The proof that you should never believe your eyes

[Gawan]

I'm trying to work on something with other more and positive faces, i.e. Putin, JFK. But when looking at the single original gif pictures the eyes seem to stick out if they are exaggerated.

 

[neema]

It would be really cool if someone could create a similar app, but this time with other faces, perhaps images of historical persons. To make an experiment and see if we are dealing with a cognitive phenomenon or something else.

OK I gave it a shot.

I chose very random portraits from history and tried to match the timing and format of the original as best I could. In my opinion nothing has been edited or enhanced in the pics of the celebrities in the original video.

In the video I made you can kind of see the effect but for an optimum effect it helps if the pics are of very similar resolution, angle of view point, brightness, colors, lighting, and even similar facial expressions.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B29ydAJkXNSTY2piRUxNTFRPT1U/view

It seems the more different the pictures sets are, the easier the visual cortex can pick them out and vice versa.

 

[Deleted member 4320]

It also makes me wonder about how this perceptual method is used in some parapsychology phenomena. I've heard that many indigenous groups in North and Central America user peripheral vision to see a person's aura, spirit guides, et cetera.

Yes, I thought about that too. One wonders if a more accurate representation of the individual is seen via peripheral vision?

Looking at the face, in the normal way, not peripheral, the individual activate his "sense" of the observation, which is connected, to his past experiences and his knowledge (if that individual have such).

When the picture is "melted" and if individual strive to grasp this picture by peripheral vision, he is compel to activate his intuition, because this is the one thing to which individual can reference.

The adventage, which the individual can achieve, is engagement of his intuition - through the same striving, to analyze the picture peripherally. Next thing is, giving himself the possible field to apply his "psychic" capability (if the individual have such).

"One wonders if a more accurate representation of the individual is seen via peripheral vision?"

Yes and no.

The question can be put: does the peripheral vision can help to see more accurate representation of the individual?

I would say: yes. By the normal and peripheral vision.

 

[Scottie]

Well, for the record: Only some of the faces looked "monstery" to me. Like maybe 15%. The rest looked like less-detailed versions of what I see when I look directly at the photos. I recognized many of the non-monstery celebrity faces with only peripheral vision...

When I was younger, I used to play around a lot with focusing my attention on things in my peripheral vision - trying to "focus" on them without looking. Came in handy when I learned to drive!

 

[3DStudent]

I did it a few times and counted each image. I get the same distortion for the same person, at least it seems so. I go back and then look at either side to see who that person is without the distortion. Interesting. One of the celebrities, an older male, picture 37 on the right has a really distorted swirly face. I don't know this celebrity. 14 on the right seems to be Natalie Portman and her eyes are really big and stand out.

On a related note, has anyone experienced this: When you're driving and at a stop and watching cars pass by, if you gaze past the cars and not look directly at them, you see a sort of dark haze that surrounds the outline of car. Kind of like a foggy dark trail that follows it. I've always wondered what that is. Anyway, thanks for sharing this interesting post!

 

[Cosmos]

First I thought that maybe the right and left brain hemispheres are processing other kinds of informations and thus the brain creates a mix.

So I did a little experiment:

- I covered the left image slide (so that it can not be seen) and looked with both eyes at the cross: Same distortion effect on the right slide.
- Then I did the same thing only now covering the right slide: Same distortion effect on the left slide.
- Then I covered the left image slide and looked at the cross only with the left eye: Same distortion effect on the right slide
- Then the same thing with only the right eye: Same distortion effect on the right slide.
- And then the same procedure with the right slide (only left and right eye): Same distortion effect on the left slide

What I'm not sure about: Do the same caricature characteristics get created at every one of those test above? Or are there differences? Would be interesting to find out, since that maybe could explain a bit how and if, getting input in the right eye is different from getting input in the left eye (or rather how the brain processes it). And if there is a difference compared with both eyes looking at the cross...

Other then that, I think the explanation given in Kisitos first post, goes a long way in explaining how that effect works.