Vex Appeal is a weblog and collection of projects by Guy Parsons, a game designer, online community and digital strategy dude in London, England. Read more about the saucy butcher boy here.
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law 37 / sleeper cell / lets change the game
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previously on vexappeal:
Back soon... Free Moshi Monsters Codes Spokeo... or spookeo, more like I'm Prove Very Where J.C Leyendecker and Team Fortress 2 Train of thought "Love Is Like A Bottle Of Gin..." Links for FAME people They Tell Stories Ffffudging it slightly
Illusioneering
Sunday, July 15, 2007
A couple of really nice illusions:
This is a silhouette of a woman spinning on the spot. However, your brain can interpret the image to see her spinning either clockwise or anti-clockwise. If you're struggling getting her to switch direction, try:
- closing your eyes and visualising her spinning the other way
- concentrating on the shadow
- covering the silhouette apart from the bottom-left corner, and when you see her foot swoop past, try and perceive at as moving away from/towards you, as desired.
It's really weird and a bit frustrating - sometimes it's very easy to change direction, and then inexplicably I'll stop being able to do it for ages. There's no trickery with the image itself, either. You can download the picture to check if you want, or have the fun experience of getting a group of people to watch it and have them all see it spinning different ways. Next up:
(Or see on YouTube if you can't view the embedded video.)
Not much I can say about this without giving the game away, but needless to say it's impressive, and will leave you feeling a bit daft. It reminds me of a conversation I had with Stuart Nolan at PlayTime about using metaphorical sleight of hand and misdirection in game design to create the illusion of open-ended play within what's obviously a finite system. Although the actual trick he showed me just involved using different routes of getting to the same ending, so whatever cards you picked, it still ended up working as a "trick." Quite an interesting line of thought, nonetheless, although probably most effective in narrative-driven play than other sorts of experiences.
Labels: brain, cognition, illusion, perception, sleight, trick