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Could someone give an ELI5 please? As I understand it, the explanation is that there was a leaf close to him that obscured the face. But what's he saying about parallax? Isn't the preview image that he would have seen on the camera display coming from the same lens that captures the image?

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The parallax in the video is just a tool since photographs don't have any real depth perception like our eyes do. The small leaves on the foreground and the big leaves in the background enhance the illusion, since they're about the same size in screenspace. Maybe the preview showed a leaf, but it's close enough to skintone I doubt it stuck out to his brain on the little phone display.

In meatspace, his eyes are at a different vantage point focusing on the face, while cellphone cameras try to keep everything visible as sharp as possible.

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