CAN YOU ?
There
is more than what initially meets the eye to this simple black and
white drawing of an old man wearing a hat. The illustration was created
by Valentine Dubinin, a cartoonist and animator from Russia who works as
a freelance artist. But before reading any further, take a good look at
it and see if you are able to spot the dog that’s hidden within it!
Were
you able to find the dog, or can you only see the old man? After
staring at the picture for a few seconds and reading this, most people
are able to make out both the man and the dog. If you still can’t
decipher the dog, keep looking because it’s in there somewhere!
These
images are called ambiguous figures, which are a type of optical
illusion, and some people also refer to them as ‘illusory figures.’
Ambiguous images are pictures that take advantage of how we perceive and
interpret things visually. They do so in such a way that the figure
presented to us, like the old man, can be viewed multiple ways because
they end up producing multiple images, i.e. the dog, each of which are
correct.
It
turns out that images like this one have intrigued researchers from
across a number of different fields for well over the past hundred
years. Scientists and psychologists cannot figure out how exactly they
work, what part of our brain holds the key to understanding them, or why
people can even switch between the two images in the first place. Some
people cannot do the switch at all, they only see one thing or the
other, which just adds more to the mystery surrounding them.
Pass this
fun image on with friends and family and see if they are able to spot
the hidden dog or not. If you’re interested in illusory figures and
pictures like this one, there are many more out there for you to
explore, so check them out and enjoy!