For example, look what Deviant artist megaossa has managed to come up with! Most interesting part is how I discovered his illusion gallery accidentally, thanks to our Facebook channel.

When I recently started promoting our FB page, I have secretly hoped for a critical mass, where at some point, good illusions and great talent would spontaneously find their way and reach us! Could it be that we have reached that point?

But let us return back on the topic. If I asked you, would you be able to spot all of the illusions in megaossa’s portfolio? For example, are you able to see the baby inside the below photo? Do you find this real-life version or the original Baby Tree Illusion better?

What you probably knew from before – Dove (domesticated Rock Pigeon, usually white in color) is a traditional Christian symbol of love and peace. According to the biblical story, after the flood, a dove was released by Noah in order to seek for land. When it returned back to Ark carrying an olive leaf in its beak, it then became clear to Noah that somewhere out there, flood has withdrawn and land has emerged!

So, in spirit of Christmas, no matter which faith you belong to (and even if you don’t care much about religion), I wish you all a peaceful and merry Christmas! Stay well my friends, and be sure to remember -one person DOES make a difference. Only those “foolish” enough to think they can change the world, end up changing it!

I’m not sure whether this artist was more influenced by Sandro Del Prete’s opus or works done by famous Octavio Ocampo, but those of you following this website for some time will immediately notice the resemblance! Just like Sandro, Oleg’s works usually feature a portrait of famous personalities. Go through the gallery below and see how many of them can you recognize. Van Gogh, Sigmund Freud and Salvador Dali are just few among dozens.

With works like these, it’s sometimes hard for the author to balance the weight of both images. Personally, I’m more fond of illusions where the “constructed”, 2nd image is more subtile. Oleg on the other hand, does quite opposite – The second image is so easily observable in some paintings, that you can actually miss the first one consisting of harmless landscape or characters in different settings. What you have to do then, is observe the painting more closely to actually see the initial setting and not concentrate on the faces. True skill of such artist is then evaluated by the fact how well did he construct the illusion, and whether the parts of landscapes constructing the illusion have useful part in the original setting. Artists often trap themselves by forcefully adding elements needed to construct the illusion, which don’t actually play their part well in the original setting. In my opinion, Oleg has mastered the technique just like Sandro did, and each part in his paintings seamlessly works in both images, the first “apparent” one, as well as the “hidden” illusory one. So, how many faces did you recognize? Which of his paintings did you like the most?

Research shows that only 12% of people actually follow through with their resolutions and complete the goals they set for themselves at the beginning of the year. Everyone else gives up at some point in the year, often before January even runs out.

Fortunately,  artist James Kuhn is one of the dedicated 12% who actually completes his goals. And his goal is something we can all enjoy. In 2008, he challenged himself to create a new face painting every day and then photograph them and upload them to his website. Even after the year was over, James kept working on his art project, although not at such a fervent pace. These days, he has over 2000 images on his Flickr stream, most of which are face paintings.

These aren’t your every day spider-on-the-cheek-face paintings, these are elaborate and artistic body paintings that took hours to prepare. The results speak for themselves. In fact, Vurdlak already unknowingly posted some of this artist’s work on the site before. BTW – Let me just warn you that some of the Kuhn’s face paintings in below gallery turned out somewhat disturbing!

Here are some notes about Tom French:

His works are predominantly figurative. He carefully combines detailed photorealism with strong elements of abstraction and surrealism, focusing on the reflection of the conscious and subconscious mind. French’s work often treads the fine line between the beautiful and unsettling, combining technically tight, classical charcoal drawings with carefree, loose and ostensibly unfinished abstract forms. By fusing the technical with lively abstraction French brings life and movement to his compositions. His work seamlessly merges the use of academic tradition with contemporary urban realism.

I have to say, I think the girl illusion above is way stronger than the boy one below. The man with the beard on the boy’s cup is much harder to see than any of the other characters, mostly because of his weirdly wrinkled brow.

Of course, if you require a little inebriation prior to being able to see your illusions, you might consider skipping the glasses and going right to the bottle. This Before & After beer can help remind you just what might happen if you down a few too many bottles.

Here’s to hoping none of your night’s events end up looking quite so drastically different by the light of day!

One of the most famous non-divine examples of this phenomenon was the Old Man of the Mountain located in The White Mountains of New Hampshire. If you were wondering why I chose to say “was” instead of “is,” it’s because the Old Man is no more after the face fell from the cliff side in May of 2003. Even so, the face is still remembered by all of the world and it was such a major part of New Hampshire’s identity that it was used as the image on their state quarters that were released in 2000.

Here’s a composite image of the Old Man of the Mountain before and after the rock face crumbled.

If you’re looking for a similar natural illusion that is still standing, you can always head to Ebihens, France and explore the much less famous Apache Head in the Rocks pictured here.

Do any of you guys know other places where you can find human faces in nature?

As you see Alexandre… or Andy Wall-hole if you will (which is the nickname Alex earned himself), carves incredible face portraits into the bricks and mortar of buildings. DailyMail reports how Alex has peppered the walls and sides of old buildings around his native Lisbon with an impressive selection of portraits, where he hopes his “faces in the city” will inspire people and make them see beyond what meets their eyes.

But Alex (23) hasn’t confined his work solely to Lisbon. His etchings can be found on buildings across Europe. He added:

With my work, I try to delve into the several layers that compose the edifice of history, to take the shadows cast by this model of uniform development to try to understand what lies behind it. 

Logically, each of Alex’s works depends on the size of the wall or surface he’s about to work with, where a two-storey building can take him a whole day to complete. Also, Alex added how most of his art is done on derelict facades and buildings which should somewhat calm the authorities down.

Pictures © curtsy of CATERS NEWS AGENCY

I understand how my English can sometimes sound crippled, specially in situations that require in-depth explaining. So I apologize once again, but also thank you for all of the warm feedback regarding my diploma!

Btw, to show you how important all of your suggestions and bug reports are, I’ve fixed the mobile theme’s width (be sure to check this site on your smartphones and report your experience). I’ve also included the “Next Random Illusion” button at the footer of each article in our mobile version :) …oh, and for today’s post – I just hope it doesn’t need any additional explanation (hint).

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?

For the illusion, it’s pretty similar to the one we already had. Those flowers on your right are much more then just flowers. At least from what I have seen. Can you spot the illusion(s) yourself? Where is it?

BTW, how do you like Jill’s posts? In my view she got hang of it very quickly! I believe she’ll manage to develop even deeper connection with you guys in the following days, and perhaps even present you with some of her fresh ideas for this site!

Created by Gianni Sarcone, Courtney Smith and Marie-Jo Waeber, Venetian mask below holds an interesting secret! Before we begin, I’d like to ask if you notice anything special in it? Observe carefully! Now if I told you how surprising number of people miss noticing that the main component of the mask is actually composed of two distinct faces – a man and a woman kissing one another, how would you react? Apparently, once the viewer discerns two individual faces, his/her brain will flip between two possible interpretations of the mask, making the viewer perceive two faces or one face in alternation. This kind of illusion, where the viewer experiences two equally possible interchangeable stable states in perception, is called bistable illusion. If you weren’t able to see the two lovers, you may find the solution here.

© 2011 Gianni Sarcone, Courtney Smith & Marie-Jo Waeber