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Comment by kthartic | Hacker News Reader

I don't get the changing room illusion. I saw things slowly disappearing over time. I thought the big reveal was gonna be that they aren't actually disappearing (ie an illusion), but nope - they are indeed slowly fading out. What's special?

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First time for me that swirly thing was distracting my attention and I was doing rapid saccades looking for weird hidden items (even though I knew that was probably part of the illusion, seemed best to play along). I didn’t notice a single thing changing so the illusion worked perfectly for me. Second time watching it was easy to see the changes.

Apparently many people didn't notice anything disappearing, because they shifted their eyes around the video. I also noticed things changing, but if you'd stopped the video before the big reveal and asked me to list them, I would have listed only a small fraction of what actually changed: the bottles on the top left, the patio door curtain, the pillows on the couch. I missed the majority of changes, as did--I suspect--everyone.

I saw nothing change. So apparently you looked at it the wrong way!

There aren't any instructions in the video (other than "See if you can spot the difference"). Was I supposed to focus only on the spiral disc or something?

I think the idea is that by trying to actively look for changes, you shift your focus around, but don't actually remember that well what is placed where.

At least for me, my focus kept wondering around the room, never noticing that things that was previously there was replaced by something else.

They were trying to nudge you to rapidly scan over the whole room with quick eye movements, like one of those hidden item puzzles. If they explained what they wanted you to do in too much detail then you probably would have suspected the trick.

It doesn't even say that - it asks you to look for items that are "out of place". When I first watched it I immediately paused the video to have a look. Not the best instructions!

Yea - same with me! Immediately paused to make sure I had the time to examine a little more closely. Ooops.

No, I was just kidding.

Yes, maybe I misunderstood the instructions but I was looking at the bottle of champagne trying to work out if it was "out of place" for the room that I noticed it was fading out. I had also noticed weird flickers earlier that I couldn't place which were presumably other items fading in or out.

Same, I noticed the lights on the tree but that was about it directly.

The big reveal was that most things changed. I only noticed the photos fading out the first time around.

SPOILER: Like you and others, I noticed that some objects were changing, very slowly. What I didn't realize, until the video pointed it out later on, is that nearly every object placed in the room was changed. The "before" and "after" pictures were shocking to me: They look like two different rooms. Evidently I cannot notice and keep track of more than a handful of things changing simultaneously in an image.

I was looking at the clothes lying on the back of the sofa when it started, and it was painfully obvious it was slowly fading.

Way more changed than I thought. I was only focused on the ceiling panels and the curtain.

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