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A negative picture is the inverse of a normal, or positive, image. In a negative picture, white or light areas appear dark, and darker areas appear light. Usually, photo negatives are turned into positive images in a darkroom.
In the negative picture visual illusion, yourbrainand visual system briefly create a color image from a negative photo. Keep reading to learn more about this interesting brain function and why it happens.
How to Create the Negative Picture Illusion
If you want your brain to create the negative picture illusion, follow these steps:
If you follow these steps correctly, you should briefly see an image of a woman in full color. If you are having trouble seeing the woman, try staring at the negative image a bit longer or adjusting how far you are sitting from your computer monitor.
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How the Müller-Lyer Illusions Works
How the Negative Photo Illusion Works
How does this fascinating optical illusion, more properly called a visual illusion, work? What you experience during the visual illusion is known as a negative afterimage. This occurs when the photoreceptors, primarily the cone cells, in your eyes becomeoverstimulatedand fatigued, causing them to lose sensitivity. This leads your visual system and brain to produce a negative afterimage in your retina.
In everyday life, you don’t notice this because tiny movements of your eyes keep the cone cells located at the back of your eyes from becoming overstimulated.But, when you stare at the negative photo image for a long time, you are preventing these movements.
The Trichromatic Theory of Color Vision
Opponent-Process Theory
The color magenta serves as an antagonist to the color green, so when you stare too long at a magenta image, you will then see a green afterimage. The magenta color fatigues the magenta photoreceptors so that they produce a weaker signal. Since magenta’s opposing color is green, you then interpret the afterimage as green.
Color Perception and “The Dress"“The Dress"was a much-discussed photo posted on social media that raised the question of visual perception. It illustrated how colors can be seen differently, as some people saw a white dress with gold stripes in the photo, while others perceived the dress to be black and blue.Research suggests people made different unconscious assumptions about the light and shadow surrounding the dress that led them to see it as either white/gold or black/blue.
Color Perception and “The Dress”
“The Dress"was a much-discussed photo posted on social media that raised the question of visual perception. It illustrated how colors can be seen differently, as some people saw a white dress with gold stripes in the photo, while others perceived the dress to be black and blue.Research suggests people made different unconscious assumptions about the light and shadow surrounding the dress that led them to see it as either white/gold or black/blue.
“The Dress"was a much-discussed photo posted on social media that raised the question of visual perception. It illustrated how colors can be seen differently, as some people saw a white dress with gold stripes in the photo, while others perceived the dress to be black and blue.
Research suggests people made different unconscious assumptions about the light and shadow surrounding the dress that led them to see it as either white/gold or black/blue.
10 Cool Optical Illusions and How They Work
Negative vs. Positive Afterimages
In a negative afterimage, you see opposing colors. You can also experience a positive afterimage, in which the colors stay the same in the afterimage. To try this, stare at brightly lit picture, and then close your eyes. For just an instant, you will continue to see the image, even though your eyes are closed.
You might also experience a positive afterimage after looking at a very bright light that is in an otherwise dark environment (say, a flashlight in a dark room). After the cells in the retina respond to light, they don’t stop responding right away, so you continue to see the image. Researchers call this “retinal inertia.”
Similar to a negative afterimage, a positive afterimage occurs when the cells in the eye are stimulated and begin to tire.
The lilac chaser illusion combines properties of a few different types of visual illusions. It incorporates a negative picture effect, complementary colors (in which images that start as lilac eventually begin to look green), and Troxler fading. Troxler fading causes images at the periphery of the visual field to disappear when you focus on a certain area.
Why it Matters
Optical illusions like the negative picture illusion are fun activities to try that also reveal important information about how the brain and visual systems work. Understanding why these illusions happen can help us better understand how the eye perceives information and how thebraininterprets that visual data.
What Is Perception?
4 Sources
Verywell Mind uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.
Dong B, Holm L, Bao M.Cortical mechanisms for afterimage formation: Evidence from interocular grouping.Sci Rep. 2017;7:41101. doi:10.1038/srep41101
Witzel C, Racey C, O’Regan JK.The most reasonable explanation of “the dress”: Implicit assumptions about illumination.J Vision. 2017;17(2):1. doi:10.1167/17.2.1
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