Meteor Crater Optical Illusion

Here’s an illusion I received from Alexis Monnerot, which was just finished on the morning 21st of September. Located in front of the Montparnasse railway station in Paris, France this hyper-realistic 3D chalk drawing greatly reminds one of Julian Beever and his epic installments. I’m not exactly sure about the author behind this installment, but I’m sure Alexis will enlighten us in her comments!

And as we mentioned comments, remember how I recently improved the discussion section with the ability for you to add pictures inside them? Well, as of recently it seems you have started using this option much more frequently. It provides me with great joy to see how people began contributing more intensely. For example, it seems there is a new trend among you – outlining solutions and posting related illusions directly inside your comments! This was my intention in the first place when I originally imagined this website! If at some point in the past you have asked yourself how come I rarely post solutions to the illusions – I secretly hoped in time our community will evolve and start contributing by itself. Seems we are on a right trail of reaching this right now. My next idea would be to add some kind of voting system to your comments, so that the best voted comments would jump up first. In time, I imagine it would come to that, that a particular comment holding the solution (image attachment or related illusion pic) would rank best. What do you think of this idea? (Just me brainstorming out loud…)

33 Replies to “Meteor Crater Optical Illusion”

  1. I got it.s its a flat picture drawn. you can tell because if you look on the outer part, where the pattern is criss cross, then look on the inner pattern of it. See the criss cross?

  2. This is very clever and I really like it… but a crater that wide would generate a lot of heat – needs more burning and smouldering!

  3. Julian Beever realized this in memory of the AZF explosion, an explosion which happened in Toulouse the 09/21/01 and destroyed lot of homes, schools, etc.
    The Montparnasse Station is the place in Paris where trains leaves for Toulouse.

  4. I’d like the presentation of these kinds of illusions to show the result from two different camera angles. That way, the understanding of how these are actually done would be far more clear.

  5. Nice illusion, but it raises a question. Do you need to be in a specific spot to view this or does it still work if you are on the other side of the drawing eg over by the man with the suitcase? Any thoughts?

  6. I am not really that pleased with this one… we have seen much better 3D chalk drawings on here… Sorry but this one is just not that great. :(

  7. Love these chalk drawings. It’s really cool when optical illusions and art meet in public spaces. Wish I could be there to do some people watching as they react to the meteor impact.

    In unrelated news, thank you to the creator of this website for all of their daily efforts. I think the voting system is a great idea. The reason I found this site was so I could better explain to my students how our sense of sight is limited/flawed, and how our brain has to “make-up” a lot of information on its own. And of course, how the brain doesn’t always get it right. But, I’ve found that I’ve continued to visit since that time because of the large diversity of interesting illusions which are constantly added. Thank you.

  8. Wow this is really cool that looks so real you’d think that it is really a big hole that hit the ground I hope to see more of these cool chalk drawings that will be so cool if you came here and did that in New Zeland and this looks like a really cool trick to play on som eone when they make you mad

  9. Wow this is truely amazing!! i am certainly gonna WOW my art teacher!! thanks alot!! if only we were certain who the srtist behind this is ..

  10. not the best i’ve seen but fantastic anyhow.i can see a lot of work has gone into it.i’m no critic, i can’t draw a straight line or a bent one if i tried. 10/10

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