s definatly something you’ve never presented before in any way, shape or form, ever before.
And you would do good if you were to knuckle down and edit the pages to delete duplicates, and the red X boxes… If you published a book, an editor would make you do it, simply because it’s too redundant.
Love the site. Hope you find some new stuff soon. Thanks for the good times. Keep it up, because I’m a big fan!
Wolfie
Ehm… people… why doesn’t anyone notice the fact that everything else in the picture DOES have a shadow?!?
I have no doubt it’s a wet spot, but there’s obviously something wrong with his shadow…
I didn’t see the illusion at all, but when i finally did it was a laugh.
You post whatever you want on your site, V, it’s all good. We, as readers, can’t expect every post to be stunning and complain when we think they’re not.
you guys are either really picky or just plain have no imagination. this is a great illusion! the spot looks like a shadow! look, i know it’s incredibly simple, but that’s what makes it so great. the guy took something that was probably already there and made a really funny photo out of it. most people would have seen that spot and said, “oh, look an oil spot in the road”. this guy saw a photo opportunity. he took something mundane and made it original. i call that creativity.
PS: Vurdlak, please ignore these haters and keep posting things like this.
this is good, made me laugh XD
Great illusion!!!!
I like it. So simply made and a cool and creative idea. I agree the illusion works better when the picture size is smaller.
You don’t need such amazing painting skills to make something cool. :)
Simple, yet still cool!
It does look like he’s floating, from where I’m standing. I like it. Thanks.
photoshopped! :-P
Yes the guy is standing near a blob or sort of something.
The idea was to pretend you are floating The trick was, try to get the right time of the daylight so you wont cast any shadow. It can be done in photoshop or get the right lighting.
Great job guy!
If i look in the small picture i see a guy kind flying. heheheh
As soon as the picture get big i can see the wet spot. hauhauaha
That was really funny.
I like it ^_^
Keep the good work.
If i look in the small picture i see a guy kind flying. heheheh
As soon as the picture get big i can see the wet spot. hauhauaha
That was really funny.
I like it ^_^
That is a dumb, stupid puddle next to him
I don’t know. Of course from the beginning I knew it couldn’t be real, but it took me a long time to see that he wasn’t floating! Very simple, yet so great.
i liked it! so simple but it works
he is standing on something look closley to his feet
so shitty, i noticed it in a matter of 2.5 seconds
i think hes suppose to be “hovering”
yes, in the widget size it looks great, but once you open it to full size it doesn’t have the same effect
im not bashing but seriously tthe windows 7 gagdet is miles better for this 1
OK sooo its works when its small but… once u magnify it its sooooo obvious. i mean i guessed it before I opened it… its cool though would have NEVER thought of it on my own
He is just standing next to a smudge that looks like the shadow of his feet. So it looks like he is floating.
hes stepping on the floor but theres a black spot thats supposed to be a shadow
he’s standing on the pavement
and then has drawn a black blob closer to the camera
and then taken the picture
so it looks like he’s levitating
he wet himself
That illusion is almost as good the the one we see everytime we “think” we see something fall. You probably won’t beleive this absolutely and utterly amazing truth . . . EinsteinReality.com
Why doesn’t he have a shadow?
uhh you people are life noobs, he just photoshopped his shadow out and either drew that stain on the concrete or pissed it there. fuck this dumb shit, and all of you for being so dumb you guys probably think chris angel has magic powers. kill yourselves.
http://i.imgur.com/OjRCx.jpg this one is like it if you cant tell the yellow frisbee is on the ground
No Photoshop, it is an overcast day with exposure cranked up to give a daylight like brightness, but the sun is diffuse enough no shadow is visible. It is wonderful because it does thoroughly fool the eye for a fraction of a second. If you look away and glance back and then away again for about half of one second the man looks like he is hovering. When you have time to digest the details the illusion soon flattens out. I would classify this as a transitory illusion vs. a steady state illusion, which is what we are used too.
i wonder were his real shadow is
hehe.only after 2 minutes i realised that the photo was taken in the center of my hometown (Iasi,Romania).
were can i see video?
duh hes standing on the ground…………
the shadow MAKES it look like hes floating
Too bad that you notice that he’s just standing to a spot on a road instead of hovering, it pretty much ruins it.
if u see he is standing on the side walk and the dark spot that looks like his shadow is actually painted to look like he is floating
oily spot
its obvious he is standing on the ground and the “shadow” is like some water or something next to him
he drew the circle on the ground, then moved up from it
like:
(Key: |=person, o= shadow)
|
o
so, the shadow is fake.
i agree..its an oil spot or something but it looks like he’s floating from the position the picture was taken
Ohh Shit this photo is from my city , Iasi from Romania !
so simple
@sexyboy Quick notice, that’s called the ground.
though it’s taken in my hometown, i have to say it’s a fail.