well, when i first looked at the spinning lady she was turning counter-clockwise and the next thing i know, she was turning clockwise. honestly, i think it depends on what part of her body i'm looking at. if it's her shoulder or boobs, she spins clockwise; if it's her feet and the shadow below, she spins counter-clockwise. there was a point when she appeared to go back and forth when i let my eyes go out of focus but maybe that was just my brain short circuiting.
from what i can tell, she mostly spins clockwise but either way, it's a dizzying optical illusion.
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Oooh -- this got passed around at work the other day. If you see counter-clockwise, you are supposed to be left-brained (logical). If you see clockwise, you are supposed to be right-brained (creative).
If you can make her easily do both, you're well-balanced between the two.
My default view is counter-clockwise (logical), but with concentration, I can make her go the other way. Which is probably a pretty close description of what goes on in my brain.
It's a depth of perception thing, like those optical illusions where you can't tell if something is going into the screen or out of the screen...
Here's a snapshot of a moment in time for the spinning dancer.
If you look at it one way, she's standing on her left foot, facing away from you, with her right foot outstretched as she twirls counter-clockwise. If you look at it another way, she's on the heel of her right foot, with the toes of that foot pointing almost towards you, and she's pulling the left foot around to swing it in front of you as she moves clockwise.
This "rotating image" is actually composed of 34 different frames in an animated .gif (I'm hosting them if you want to see them. Download here.), each that has a slightly different pose for the dancer, but each uses the shadow image to create this dual-view depth of field illusion. The "trick" is your mind focuses on seeing the dancer facing one way, and then as the picture changes, your brain is stuck in this direction, and automatically accepts that direction for each of the next images. When you see her switch direction, it is your brain suddenly "seeing" her face the opposite direction, and then you start seeing her MOVE the opposite direction.
Think of looking at a rotating hubcap - you KNOW it's rotating in one direction, but if your eyes focus on the image just right, you can see it rotating the other way. This is just another application of that principle.
Sorry if I destroyed the magic for any of you, but I thought this was cool enough to look into. Of course, I'm the guy that always tries to figure out how the magician does their tricks, too. I don't think any of the awe and wonder comes from knowing the secret behind the trick....
janette, i'm not sure what to think!
georgia, i saw the same thing, where her body seemed to flip but only when i wasn't concentrating or looking at her.
ross, the destroyer. thanks to your logic, my fantasy world went up in smoke. just kidding. what you said totally makes sense, thanks for breaking it down!
reesie, a friend of mine didn't see the counter-clockwise spin and then it happened. maybe it'll help to see the frames ross mentioned above?
grrrace, just look away. ;)
my brain.