The Jesus Illusion

by John P.

The Jesus IllusionHold on, hold on. Before everyone goes and gets all upset with me, this is not a jab at Christianity. It’s actually an illusion that features Jesus!

You might need to stare at the lines for a few minutes, but after a little while you’ll begin to see the outline of a figure. I found it helpful to actually step away from the monitor to really see the image pop out.

Obviously, this is an optical illusion. But it was also an entry in some sort of design competition or an ad or something. If anyone knows more about where this came from please share with the rest of us.

The Jesus Illusion


{ 21 comments… read them below or add one }

1 Brandon September 14, 2007 at 9:14 am

I had to get about 10′ back from the screen to really see this one..
I love optical illusions tho, keep em coming :)

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2 Tom Barr September 14, 2007 at 10:33 am

It’s easy to see if you view your screen from different angles. I see some Italian looking guy in some ornate robes not a Jewish carpenter from 2000 years ago. :D

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3 Derek Wong September 14, 2007 at 11:17 am

Pretty eye-catching, controversial title. Pretty eye-catching optical illusion!

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4 Derek Wong September 14, 2007 at 11:23 am

I thought I had submitted a comment already, but I guess not.

I was just going to say that was a pretty controversial and eye-catching title with an equally eye-catching optical illusion. I like the optical illusions but sometimes they make my eyes hurt.

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5 MG September 14, 2007 at 12:59 pm

The History Channel ran a special on what Jesus would look like. Brown hair and blue eyes be damned, that wasn’t the look back then and that’s not what he looked like. My mother doesn’t agree. But then again, she’s certain that God wears white robes, has a long white beard, is white, and has a deep commanding voice.

I’m religious, but I also enjoy challenging my own beliefs by asking questions such as “If God is not of this world (if he’s in “heaven”), is he technically an “alien”?”. It’s very important to be comfortable enough to question your faith. If you’re not comfortable doing so, you probably need to study it more to figure out what you truly believe. Faith is funny that way :)

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6 Urbanist September 14, 2007 at 2:30 pm

Hmm, I’m a little confused – I saw the figure right away on the page. Is that unusual? Did anyone else experience that?

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7 Lisa Marie Mary September 14, 2007 at 3:40 pm

I saw it right away, too, WU!! :)

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8 John P. September 14, 2007 at 3:52 pm

You know, what I noticed was that it is easier to see in the thumbnail version, but harder to see in the full sized version. Perhaps I shouldn’t have put the thumbnail up because it would have made people look harder…

John

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9 Peter B September 14, 2007 at 7:58 pm

Yep, stood back about 6′ – saw it fine. And yep, I agree with the previous comment re: Western iconography that portrays Jesus as a Nordic or Slavic looking man. He was a Semite from the Middle East – he would’ve looked more like Yasser Arafat or Ariel Sharon at 30 then anyone else.

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10 The Internet Experiment September 15, 2007 at 2:12 am

Thats pretty cool. I saw it right away though. ;o)

- Andrew

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11 baschie September 15, 2007 at 5:37 am

Generate a set of lines (it helped me to first draw 3 pixel wide, black lines on a white background, resize the image to 200% or so, and gaussian blur a bit). Copy the layer over an image and set the layer to multiply. Then add another layer with the same lines on top of the two, and set it to “normal”, with about 85% opacity depending on the contrast in the original image. Rescale a bit to get the same line density as in the jesus case, et voila, :-).

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12 Luke September 17, 2007 at 6:23 am

I haven’t seen this one before, I thought it was going be an illusion I found a couple of years ago. Similar concept, different image.

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13 deekay October 25, 2007 at 7:07 pm

hey great ! i was able to see that after lookin for few sec

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14 sujay December 7, 2007 at 5:15 am

hey it really rocking, i can see after a few moments.

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15 KB February 13, 2008 at 10:24 pm

Hey, very cool I also found that it is easy to see it if you shake your head and look at it at the same time. Hope that helps

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16 thienbao April 6, 2008 at 7:55 pm

please, tell me the software make it’s that

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17 kiki July 9, 2008 at 10:50 am

hey i couldnt see anything is that unusal???!!:D

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18 kiki July 9, 2008 at 10:52 am

nevermind i had to look at it for a couple of seconds!!??? HAHA

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19 Raamses March 3, 2009 at 8:31 am

Powns

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20 Raamses March 3, 2009 at 8:32 am


cool

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21 John W. March 4, 2010 at 9:50 am

Cool optical illusion. Had to step back from the screen pretty far to see it though. Would be funny if this was randomly featured on some product bar codes.

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