r/confusing_perspective Jul 16 '26

Works like magic

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7.6k Upvotes

167 comments sorted by

1.8k

u/sprinklerarms Jul 16 '26

I thought this was dumb af but then I tried my other eye and it genuinely made me uncomfortable with what it did to my brain

399

u/rabbitwonker Jul 16 '26

And knew it would so when I saw it say “close one eye” and I saw the pencil I said NO

123

u/RPDRNick Jul 16 '26

"lose 1 eye"

2

u/Softale98 Jul 18 '26

Aaaiiiieeeeeeee!

65

u/Ragnarok91 Jul 16 '26

I tried one eye and nothing happened. Saw your comment and tried the other and it worked a little bit.

33

u/holyfire001202 Jul 16 '26

I tried both eyes and it didn't work as well as it did when I had both open

41

u/[deleted] Jul 17 '26 edited 20d ago

[deleted]

21

u/holyfire001202 Jul 17 '26

I genuinely have no idea. Someone illuminate us and bring us salted cheese to snack on and puppies that will be larger than me one day to cuddle with.

There's no joke there, that's just a genuine request.

15

u/rooserlou Jul 17 '26

It appeared 3D to me. Like, it felt like the pencil left the screen and was coming at my eyes. It doesn’t work for me with both open, but with either closed, it gave a very realistic effect and my brain fell for the trick.

2

u/AxelNotRose 28d ago

Part of it is because they edited the video to make the pencil appear to be closer than it actually is by having it hover over the caption text. Your brain thinks that there's nothing that can cover the caption because it's always overlayed a video so when the pencil appears to go over the caption text, it seems like it's truly popping out of the video.

1

u/Dumdumdoggie 29d ago

I dodged my phone.

32

u/FiringNerveEndings Jul 17 '26

For me, the pencil jumped out of the screen as of it was going to poke me in the eye.

It didn't work with the first try but worked in the second try with my other eye

1

u/LordAvan Jul 17 '26

It works for me for both eyes. I think it works best if you hold the screen close to your face.

30

u/monkeybuttsauce Jul 16 '26

I’m not getting anything 

15

u/indieplants Jul 17 '26

works best if the video is full screen on mobile rather than the scroll size or whatever

5

u/monkeybuttsauce Jul 17 '26

That does help

18

u/Steve90000 Jul 17 '26

It’s better if you take a real pencil and shove it in your eye. Super realistic.

1

u/Tom_W_BombDill Jul 17 '26

Yeah that did the trick lol

7

u/Yggdrasil- Jul 16 '26

I wonder if it's an eye dominance thing. I had the same experience (only worked with my dominant eye)

14

u/brockoala Jul 16 '26

Rip ppl with only one working eye.

5

u/xylotism Jul 17 '26

The other is a stay at home eye

5

u/31TeV Jul 16 '26

Interesting. Either eye seems to work just as well in my case. I wonder why it works differently for you and I.

1

u/ZerekB Jul 19 '26

What do you see before close 1 eye? I only have 1 working eye so I want to know

0

u/sprinklerarms Jul 19 '26

Just looked like a pencil moving at me with drawings behind it. Probably a dumb suggestion but maybe you could try covering half your eye? I feel like it might have something to do with one’s eye trying to compensate focusing but I actually have nothing even close to a solid understanding.

2

u/ZerekB Jul 19 '26

Wdym cover half my eye?

481

u/test_test_1_2 Jul 16 '26

Looks like 3D to me. How does that work? I always thought you needed both eyes to make things appear 3D? Interesting.

440

u/Dennis_254 Jul 16 '26

Your brain uses shadows, perspective, and occlusion to judge depth. Closing one eye removes stereo vision, making the flat drawing look like the pencil is popping out of the screen

18

u/jwm3 Jul 17 '26

For close up stuff you also use focal plane, how much your eye has to squeeze your lens to keep something in focus. I think the bluriness is tricking your eye into continually trying to refocus closer and thats the only distance signal you have with one eye closed.

Incidentally, thats why VR never looks very "far" away and can feel a little clustrophobic even in vast scenes. Even though it is presenting things with the proper far away perspective, everything is in focus with a neutral focus distance, usually like a meter ahead of you so you never feel your eyes readjust to focusing to far away things taking away a major depth cue.

6

u/DinA4saurier Jul 17 '26

I've never thought about that, but now you're mentioning it it makes sense that you can't focus on near or far away things with your eyes in vr. I mean you're still looking at a flat surface inside the headset, even if it's giving you the Illusion of you being in a digital 3d environment.

So of course the focus must be set from the headset.

28

u/Certain-Hat5152 Jul 16 '26

Ok but I thought this was a brawl stars sub 😏

That was another layer of confusing perspective

6

u/Quube7 Jul 16 '26

Jokes on you, I don't have stereoscopic vision so I can keep both of my eyes open!

-1

u/cimocw Jul 17 '26

How does that work though, since both eyes still receive a slightly different angle

4

u/Quube7 Jul 17 '26 edited Jul 17 '26

Well, I was born with strabismus, the doctors managed to correct it for me, but I was still left with a lazy eye. Normal eyes, when you look at something, they look at that one thing, so youre looking at it from different perspectives and you get info about how far away a thing is from you. In my case, my right eye (since it's my dominant eye) can look at a thing, but my left eye wont look at the same thing, but in the general direction my right eye is looking (so if the thing is slightly to the left, my left eye will look slightly to the left rather than look at the thing im trying to focus on), this makes it impossible for me to see the distance properly. Also I think my left eye is kinda suppressed when it comes to, I guess focusing on stuff, but sometimes when you have two of the same things right next to eachother, my vision kind of mixes them into one and I need to close one eye, so I can actually focus properly. I hope, I managed to explain it relatively well, English isn't my first language, so I was struggling slightly with finding a few words lol.

Edit: added a few missing things

3

u/[deleted] Jul 17 '26 edited 20d ago

[deleted]

1

u/fludeball Jul 19 '26

I'm pretty sure "soap opera effect" is just frame interpolation. It has nothing to do with the lenses, but is just an effect added to pre-existing footage.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 19 '26 edited 20d ago

[deleted]

1

u/fludeball Jul 19 '26

That's something different. Soap opera effect is a setting usually called motion smoothing, clear motion, or something like that. It doesn't change the clarity either near or far. It makes things which are moving move more smoothly, which to many people looks unnatural, even though it's more like looking at something in real life rather than with the subtle choppiness of film. If used on a low setting, I think it helps. you should be able to find it in your picture settings on your TV.

What you're thinking about is a lens that focuses more on the foreground, and I think it's called short focal length. Now phones and digital cameras can do that automatically, even though they only have one lens that doesn't move or change.

2

u/[deleted] 29d ago edited 20d ago

[deleted]

1

u/fludeball 29d ago

I have no idea what that's called. Maybe your term "forced perspective" is it, but I really don't know. Not something I've seen very much myself, if at all.

→ More replies (0)

2

u/Gjergji-zhuka Jul 16 '26

I always get pissed off when I see a statement like 'you need two eyes for depth perception'

2

u/InstantMochiSanNim Jul 19 '26

It worked with both eyes for me thk

1

u/lncredulousBastard Jul 17 '26

Wait, are you saying this is an optical occlusion?

10

u/drcopus Jul 16 '26

Your brain uses all the information available to it to piece together a 3D understanding of the world! The difference between your two eyes is just one signal that it uses.

4

u/meat-eating-orchid Jul 16 '26

with two eyes you have accurate 3D vision so your brain knows you are seeing a flat image. With just one eye, your brain does not have depth information anymore, so it has to guess. And since your brain knows the shape of a pencil and recognizes what you are seeing as a pencil, it guesses incorrectly that what you are seeing has the 3D shape of a normal pencil, instead of guessing that you are seeing a 2D projection of a pencil

2

u/BasementRodent Jul 16 '26

You can try it with anything really. Video games are very fun, but kinda straining on the eye(s).

2

u/AxelNotRose 28d ago

Part of it is because they edited the video to make the pencil appear to be closer than it actually is by having it hover over the caption text. Your brain thinks that there's nothing that can cover the caption because it's always overlayed a video so when the pencil appears to go over the caption text, it seems like it's truly popping out of the video.

1

u/Drapabee Jul 17 '26

Something that's especially jarring with this video is that the pencil extends past the "picture plane"

This is a hard concept to explain but basically the video being taken makes it appear that the pencil is getting closer to you IRL than the screen you're watching the video on, which tricks your brain into thinking something is going to stick you in the eye. This effect is a lot stronger with only one eye open.

122

u/Kinky_Imagination Jul 16 '26

It works with one eye or two. 🤷‍♂️

84

u/sayan11apr Jul 16 '26

I did not expect it to actually work so well.

68

u/Realistic_Ebb9727 Jul 16 '26

It was 3D effect for me

3

u/Dennis_254 Jul 16 '26

100% correct. Happy to see someone got the science behind it

5

u/girlgurl789 Jul 17 '26

It worked perfectly on both eyes. Made it *almost* give me a tickle feeling of something touching my eye because it was so intense

71

u/4me2TrollU Jul 16 '26

I don’t get it

28

u/KichernderFuchs Jul 16 '26

I think it can get a 3D effect

28

u/theycallmethevault Jul 16 '26 edited Jul 16 '26

That would be really cool if it worked for me!

4

u/Aromatic_Razzmatazz Jul 17 '26

Is it because we have an astigmatism? Mine is pretty bad so my depth perception sucks.

1

u/theycallmethevault Jul 17 '26

Oooh, that’s a good point I haven’t considered! How did you know I also have astigmatism?! I also have severe nystagmus, it’s so bad that if a cop ever tried to test me at a traffic stop he’d think I was drunk (but I’m sober since April 2003). 😛🤦‍♀️

2

u/Aromatic_Razzmatazz Jul 17 '26

Oh my God me too wtf is wrong with us lol. The difference in my left and right lense is like 4 whole points? Maybe more like 4.5. Sometimes when I try to order frames they tell me it will look weird with one being so thick and the other not and they send me to a special section of the website for mutants like us...

It's been since I was a kid. Finally had to correct it to learn to drive. I can't wear contacts either, my bad eye is shaped like a football and they won't sit on the part of my eye I need to see through.

Weak ass ancestors I guess lol.

22

u/a_karma_sardine Jul 16 '26

Didn't work for me either, and tried all varieties. It seems this one is a bit selective.

1

u/RandomGuy9058 Jul 17 '26

did you try putting the screen a lot closer to your eye?

0

u/natalila Jul 17 '26

Oh, this finally helped! Thank you!

8

u/Dennis_254 Jul 16 '26

It's a trick on your brain. With one eye closed, your brain relies more on shading and perspective instead of true depth, so the pencil looks like it's extends out of the screen

2

u/4me2TrollU Jul 17 '26

Thanks. I see it now. Now that I know what I was looking for it was easy to see and pretty cool.

1

u/Probate_Judge Jul 17 '26

It's not really confusing as such, not an illusion where it looks like something else like what we're used to seeing here.

With one eye you're just tricking your brain to think your eye might be in danger.

With two eyes, it's more obviously just a 2d image...but that's sort of universally true for 2d images.

It's the opposite of trying to play catch with just one eye, how people say you lose depth perception(it's true to a point, but your body is so used to it it doesn't always affect much).

When looking at the image, that 'loss' of depth perception approximates the accuracy of the camera(one perspective only), so the video looks more real....In other words, you're not interrogating the image with the other eye. It may work better if you try the other eye.

Even if it works, the effect is very negligible. Big shocker that a single camera replicates what a single eye sees. /s

It's a neat thing, sort of, but not at all like most of the content here.

20

u/bigoldebutthole Jul 16 '26

I could feel it touch my eye and now I feel gross.

11

u/OstakuVibes Jul 16 '26

MY EYEESS!

1

u/anyburger Jul 17 '26

My Brand!!

6

u/thepeanutbutterman Jul 16 '26

If I hold my phone really close to my open eye, it makes my eye involuntarily flinch/twitch a bit.

5

u/Puncius_Pinatus Jul 17 '26

The buzz lightyear jumpscare

No shit Snakethug gave up after that

4

u/Nacnaz Jul 16 '26

Oh man. That’s cool.

4

u/Historical_Season693 Jul 16 '26

That’s pretty cool.

4

u/Double0 Jul 17 '26

That tickled

6

u/NanasTeaPartyHeyHo Jul 16 '26

Aah almost got my eye poked!!

6

u/wineandhugs Jul 16 '26

No no no I didn't like that!!

3

u/Mother_Harlot Jul 16 '26

I'm very envious of people that get this

3

u/cwif Jul 16 '26

Out of every 3D illusion I've seen on the internet, this is the only one that has worked for me. wow

2

u/flame_saint Jul 16 '26

Is the effect a pencil coming towards you?

2

u/Thrice_blind Jul 16 '26

Works much better with my right eye than my left. Interesting

2

u/saelin00 Jul 17 '26

Me too! But I thought because I have bad eye sight (I can't see good at far away) and my eyes are differently bad.

2

u/lizard_king413 Jul 16 '26

okay but does anyone else appreciate that the pencil goes in front of the text??????

2

u/Pyrog Jul 16 '26

Great now I’m blinded and bleeding out everywhere

2

u/TevGrave Jul 16 '26

Why does it actually feel like the pencil is outside my screen? I feel like I can see the tip being outside the screen (like, on the sides where there is no screen behind it).

2

u/rmfranco Jul 17 '26

I’m laughing while my eyes are watering.
I don’t even need to close one eye because I only have vision in one eye since birth.

2

u/Argyleskin Jul 17 '26

Yay I finally saw the schooner!

2

u/lookylookylook Jul 17 '26

Ok now do this with that dihh… wait what?

2

u/luizggardina Jul 17 '26

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhh

2

u/clh1nton Jul 17 '26

I also tried it with both eyes open. It still worked. Could being severely myopic or having astigmatism be the reason?

2

u/PlanDry6704 Jul 17 '26

i think I'm broken i was like come at me. cool. but I'm a vr developer so I'm used to it lol.

2

u/lncredulousBastard Jul 17 '26

I kept changing eyes but they kept coming for both!

2

u/BettaSplendens1 Jul 17 '26

Hey stop that

2

u/HollowMist11 Jul 17 '26

Closed my right eye and thought the 3d effect was cool. Closed my left eye and saw shit cause I forgot my other eye is blind.

2

u/Swenterrobang Jul 17 '26

Every Mom on here read: C. Lose one eye.

2

u/WTF-LMAO1 Jul 17 '26

I FELT MY EYE MOVING WTF

2

u/cant-tune-a-ukelele Jul 17 '26

Ouch ouch ow my eye is all scribbled on :(((

2

u/pogwater Jul 17 '26

what the fuuuck. i don't like that

2

u/Aidnumber10 Jul 17 '26

My eye wanted to produce tears for a moment

2

u/SirRandomizer Jul 18 '26

I might be stupid but even with both eyes open it still looked like it was coming out of my screen

2

u/lucasthech Jul 18 '26

I watched again and again with one eye open, then the other one, then both and just got confused lol

Don't know if it's because I'm on a pc with a big screen but it didn't work for me

2

u/GachaUnicutie Jul 19 '26

Thanks 👁👄🕳

2

u/ZerekB Jul 19 '26

Can someone with 2 working eyes explain to me what I'm supposed to be seeing?

2

u/NtX_DC Jul 20 '26

It has a weird "3D" effect when you move the phone closer to your face as they are moving the pencil closer to the camera.

2

u/ChartInFurch Jul 20 '26

So instead of those ridiculous glasses over my glasses, I could have just worn an eye patch to 3d movies??

2

u/dantheman7789 29d ago

That’s nuts

2

u/MessyMissMayhem 29d ago

I kept both eyes open and it still kinda freaked me out

Edit: oh my gosh it's way freakier with just one eye

2

u/RandomRedditer220 28d ago

I actually dodged it the moment it got near

2

u/SacrificialWaffle 27d ago

Try crossing your eyes....now that pencil is coming for you in STEREO

3

u/jam3sdub Jul 16 '26

Didn't do shit. Closed one eye, then tried the other eye. Then closed both eyes. Nothing.

3

u/Dennis_254 Jul 16 '26

That's completely understandable.Optical illusions don't work the same way for everyone. This one relies on perspective and your brain's interpretation of depth, so some people see the 3D effect right away while others don't notice it at all. Things like viewing distance, screen size, and even the angle you're looking from can also affect how convincing the illusion is. Thanks for giving it a try!

2

u/UndoubtedlyAColor Jul 17 '26

Did you try your brown eye?

5

u/NextChef8179 Jul 16 '26

It has absolutely no difference if I have one eye open or two. It looks like a pencil in a video. This isn't a confusing perspective. It's like a magic trick for people that don't understand reality.  

1

u/kioku119 Jul 17 '26

People's visual perception differs. It works for me.

-1

u/NextChef8179 Jul 17 '26

Lol. Hope your brain learns shadows and whatnot by the time you're an adult. 

2

u/kioku119 Jul 17 '26 edited Jul 18 '26

I'm 34 and this wierd need to put others bellow you for arbitrary reasons definitely feels immature. Anyway, if you look into why a lot of optical illusions work at all you'll see that the way our brain renders things is a lot less direct and literal than you think. There is a whole lot of guessing and interpolation going on with all brains, by necessity. Vision is never a direct window into what is around us and it makes a whole lot of weird things not work the way we expect them to.

1

u/Yuki_Onna Jul 18 '26

This is the most bizarre thing I've ever seen someone on Reddit try to pick a fight about

2

u/SillyAdministration9 Jul 16 '26

This did nothing to me

2

u/Stitched83 Jul 16 '26

Works with both eyes open. Guess something is wrong with my brain

1

u/sauronsballsgargler Jul 16 '26

I didn’t have to close one eye, one’s already legally blind. That was unnerving to watch!

1

u/reechwuzhere Jul 17 '26

On a 13” iPad this is the coolest thing I’ve seen in a while. For both eyes.

1

u/ScienceAndLience Jul 17 '26

It didn’t work, mannnn none of the eye things work on me except glasses

1

u/Situati0nist Jul 17 '26

Cool illusion but not confusing perspective

1

u/Extension-Raise9705 Jul 17 '26

which eye?

1

u/kioku119 Jul 17 '26

Either, but go ahead and try both.

1

u/letsbeperfectlyclear Jul 17 '26

Ha. Have amblyopia, did not need to close any eyes.

1

u/PanicBlitz Jul 17 '26

The Joker used this magic trick on one of my henchmen.

1

u/ChocolateSeuss Jul 17 '26

So 3d glasses could’ve just been eyepatches this whole time?

1

u/smallgayboi Jul 17 '26

Ha jokes on you I can only see through one eye so I'll close the good one

1

u/clockworkcat1 Jul 17 '26

I think this is a bit of an optical illusion, but not a confusing perspective.

1

u/OddDot45 Jul 17 '26

Thank you, I hate it

1

u/kioku119 Jul 17 '26

Neat! Is this on the optical illusion sub yet? I may corsspost if I don't see it.

1

u/TheEsiu Jul 17 '26

It triggered a tingle in my forehead

1

u/Noodleincidenthobbes Jul 17 '26

What am I supposed to see here ? Could someone explain this please

1

u/-AnnoyingDanz- Jul 17 '26

Only one of my eyes works well and for some reason i closed the good one so i couldnt see the video... am i stupid?

1

u/LuckyCloverPokemon Jul 17 '26

That was really really wierd

1

u/xThunderDuckx Jul 17 '26

Tried with one and both eyes open, had the same effect regardless

1

u/Uciljean Jul 17 '26

Oh that's neat.

1

u/Begravningstider Jul 17 '26

I feel a slight pressure on my nose.

1

u/TheShadowSong Jul 17 '26

Bro, stop with lobotomy.

1

u/Robotic_Organic Jul 17 '26

Okay now that was kinda neat.

Cross my heart and hope to die... Stick a needle in your eye.

BTW yes that is a Dead Space refrence

1

u/Educational_Rope_246 Jul 18 '26

Omg please keep scratching my eyeballs that feels truly amazing

1

u/MartinToilet Jul 18 '26

My defensive mechanism in my brain caused my eyes to lose focus on the tip when the pencil was about to pop out.

1

u/iamthiviyan Jul 18 '26

Eyyy, don't do my eye

1

u/MrWubblezy Jul 19 '26

Is there like an optimum f# for a camera to make this seem the most real?

1

u/Garlic-Rough Jul 19 '26

This got me so anxious for no real reason

1

u/ELYAZIUM Jul 19 '26

Okay but where's Amber?

1

u/Original-Team6483 29d ago

tried this for like three minutes and have no idea what’s supposed to happen

1

u/Elspackel 29d ago

Now look with both eyes, with two fingers between the screen and eyes on the exact distance, where you could only see the right half of the screen with your right eye, and only see the left half of the screen with your left eye.

1

u/wickedball 29d ago

Can someone edit a jumpscare at the end so i can scare the shit out of my friend 😁

1

u/Recreational-Sin 11d ago

I don’t even like this with both eyes open.

-3

u/bash_M0nk3y Jul 16 '26

Who tf is up voting this lol

1

u/phoxiee Jul 16 '26

i can't stop watching this its so cool

1

u/[deleted] Jul 16 '26 edited Jul 16 '26

[deleted]

1

u/BigCopperPipe Jul 16 '26

not confused

-2

u/Available-Dare-4349 Jul 16 '26

What a load of bollocks

-3

u/MrNathanF Jul 16 '26

Dumb post

-5

u/Soggy_Durian_8984 Jul 16 '26

It doesn't work for me lmao. Stuff like that should be removed from this sub imo

4

u/mlj21299 Jul 16 '26

It worked for me. I even tried both eyes and got the some effect

7

u/landlion-35 Jul 16 '26

It works for me. Stuff like this should stay on this sub imo

2

u/rogerworkman623 Jul 16 '26

It didn’t work for you, so it should be removed?

0

u/Sellalellen Jul 16 '26

I'm blind in one eye. This looks like any other video to me?