Just wanted to mention that I updated Google Earth category with some cool illusions from the past that can be seen in Google Earth or using web application, Google Maps. I would appreciate if you checked it, and post your thoughts on that category. Also, if you encounter any errors, be sure to drop me an email. Today illusion was submitted by Alexander Sell. He wrote: “At first I gotta say that I really like this page and the widget. The attached picture I found in Google Earth close to Frankfurt Airport in Germany. It looks like there are 3 planes (Boeing 747 !?) departing very close to each other. The distance between the 1st and the 3rd is less than 1 nautical mile which is far below the minimum allowed distance behind an aircraft that is classified as heavy. Of course it’s only one aircraft that was shot three times in a row by the satellite. Maybe this one fits to the Google Earth gallery.”

Google Earth,

(11 votes)

Luis Felipe Salazar Blanco sent in this cool black and white illusion he made with his digital camera. First I’d like to say, you have a cool name man! Second, I’ll let Felipe describe this submission himself: “I really love your internet site. I have your widget on Mac. I’m always checking it. Congratulations! And since I like it so much, I would love to participate. I took this picture of my wife the other day, it was accidental (the illusion). Its not obvious, but you might like it. She is looking into a pocket mirror, and on it we see her eye that she was pulling down. It looks like she is doing the “eye pulling” right on the image of her eye formed on the pocket mirror. Hope you like it.” I believe all of you got Felipe’s point, more short: it appears his wife is pulling her eye down, reaching inside the mirror. Very nice post, do you agree? Another cool black and white illusion can be found here. Check Flickr section for more cool optical illusions.

Scary Illusions,

(20 votes)

Long time ago those afterimages were quite popular. To my best knowledge, it all started with the original Jesus afterimage. Then another cool example I stumbled upon was USA Flag afterimage. I asked my readers to submit afterimage flags of their own countries, and received much responses back then. You can find all sorts of them inside the afterimage category. Today I decided to post Ronno’s and Leonardo’s submission. Ronno Das sent in national flag of India, while Leonardo sent Italian flag.

Here’s Leonardo’s description: “Hi Mighty, I’m Leonardo, I discovered your site 3 days ago….and i have to say that it is very beautiful and interesting…so I’ve put your gadget on my Google homepage…yesterday I saw England and Brasil flag afterimage…so I’ve soon thought that the flag of the football world champion might be here… here it is…” You can find Italian flag, right after the jump inside. The proper way to see them, is to stare at the center dot for one minute, and then when the image “burns” in your brain, quickly look at the white piece of paper, or wall and after few seconds, the real colored flag will appear. It may help to blink a little. Did you manage to see them? Post your findings!

Afterimages,

(17 votes)

Check out these two photos of painted cars. Aren’t they cool? It’s like body paint, only done on cars. I had two other examples in my April 2006 archives, gimme a sec to dig them up… Ah, here they are – Painted Van was the first one I posted. The other one is pretty much the same, but this time bus was used as a canvas: Two Buses illusion. Then there were funny versions of this. I really like how realistically these were done. From the distance, you actually think there’s two vehicles, one parked in front of the other. Off course all of them are peanuts, compared to painted trucks. Watch out, the link to painted trucks points to photoshopped images (which I didn’t realize back then), but the winner ideas were made in real-life as well. You can see them here: real painted trucks.

Another category was successfully updated today. This time it’s our under-rated transportation category. Even I often forget about it, and don’t update it as much as I should. Never the less, I just checked it while modifying it, and remembered myself about some pretty cool illusions that were there all the time. You should definitely see it, and you can also comment which category you like the best!

Transportation,

(30 votes)

Hehe, just stumbled upon this funny picture. I’m sure that all of you who attended elementary school understand this, since the illusion occurred because of simple physics. The water acts as a magnifying glass, it reflects, and also breaks light beams. If you didn’t knew this by now, you can learn it through our user posted comments in Bent Pencil illusion. Basically this illusion is almost identical to Small Heads article. Concerning the site, I’m optimizing it as we speak, so you may notice some small design changes in following hours. Nothing to worry about. I also updated the Escher Style section, so be sure to check it if all links work properly and then report your findings. I’ll probably post some more illusions today if I get time to do so. In the mean time browse through our galleries, since many of the posts have been edited and new illusions added. I just remembered this one. Like it very much!

Relative Sizes,

(17 votes)

I found this optical illusion through my Google Alerts email, and noticed it’s pretty interesting. At first you may miss the illusion, but if you watch carefully the center of the brown “dot”, you will notice that it appears to be expanding. The effect by its nature, is quite opposite from other illusion located in disappearing effect section (which I updated just now), but it works in the same way. Just think of it like this – the center blurred spot isn’t vanishing, rather expanding, but the outer yellow surrounding is slowly shrinking (disappearing). This is the reason why I placed it in the same category. You may want to check stronger examples like vanishing haze, but you should also visit expanding cushion and expanding block that aren’t much similar, yet they also seem to expand.

Color Adapting,

(23 votes)

I noticed that for over a year now, one of our most visited optical illusions on this page is original Scary Illusion. Illusions from scary section perform very well actually. Am not sure why, though. It was one of my first posts in the early days of this site, and I don’t know exactly why I put it online in the first place. Its even not an illusion, but more like a prank. Just my thoughts, ignore me.

Ok, I got these 3 art works from my friend who is professional internet surfer. I don’t know the original artist’s name, but I’m sure I’ve seen similar versions of this before. Where multiple animals or people make one complete image or portrait. As you can see, the first image and second two can be seen in multiple ways. What did you saw first? An old man’s portrait, or a peasant on a horse? I saw the old man first. Share your opinion about these illusions. Don’t forget to jump inside this article to see full collection.

Another thing; I see many negative comments lately, but you have to understand it’s not easy to post best optical illusion every day. Thousand of them are already posted on this site, and it’s getting harder and harder to find the very good ones. I can assure you that everything I post on Mighty Illusions is in some way connected to illusion arts or visual phenomena. Other extras include games, tests and toys, but these sections should be considered as an easter eggs, to give you more options when you’re feeling bored.

Multiple Meanings, Octavio Ocampo

(23 votes)

So, what’s been happening lately. As you might have noticed, our pages are back in Google index, after some problems we had previous week. Also, you can now again submit our articles to digg or stumble-upon them easily. We had some banning issue in the past with digg, but that is sorted out now. So if you have a spare second, you can vote for us. I took my free time and updated Color Adapting section, so be sure to check all those cool illusions posted there. I’d also like to mention we continue building our links exchange, and Myspace Layouts site freecodesource.com is our newest exchange. If you also have high trafficked website, and would like to do premium sitewide link exchange with Mighty Illusions, be sure to contact me. Now let’s go with today’s illusion:

You’ll probably think “what does sand has in common with optical illusions?” Not much, I agree. But what you see below isn’t only sand. There is something camouflaged in the photo below. Can you see the hidden life form I am referring to? I know I pointed out coffee bean man before, but this one is very similar in my opinion. For another similar illusion, be sure to see camouflaged girl.

Spot The Object, Transparent,

(22 votes)