Illusions

Adapt

Flickering pattern demonstrating visual adaptation to flicker
Adaptation to Flicker
Colored pattern that produces a color afterimage when stared at
Color Afterimages
Gradient ramp pattern demonstrating a motion or tilt aftereffect
Ramp Aftereffect
Outlined star shape used to demonstrate contour adaptation
Contour Adaptation
Sawtooth pattern demonstrating the moving saw teeth illusion
Moving Saw Teeth

Colour and Brightness

Pattern demonstrating how the two eyes combine brightness signals
Binocular Brightness
Diamond shape illusion involving perceived colour or brightness
Diamond Illusion
Rapidly alternating pattern demonstrating brightness flicker perception
Flicker
Image illustrating how shadows affect our perception of colour and pattern
Fashion and Shadows
Coloured pattern illustrating differences in colour vision between humans, infants, and fish
How Babies and Fish See Colors
Heart shapes that appear to flutter or vibrate due to colour contrast
Fluttering Hearts
Negative colour image that reveals a positive afterimage when viewed
Negative World

Motion

Animated bars that appear to speed up and slow down like footsteps
Footsteps
Concentric rings that appear to rotate due to motion contrast
Rotating Rings
Pattern demonstrating second-order motion, perceived through contrast rather than luminance
Second-Order Motion
Animated bicycle spokes demonstrating rotational motion illusion
Bicycle Spokes
Pattern showing how a stationary object appears to move when its surroundings move
Induced Movement
Moving pattern that causes a perceived shift in the position of a static object
Motion-Based Position Shift
Animated pattern where edges are defined purely by motion
Kinetic Edges
Dotted lines that produce a misleading sense of motion direction
Dotty Lines
Pattern illustrating the conflict between local and global motion signals
Local and Global Motion
Animated pattern in which elements appear to trickle or drift downward
Trickle Effect
Two lines resembling chopsticks that demonstrate a motion-based perceptual illusion
Chopsticks Illusion
Striped zebrafish-inspired pattern used to study motion perception
Zebrafish
Grooved pattern demonstrating illusory peripheral motion in furrow-like structures
Furrow Illusions
Zigzag pattern that produces an illusion of directional or oscillating motion
ZigZag
Pattern demonstrating reverse-phi motion, where brightness reversals cause apparent backward movement
Reverse Phi
Four-stroke animation cycle illustrating the reverse-phi motion effect
Reverse Phi: Four-Stroke Cycle

Miscellaneous

Elongated figure referencing the El Greco fallacy about distorted visual perception
El Greco
Graph-like pattern showing how luminance varies across a visual scene
Luminance Profiles
Dots that appear to split or group based on motion and proximity cues
Split Dots
Striped pattern demonstrating White's Effect, where identical grey patches appear different in brightness
White’s Effect
Animated sine wave pattern illustrating Fourier decomposition of visual stimuli
Fourier Fun
Pattern demonstrating the reduced sharpness of vision in the periphery compared to the centre
Peripheral Acuity
Archive icon linking to illusions and research from 2014 onward
2014 and Beyond