Up-till now, visual design of Mighty Optical Illusions was done by myself. Obviously, it didn’t take very long before I’ve reached my limits. For a control-freak and detail-obsessed person I am, admitting this wasn’t the easy part. Yet it helped tremendously in freeing myself and in finding the right person to do it. It was about time to outsource design to a professional!

Before I introduce the proposed idea, and go live with our new identity, there are still some minor details to be polished. Still, I’d REALLY appreciate to hear your thoughts and suggestions! So here it goes – below you may find the early mockup of our new appearance. What do you make of it? Be sure to open the template in full size before you make up your mind. I still haven’t decided should we keep the grayish header bar (reserved for advertisement), as well as the current logo suggestion? How about the general feel? What would you add/change? Looking forward to hear your opinion! …Oh, almost forgot to mention the illusion above – it appears there is one continuous black and white spiral, while in fact there are many concentric circles inside!

Click on the template above to open it in full size!

Onto the illusion now! The strange Atomium-like impossible object below was created by Pawel Hynek in 2006. I bet you would have hard time constructing something similar on your own! After a while you get used to the idea this thing can’t exist on it’s own, and how it was probably brought to life in digital environment. Never the less, I admire the hyper-realistic result Pawel achieved. Does it remind you of a famous Brussels Atomium monument (this one)? BTW: The Atomium monument was originally built for Expo ’58 (1958 Brussels World’s Fair). Designed by André Waterkeyn, the monument consists of nine steel spheres connected so that the whole forms the shape of a unit cell of an iron crystal magnified 165 billion times!! The sculpture stands 102 meters (335 ft) tall.

Now, I wouldn’t want to draw any unnecessary attention, asking all them security questions (lol), yet young engineer-problem-solver minds are always curious and strive for knowledge in diverse fields :D Having such a big audience can actually be a mighty tool – just like that time we got insight into Free Masonry, which basically translates to networking/philanthropy brotherhood for what I could sum it up to(?). Anyhow, sorry for pulling you off the illusion course for a moment – won’t happen again… So, can you decide which of the police officers below is the biggest? You might be surprised what comes out of it, specially if you own Photoshop or some tools to inspect…

The head master, who attended school in England says that American schools no longer focus on character – despite the fact that the country was founded on the belief than anyone who worked hard and kept trying, despite failure could become a success. He explains:

People who have an easy time of things, who get 800s on their SAT’s, I worry that those people get feedback that everything they’re doing is great. And I think as a result, we are actually setting them up for long-term failure. When that person suddenly has to face up to a difficult moment, then I think they’re screwed, to be honest. I don’t think they’ve grown the capacities to be able to handle that.

As a result, Randolph tries to encourage his teachers to instill values like grit, character and gratitude into students rather than just drilling them to perform well on tests. He even has meetings with parents, urging them to let their children fail on occasion so they can learn how to turn that disappointment into a life lesson that will improve their character and future success.

The New York Times has a fascinating profile on Randolph and his philosophy for improving student’s lives. It also features these excellent anamorphic tape illusions that were used to illustrate Randolph’s measure of character throughout the article.

The pieces were completed by the Doyle Partners advertising company and they are just as cool as the profile on a head master who is redefining success in school.

For a little perspective, here are the images from other angles where you can’t read them as easily.

As time goes our readership grows, and you might be surprised if I told you how many new faces arrive here each day – Those are the people that have just recently learned of this site. It’s normal for them to feel little lost when they arrive here, thus why it’s so important for me to have illusion categories, random illusion button and so many underlined (related) illusions in each one of my texts put in center of attention.

I felt this needed to be explained, as I get daily inquires why there are so many references to old stuff – it’s easier to discover earlier content this way, that is my humble opinion. BTW, I’d also like to remind all of you using iGoogle on regular basis to add our “Optical Illusion of The Day” gadget if you still haven’t …you may also download our regular desktop versions! I think it’s the best way to stay updated with new stuff Mighty Optical Illusions comes up with (almost) each day. Now for the promised illusion video:

Horsemanning is actually an example of everything old becoming new again. While the trend has been exploding across the net, it actually was a big fad in 1920′s photography. The process is pretty basic: arrange two people so one person’s head can’t be seen and the other person’s head is the only part of their body that can be seen. In the twenties, this was a popular way to imitate the headless horseman from The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.

The modern incarnation of the trend started when someone found the image below at a flea market and then uploaded it on to the net.

Being as how planking and owling both peaked in popularity shortly before this image came out, it’s not too surprising that the trend became huge immediately. It even has its own Facebook fanpage and homepage. What do you guys think of the fad, is it fun? Funny? Or just plain stupid?

Also, have you ever taken goofy illusion photos like this at home?

Well, whether or not you believe his story that says he was completely unaware of the hacking, and whether or not you believe he deserved getting hit by a pie during his testimony in the House of Commons, it’s hard to deny that there’s something a little mischievous about him. Fortunately, thanks to a specialized news camera that is designed to show people in their true form, we now know what Rupert Murdoch has been hiding for years -his demonic nature.

Ok, so maybe it’s just a strange camera angle that caught a humorous view of the media celebrity, but the horns illusion is still surprisingly fitting for the old man. What do you guys think, is the camera operator trying to tell us something?

Did you know that Octavio Ocampo is one of Mexico’s most prolific artists? I’m not sure we ever talked about him in details, yet I feel it’s important to know he is very well known for his evocative paintings in which detailed images are intricately woven together to create larger images. This is what Octavio Ocampo terms as metamorphic style. By now you should already be able to recognize illusions we featured, which were done by Ocampo. I’ve added the cropped thumbnail just so that you don’t miss the “hidden” details in this one. The rare full-size original may be seen below.

Now that we covered the important part, let me share some important news. As you see I’m doing some major improvements on this site lately. Unfortunately, not always do things go smooth. Luckily, Jill is helping me with the content so I’m given more time to concentrate on the technical part. Before I can proceed with more upgrades, I need you to help me by answering these few (short) questions:

• I believe the “random illusion” button is finally fixed. Is it working correctly for you? Does it bring you to a new random illusion each time you click it?

• Some of our users have reported annoying pop-up ads. As I never allowed those, I think I have identified and disabled them. Do you still encounter misbehaving or ugly adds? Please send me some screenshots at vurdlak@gmail.com if yes, so I can investigate further!
• One of our visitors reported he has been redirected to some spammy “Mac Defender” website. Has this happened to you in the past day or two?

• Few days ago, there has been caching technology implemented to our site. Do you see any improvement in speed when you open this site? Is there something you still find buggy?

• What is the main thing you dislike on moillusions.com, something that makes you not want to visit this site again?

As for my interest in illusions, well, I’d say that stems from my fascination with art. After all, to some extent all visual art is an illusion being as how it is really just a pictorial representation of something else. Art revolves around one’s perception of the world around them and illusions are nothing more than selective use and distortion of perception.

That being said, I am a particularly big fan of mural art and when public works of art become illusions, the effect is simply fascinating. These particular examples come from the Bayview subway station in Toronto. They were created by Panya Clark Espinal. The most impressive aspect is their anamophic properties that ensure they can only be accurately perceived from specific angles.

That’s probably enough of an introduction for now, I’m sure we’ll get to know each other better as my time on the site goes on. I am greatly looking forward to sharing more great illusions with you and if you have any you’d like to share with me, please feel free to email me at contact@jillharness.com.

Also, a special thanks to Andrew Willman for the photos of the stair and ladder illusions.

It’s based on the WPtouch Pro theme by BraveNewCode. Unfortunately I had to pay for the service, but I believe it’s worth every penny. The install went pretty much straight-forward, and the level of customization it provides is amazing.

To see the new mobile version, just go to moillusions.com on any touch-screen mobile device. I’ll be improving on the design in the coming weeks, so be sure to report your findings and share what you think of it in the comments. Here are some screenshots taken with iPhone and Samsung. Also, I would deeply appreciate if you could send some more of off your device. I will then include them inside this gallery!

Anyway, check out how perspective plays with us in the following photo! The soldiers appear so close to each other, yet the difference in their size suggest different! BTW, there is a bonus Easter-Egg animation called “Superman Experience” hidden somewhere inside this article… let’s see how many of you can find it ;D

I invite all of you using Google Chrome to give our best yet extension a try! It’s free, speedy, fully secure, and gives you life-time access to new optical illusion each day. If you feel like helping, I would deeply appreciate you giving our extension some quality rating in Chrome directory (here). Of course, only if you like it enough. First time you run it, it may takes few seconds to set itself, but this goes only for first run. Click below to get our newest gem, and feel free to post your thoughts and experience with it! Don’t wait – get it now!

Below you may see a screenshot of the plugin, as well as it’s description in Chrome apps directory. Click on the “Install” button below or above, and follow the procedure. You can have it installed in seconds from now, and receive daily optical illusions for rest of your life! Best of all – IT’S FREE!