How you perceive the image depends on the distance from which you are viewing it. From up close, you'll see Albert Einstein, but if you move further back from the screen, you'll see Harry Potter.
This is one of a series of hybrid images created by Aude Oliva of the Computational Visual Cognition Lab at MIT. Here's an explanation of how these images work, and here's the spinning silhouette illusion from yesterday.
[Original image uploaded to Flickr by Jeremiah Owyang]
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Looks like Harry Potter from a distance, Harry Potter with fake eyebrows and mustache on closeup.
Mo, if you haven't been to Pz 's site today, get there now pronto.
Hitchens done went plumb crazy.
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2007/10/ffrf_recap.php#more
saurabh - I think that's because the pic is so small. Try the full size image.
The illusion works when defocusing my eyes.
I agree with saurabh, Comparing to the full-size image, I suspect the reduction trashed too much of the high-frequency data. In the full-size image, both faces look "equally damaged"....
The image doesnt change in the slightest bit when i move away from it..i see all the photoshop elements, with a blurred potter in the background and a photoshop layer Einstein in the foreground.