Stare At The Dot. Which Way Do The Red Stripes Spin?

Here’s one of classic examples how our brain can easily be deceived. When you first look at the image below, red stripes seem to move in one direction only. Try focusing on the central dot… See how the stripes started moving in the opposite direction? You can repeat this process as many times you want, it works all the time! Enjoy!

99 Replies to “Stare At The Dot. Which Way Do The Red Stripes Spin?”

  1. Oddly enough I found that it seemed to switch back and forth. It would clockwise for a while, then switch and go counter clockwise for a bit, then back the other way…..

  2. same here, anon, i could practically tell it to go one way or another, not literally of course but i could say in my mind that ‘its going left’ or ‘its going right’ and it would look like it was going that way. youre right too neath, cause if you just look at the stripes they change direction.(also,if you move your pointer slowly over the stripes back and forth they seem to change direction

  3. well when I actually payed attention to it it did seem to go back and forth as if in a rocking motion, but in such a motion that it would spin half way left then half way right. Not making a complete circle on either side.

  4. I can control the red stripes! I say “Left” and they spin left!!!
    I am the master of red stripe!

  5. I have double vision and can see them moving in different ways at the same time. It is absolutely amaziing.

  6. anon ur right, its like a clock.
    if you want to hear tick instead of tock you hear tick! vise versa! THIS IS SO COOL, but im off 4 a pint

  7. They are just simply blinking lights going from red to white and back again making it seem like they are moving .

  8. yea… when u look at the stripes, they go one way, and once u stare at the dot for a sec or two, the stripes turn around the other way

  9. Its like if you try you can control it! THIS IS MY FAVORITE! (besides the evil ninja kung-fu karate bunny! lol)

  10. It does not matter which way they appear to be spinning. They will do so whatever way you follow them. If one of the spots was different than the rest then it would matter which way they appeared to spin.

  11. lol i forgot it was animated at first and al i thought was wow this is the best illusion ive ever seen, it really doe slook like is movin

  12. its not spinning!!! the red stripes are simply alternating places which gives the illusion of spinning. if you cover all but a small portion of the wheel (say about 3times the width of a red stripe) you can clearly see the alternating

  13. people! it is an animation. so, that means it does go one way. Try counting the seconds in between switches… it should be regularly spaced. That’s because they are only spinning one way at a time. It’s a gag

    1. You are very wrong. It is not spinning at all, just alternating between red and white, Our mind interprets it as spinning one way or the other.

  14. i found if you slightly moved your head right the wheel would turn clockwise and if you turned your head slightly to the left the opposite would happen

  15. also if you move your eyes back and forth over the top of the circle, it will move in that direction. I figured out how it works too! It really just blinks back and forth, giving the illusion that it’s moving.

  16. I noticed that it’s not so much willing. Be careful of your eyes. If your eyes stray even a little bit, it seems that it will move back to clockwise. I think you need to keep your eyes DEAD center on the dot, or else it won’t switch, or you’ll switch back and forth.

  17. i could see them spinning in either direction or just flashing, each rectangle alternating between red and white without looking in the middle

    … by the way i know they are not actually rectangles.

  18. if you make yourself go crosseyed then you can watch 2 circles spin in opposite directions….
    Tres cool

  19. If you say left it goes left because you THINK it goes left.
    when you make your head go to the right it GOES right because you think it does.

  20. This is cool because it isn’t switching back and forth by it self really it is your brain because I saw clockwise and forced my brain and saw counter- clockwise.

  21. I found moving anything would spin the image, moving your hand across the screen would spin it to the right / left, focusing from red to white could change direction, and inside my head I could change the way it spun, by simple commands. Also blinking changes it.

  22. nice..
    it might just be me but when the thing is spinning counter-clockwise it looks like the background color of the stripes turns slightly teal which i thought is really cool :D

  23. its obvious. THere is lots of red spokes and a white ring behind. These go opposite directions! You can tell because when you look at it carefully you can see it going in both directions. THe only this works is because you aren’t lookin for that you are looking for the change as you stare at the dot.

  24. okay, this is just me, but i think because there are 2 colours u think its moving in 2 directions, but in reality its only moving in one, i held something over a red shape going clockwise, and as others have put i ‘willed the shape’ to go anticlockwise, what i focused on when i willed it was the white shapes, and when i saw it go clockwise i focused on the red shapes, but thats just me.

  25. I know how they do this!!! The wheel isn’t really spinning, the red and white are just changing colours constantly so it could be moving in any direction as you want…i may be wrong but it makes sense!

  26. it’s going back and forth every 1 or 2 clicks but i can’t really will it any direction for more then like 6 clicks.

  27. I already have found the trick. It depends on the eye with which you look at it, with an eye one sees in a sense and with the tro one sees in the opposite sense. How does it work? Not, I said that alone wise the Turk!! XDDD

  28. How can I get a clock like this or just a wall piece. Does this come in a wallpaper? I love this one…

  29. Um. This is kind of a fake. If you stare at JUST one single red stripe for 6 seconds… you’ll notice that they all change direction after about 2 sections. So this isn’t an illusion in my book. Just a circle of rotating stripes that change direction and try to fool people into thinking they’re only going one way but “appear” to go different ways or something.

  30. Originaly Posted by Ices625 says:
    July 7, 2009 at 8:00 pm

    Um. This is kind of a fake. If you stare at JUST one single red stripe for 6 seconds… you’ll notice that they all change direction after about 2 sections. So this isn’t an illusion in my book. Just a circle of rotating stripes that change direction and try to fool people into thinking they’re only going one way but “appear” to go different ways or something.

    uhm no, that’s where the effect works idiot

    1. Uh no sir you are an idiot, if you keep swaying side to side you’ll notice it is an illusion not effect..idiot

  31. they don’t spin at all, they just blink from one to the other so they will spin whatever way you want them to

  32. @Hugglepuff is correct, they are not actually spinning, the colors are simply flashing from white to red and red to white. Our minds assume that something at that speed is spinning.

  33. lol nice try but total rip off lol it changes its own direction look at it first time for few seconds see waht way it moves look away for a few then look back its moving diffrent way lol nice one liar XD

  34. For those that thinks that the circles changes direction after some time they’re wrong. It’s your brain that fucks up. If you follow the red spots it continues to go to the right all the time how long you ever want it to. the same is with the white one. The only reason that we should look at the black dot in the middle is so that the white collour “changes” into a blue likely collour, in that way your brain/eyes start following the white/blue pieces instead of the red ones. but as soon you start looking at the red ones the circle starts “moving” the other again.
    I agree with Hugglepuff.
    I disagree with Woodcrow, Ices625.
    @HHHhhh : Nope.It doesn’t.

  35. seeing as there are only two colours, how can it be spinning anyway? it’s just flashing red, white, red, white etc.
    nice illusion :)
    i used to love watching christmas lights, because it looks like they move along the string of lights. even though it’s only flashing on and off, it’s still cool. :)

  36. One more thing about this illision: If you stare at it, the wheel color will change from red and white to light blue and red. Try it

  37. This is absolutely Fake.
    The image is in a gif (moving) format.
    Save the image as a bmp image and you iwll find that it does not move at all…
    Next time be careful…
    But its a great attempt to make it look like an Illusion….

  38. With my left eye they are going counter-clockwise and with my right they switch to going clockwise…. WHAT IS WRONG WITH MY SIGHT?!

    I love that illusion :)

  39. Also, for me, the white turns to like an aqua blue color.
    AND
    It changes directions depending which side of the picture you look at. xD

  40. If you watch the dot from the left side of the monitor it spins clockwise and if you look from the right side of your monitor the it spins anti clockwise

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