Optical Illusions: The Science of Visual Perception (Illusion Works)
Average customer rating: 5 out of 5 stars
  • Nice book, very misleading title.
Optical Illusions: The Science of Visual Perception (Illusion Works)
Al Seckel
Manufacturer: Firefly Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1554071518

Book Description

Seeing is not always believing.

Optical Illusions is an intriguing collection of baffling images and shapes that change before your eyes: hidden figures, incredible designs and dazzling graphic patterns. The book includes such well-known optical illusions as Shepard's Tabletop, Wade's Spiral, the Floating Finger illusion, Ames Room, and Rubin's Face/Vase illusion. There are more than 275 illusions in all, with explanations of each image and notes about the science of visual perception.

Every type of optical illusion is here, among them:

With illusions rendered in photography, artwork and computer imaging, and its huge variety of themes and effects, Optical Illusions dazzles both the mind and the eye.

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars Nice book, very misleading title........2006-10-30

One of the most beautiful and wonderful books I own is Al Seckel's "Masters of Deception: Escher, Dali & the Artists of Optical Illusions" (2004). Unlike most other books on illusions, the book itself is a creative tour de force. And Seckel supplements his creation with visually striking and important media at his website. I think I've already given away as many as ten copies of that book to family and friends since its release.

Another of Seckel's books that I refer to frequently "Incredible Visual Illusions: You won't believe your eyes" (2003). That book has twenty chapters, each containing a different class of illusion. As a sensory scientist who teaches courses on sensation, perception and cognition, I find this book useful because it organizes a nice collection of illusions into meaningful categories that are relevant to me. In this work, as in Seckel's many others, the author acknowledges many renowned vision scientists. I imagine that the book's organization benefited from Seckel's association with these people.

Seckel's new book is "Optical Illusions: The Science of Visual Illusions." This is a fine book, with 281 optical illusions (one per page). The book begins with a four page essay on illusions. This is followed 281 pages of illusions, each printed to fill one page. Many of the illusions have been published by Seckel and others previously. A few of the illusions are new. The illustration section is followed by 24 pages containing BRIEF explanations of each illusion. Each explanation is, on average, seven or eight sentences.

I have one major criticism of the new book. The title is highly misleading. The book title suggested to me a book that would delve into science, in a scholarly way, at least at the level of a Sensation and Perception undergraduate textbook. I was hoping for something of a sequel to Masters of Deception (e.g., "The Science of Deception"?). However, this book is not about the science of visual perception or of illusions. It is not even about "optical" illusions, as most illusions are explainable in terms of perceptual and cognitive processes beyond simple optics. Sure there are 24 pages of explanation at the very end of the book, but these are generally not deep, satisfying explanations. And there is no reference list that would allow the casual reader to track down important scientific articles.

One superb, beautiful resource on the science of visual illusions is Michael Bach's website, "Optical Illusions and Visual Phenomena". Bach's dynamic site is visually striking, presenting some great illusions. The explanation of each illusion is accessible to the novice, but detailed enough to satisfy and impress other perceptual scientists. Bach generously acknowledges the artists and scientists associated with each illusion, providing scholarly references in each case. Bach lists and explains scientific controversies regarding many of the illusions. I should add that Bach is a first-rate sensory scientist from the University of Freiburg. His electophysiological and psychophysical research is highly-regarded, important, and of high quality. When I have spoken to him in the past (at conferences and at the Smith-Kettlewell Eye Research Institute in San Francisco), I have always been impressed by his knowledge and intellectual passion. Bach and his website are the real deal.

There are plenty of other excellent scientific sources on illusions. Richard Gregory, for instance, has written and spoken about many illusions, and he is the prime mover, director, and creator of London's Explororey. Another great innovator and scientist is Christopher Tyler, a vision scientist at the Smith-Kettlewell Eye Research Institute. Among sensory scientists, Tyler is widely regarded as a genius and computational/theoretical wizard. He's the guy who invented the autostereogram (aka "The Magic Eye"), and who makes unique observations about art and symmetry. He contributed considerably to San Francisco's Exploratorium. He presents a variety of interesting things at his S-K website. The Exploratorium has a wonderful website on illusions and their explanations that is definitely worth a look. Project Lite and Viperlib are two other impressive, important sites related to the science of illusions.

Seckel mentions at his website that he has even more books on illusions that are coming soon. The one that got my attention is the following:

"Your Mind's Eye: A Comprehensive Scientific Examination of Visual and Sensory Illusions. Boston: The MIT Press." Seckel writes, "This will have a dual platform (Mac and PC CD Rom) featuring hundreds of interactive illusions, and very rigorous scientific explanations. University level." I hope that this book lives up to its billing. There's no doubt that Seckel's work, combined with a healthy dose of good science, would be an important contribution. I'd love to see Seckel promote scientists and their explanations with the same enthusiasm that he promotes their illusions. Moreover, I feel confident that Seckel has important insights into illusions, and that his ideas have scientific importance. I'm not sure that Seckel has succeeded in expressing these ideas... yet.
Walter Wick's Optical Tricks
Average customer rating: 5 out of 5 stars
  • Elusive illusions
  • tHiS wAs So CoOl
  • Amazing is right!
  • Amazing...Great to train operators of printing press
Walter Wick's Optical Tricks
Walter Wick
Manufacturer: SCHOLASTIC
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0590222279

Amazon.com

From the creator of the I Spy books and the award-winning, irresistibly aquatic A Drop of Water comes Walter Wick's Optical Tricks. Optical illusions abound in Wick's stunning color photographs--tricking the brain into pursuing phantom images. In the opening spread, entitled "First Impressions," we see a white glob of smashed clay, with sunken impressions of objects such as buttons, screws, and chess pieces. But when you turn the page upside down, the clay impressions seem to pop out! In the second spread, "Mirror Magic," you see a collection of objects such as a billiard ball, a die, and a wooden block in the shape of the number 4. The billiard ball, also a number 4, is reflected backward in the mirror, but the block number 4 is not. Why not? Fortunately, readers can flip to the back of the book, where Wick explains the illusions in his refreshingly straightforward and concise manner.

Brilliantly composed photographs of simple props, expert lighting, and myriad mirrors baffle us page after page: a "Tricky Triangle" that has a peculiar twist; a bogus box; Escher-like visual deceptions; and more. Wick explains, "As much as possible, the photographs are designed to challenge readers to compare true perceptions (the objects as they really exist) with false perceptions (the illusions) as a way to cultivate visual logic skills and to sharpen powers of observation." This visually maddening, mind-bending book will challenge and entertain even the keenest young observers. Is it all smoke and mirrors? Most certainly. (Ages 7 and older) --Karin Snelson

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars Elusive illusions.......2004-04-10

Goofiness. Utter utter goofiness. Using 4" x 5 " and 8" x 10" view cameras, photographer Walter Wick has done what many would have thought was well nigh impossible. He has systematically photographed some of the world's best known optical illusions. Happen to like the M.C. Escher print where people walk up stairs to a balcony equal in height as to where they started? It's in here. How about cubes whose arms twist in depth defying ways? In here too. Walter Wick is best known for his I Spy book series. With this book, however, he has created a series of amazing oracular photographs that are just as interesting to figure out as they are to look at. Fortunately for the reader, Wicks has included short explanations of how some tricks work and how others fool the eye. He explains how he created his photographs and why some of them work as well as they do. For any child (or, heck, adult) interested in some true to life optical illusions, this is the best book on the market today. But bear in mind, even when Wick's explanations are said and done, some of these photos bear some going over. I, personally, had to read the following sentence five times: "The balcony is attached to the arches in the foreground, but the top of the foreground archway is cut at an angle that matches the angle of the walkway's bottom edge". I'll be honest. I still don't quite know what that means. So if your kid doesn't mind reading some fairly complex explanations like the one above, this book is ideal reading material. If they do mind, best that you find them something a little less brain/word twisting.

5 out of 5 stars tHiS wAs So CoOl.......2001-06-28

This was a cool book cause kids can also read it and try to figure out the optical illusions. It could help them with skool, and its also fun!

5 out of 5 stars Amazing is right!.......2001-03-26

This book is wonderful and it goes to show you what meets the eye. I am a big fan of Walter Wick's, purchased this book for a gift, and had to keep it myself and get another copy to give. This is a wonderful collection to any library and really makes to think...and wonder.... Excellent Job!

5 out of 5 stars Amazing...Great to train operators of printing press.......1998-11-26

I first ordered this book as an nice addition to my library. Nonetheless, once I got it I found an interesting use that I had not thought of before. I decided to show it to different printing press operators at the plant that I help run as a way to convice them of the importance of using a densitometer. Before showing them this book they were reluctant to use them because "we've always done it this way and nobody's complained". With this book I think they now understand that our eyes are not as reliable as we would hope. This book has made my job as plant supervisor easier and in the long run, will definitely help out product's quality assurance.
The Playful Eye: An Album of Visual Delight
Average customer rating: 5 out of 5 stars
  • Get this book, if you love to play with optical illusions, & would like to enjoy further visual diversion off the beaten path!
  • Excellent resource for classic illusions
  • a multi-layered visual treat
The Playful Eye: An Album of Visual Delight
Julian Rothenstein , and Mel Gooding
Manufacturer: Chronicle Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0811826961

Book Description

Is it a crone or a lovely lady? A dapper man with a ascot or a toothless old geezer? Things are not always what they seem at first glance... or even at second or third. The Playful Eye is a virtual feast of games and visual tricks gathered from around the world. With a full-color puzzle or conundrum to tease the eye and intrigue the mind on every page, this generously sized volume goes far beyond other optical illusions books. There's no straining to see garishly colored 3-D images that rarely materialize like those other books of eye candy. These original, antique illustrations garnered from exquisite European and Asian art and ephemera of centuries past are as delightful to look at as they are to play with. A phantasmagoria of hidden images, multiple figures, upside-downs, rebuses, and good old fashioned illusions, this book brings the mysteries of perception into plain sight. Perfect for the artistically inclined and anyone who enjoys visual diversion off the beaten path, The Playful Eye weaves the comic, charming, ingenious, and sinister together in one bustling compendium of optical tricks and games--bringing far more than just beauty to its beholder.

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars Get this book, if you love to play with optical illusions, & would like to enjoy further visual diversion off the beaten path!.......2006-10-21

The Playful Eye: An Album of Visual Delight
by Julian Rothenstein

If you love to play with optical illusions, & would like to enjoy further visual diversion off the beaten path, please get hold of this wonderful book & add it to your personal library.

The Playful Eye is certainly a virtual feast of ingenious games & visual tricks gathered from around the world.

The author has done an excellent job in putting this wonderful compendium together. Kudos!

5 out of 5 stars Excellent resource for classic illusions.......2000-10-28

It is rare when you come across a book on optical illusions that has something new to offer, but this is what sets The Playful Eye apart from many of the other optical illusion books currently on the market.

The Playful Eye is a wonderful collection of classic illusions that were printed on obscure puzzle cards, postcards, trading cards, advertisements, and the like during the late 19th to mid 20th century. The editors have done a remarkable job in collecting these illusions from obscure source material and private collections. What is even more remarkable, and in my mind, one of the best aspects of this charming collection, is the amount of research that they put in labeling the sources for each image. This is a real reference tool for an illusion collector like myself.

The illustrations are wonderful and you are bound to see images that are not seen elsewhere. Lots and lots of fun!

5 out of 5 stars a multi-layered visual treat.......2000-04-20

I love books that make you view things in ways that are unexpected--this book was a treat for my eyes and my brain. I enjoyed the compilation of vivid illustrations from various cultures and periods. I went through the book once to enjoy all of the wonderfully detailed illustrations, then I went back through the book again to tease my mind with the visual play in each one of those colorful pictures. This book is fun and can be enjoyed over and over again.
Can You Believe Your Eyes?: OVER 250 ILLUSIONS AND OTHER VISUAL ODDITIES
Average customer rating: 5 out of 5 stars
  • GREAT FUN & yet very educational...understanding how the brain really works!
  • A great book! It's fun to see different people figure it out
Can You Believe Your Eyes?: OVER 250 ILLUSIONS AND OTHER VISUAL ODDITIES
J. RICHARD BLOCK
Manufacturer: TAYLOR & FRANCIS/ ROUTLEDGE
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0876306954

Book Description

Presents over 250 visual illusions gathered from around the world to explore the psychology of vision. Discusses the phenomenon of human perception and the use of illusions in society.

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars GREAT FUN & yet very educational...understanding how the brain really works!.......2006-03-15

This is the first classic book on visual illusions by J Richard Block, the author, who also wrote a second book entitled 'Seeing Double'. Both are printed in large format. In fact, there is also a card deck which amplifies the earlier book.

Both books discussed the phenomena of human perception through hundreds of perplexing visual illusions & mind-bending eye tricks gathered from around the world.

The entire collection in the two books is definitely amazing and unique in some way.

The best learning experiences I got out of these two wonderful books are a greater understanding - & appreciation - of how the brain really works. I often use many of the visual illusions to demonstrate the principal operating principles of the brain, particularly the salient aspects of selective recognition and patterning. I have also found that some of them have been very useful in demonstrating cognitive traps & pattern interrupts, especially in the context of personal creativity.

Although the visual illusions are fun to play with, I find them very educational, just as what I have elaborated.

There is another type of visual illusions, known as random dot stereograms (some people call them 3D visual illusions), which are more fun but somewhat harder to play with. Nevertheless, they are also very educational, especially in understanding - & appreciating - how the brain really works!

5 out of 5 stars A great book! It's fun to see different people figure it out.......1999-04-02

A great book!!!!Watch others try to figure out the puzzles
Magic Eye: The 3d Guide : A Training Manual
Average customer rating: 5 out of 5 stars
  • Magic eye rules
  • Magic eye rules
  • "Magic Eye will get YOUR eye"
Magic Eye: The 3d Guide : A Training Manual

Manufacturer: Andrews Mcmeel Pub
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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5 out of 5 stars Magic eye rules.......2002-02-17

magic eye is one of the best books to get your imagination going and it helps to keep your eyesight great. The only thing is you cant find this book in any shops so look online!

5 out of 5 stars Magic eye rules.......2002-02-17

magic eye is one of the best books to get your imagination going and it helps to keep your eyesight great. The only thing is you cant find this book in any shops so look online!

5 out of 5 stars "Magic Eye will get YOUR eye".......2000-04-11

I think Magic Eye is a fabulous book for children, and adults. It really brings you into the book and shows you the wonderful world of 3-D. Once you open this book, your eyes will stick to it, and you can't put it down until your done. So please buy this book, you will be happy if you do. Magic Eye is really what I'm saying, it's great!
Is the Visual World a Grand Illusion? (Journal of Consciousness Studies Controversies in Science & the Humanities)
Average customer rating: 4 out of 5 stars
  • Balanced Volume on a Radical New Breed of Scepticism
Is the Visual World a Grand Illusion? (Journal of Consciousness Studies Controversies in Science & the Humanities)

Manufacturer: Imprint Academic
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0907845231

Book Description

There is a traditional scepticism about whether the world "out there" really is as we perceive it. A new breed of hyper-sceptics now challenges whether we even have the perceptual experience we think we have. According to these writers, perceptual consciousness is a kind of false consciousness. This view grows out of the discovery of such phenomena as change blindness and inattentional blindness, which show that we can all be quite blind to changes taking place before our very eyes. Such radical scepticism has acute and widespread implications for the study of perception and consciousness. The writings collected in this volume explore these implications. The contributors are scientists and philosophers at the forefront of this research, and include well-known authors such as psychologists Susan Blackmore and Arien Mack, and philosophers Andy Clark and Daniel Dennett. They have an gift for bringing these paradoxical issues to life and sharing their excitement with the non-specialist.

Customer Reviews:

4 out of 5 stars Balanced Volume on a Radical New Breed of Scepticism.......2005-04-21

IS THE VISUAL WORLD A GRAND ILLUSION?, edited by Alva Noë, tackles an interesting "new breed" of scepticism. Unlike traditional scepticism, which asks whether the world "as it really is out there" is as we perceive it to be, this new breed of sceptics ask whether "we have the perceptual experience we think we have." Given growing work in perceptual theory, including work on illusions, change blindness, and inattentional blindness, some philosophers and perceptual theorists claim that our experience of the world must be a "Grand Illusion" insofar as we fail to "perceive" objects and events that are located smack-dab in the middle of our visual field. On a personal note, I took an upper-level seminar on this new area of perceptual theory and we used this volume as one of our textbooks.

IS THE VISUAL WORLD A GRAND ILLUSION? is a balanced sampling, containing well-written articles from camps that answer the title question both positively and negatively. All of the articles are interesting and thought provoking. If you're looking for some of the most up-to-date work in perceptual theory that connects with broad issues of consciousness, you've come to the right place. In order to save you some time from looking at the list of contributors to this volume, I've provided a list:

Alva Noë - "Is the Visual World a Grand Illusion?"
Daniel C. Dennett - "How Could I Be Wrong? How Wrong Could I Be?
Susan Blackmore - "There Is No Stream of Consciousness"
Bruce Bridgeman - "The Grand Illusion and Petit Illusions: Interactions of Perception and Sensory Coding"
Eric Schwitzgebel - "How Well Do We Know Our Own Conscious Experience? The Case of Visual Imagery"
Dana H. Ballard - "Our Perception of the World Has To Be an Illusion"
Davies, Hoffman, & Rodriguez - "Visual Worlds: Construction or Reconstruction?"
Frank H. Durgin - "The Tinkerbell Effect: Motion Perception and Illusion"
Arien Mack - "Is the Visual World a Grand Illusion? A Response"
Daniel T. Levin - "Change Blindness Blindness As Visual Metacognition"
Charles Siewert - "Is Visual Experience Rich or Poor"
Jonathan Cohen - "The Grand Grand Illusion Illusion"
Mark Rowlands - "Two Dogmas of Consciousness"
Andy Clark - "Is Seeing All It Seems? Action, Reason, and the Grand Illusion"

As you can see, there are some real heavy-hitters in this bunch and the volume has proved very helpful. Even if you are approaching perceptual theory for the first time, this new area of scepticism will fascinate you and many of these articles will prove accessible.
Mind sights: Original visual illusions, ambiguities, and other anomalies, with a commentary on the play of mind in perception and art
Average customer rating: Not rated
    Mind sights: Original visual illusions, ambiguities, and other anomalies, with a commentary on the play of mind in perception and art
    Roger N Shepard
    Manufacturer: W.H. Freeman and Co
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    Seeing: Illusion, Brain and Mind
    Average customer rating: Not rated
      Seeing: Illusion, Brain and Mind
      John P. Frisby
      Manufacturer: Oxford Univ Pr
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      The Optical Unconscious
      Average customer rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
      • Can you see the watcher?
      • unconfortable platform to contemporary culture
      The Optical Unconscious
      Rosalind Krauss
      Manufacturer: The MIT Press
      ProductGroup: Book
      Binding: Hardcover

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      ASIN: 026211173X

      Book Description

      The Optical Unconscious is a pointed protest against the official story of modernism and against the critical tradition that attempted to define modern art according to certain sacred commandments and self-fulfilling truths. The account of modernism presented here challenges the vaunted principle of "vision itself." And it is a very different story than we have ever read, not only because its insurgent plot and characters rise from below the calm surface of the known and law-like field of modernist painting, but because the voice is unlike anything we have heard before. Just as the artists of the optical unconscious assaulted the idea of autonomy and visual mastery, Rosalind Krauss abandons the historian's voice of objective detachment and forges a new style of writing in this book: art history that insinuates diary and art theory, and that has the gait and tone of fiction.

      The Optical Unconscious will be deeply vexing to modernism's standard-bearers, and to readers who have accepted the foundational principles on which their aesthetic is based. Krauss also gives us the story that Alfred Barr, Meyer Shapiro, and Clement Greenberg repressed, the story of a small, disparate group of artists who defied modernism's most cherished self-descriptions, giving rise to an unruly, disruptive force that persistently haunted the field of modernism from the 1920s to the 1950s and continues to disrupt it today.

      In order to understand why modernism had to repress the optical unconscious, Krauss eavesdrops on Roger Fry in the salons of Bloomsbury, and spies on the toddler John Ruskin as he amuses himself with the patterns of a rug; we find her in the living room of Clement Greenberg as he complains about "smart Jewish girls with their typewriters" in the 1960s, and in colloquy with Michael Fried about Frank Stella's love of baseball. Along the way, there are also narrative encounters with Freud, Jacques Lacan, Georges Bataille, Roger Caillois, Gilles Deleuze, and Jean-François Lyotard.

      To embody this optical unconscious, Krauss turns to the pages of Max Ernst's collage novels, to Marcel Duchamp's hypnotic Rotoreliefs, to Eva Hesse's luminous sculptures, and to Cy Twombly's, Andy Warhol's, and Robert Morris's scandalous decoding of Jackson Pollock's drip pictures as "Anti-Form." These artists introduced a new set of values into the field of twentieth-century art, offering ready-made images of obsessional fantasy in place of modernism's intentionality and unexamined compulsions.

      Rosalind Krauss is Professor of Art History at Columbia University and an editor of the journal October.

      Customer Reviews:

      5 out of 5 stars Can you see the watcher?.......2001-06-26

      Kraus's "The Optical Unconcious" is a good companion, as it were, to Martin Jay's "Downcast Eyes." Both discuss the dilema of visuality in Modernist thought and then -whoa - bring out post-modernism just by speaking about the eye and seeing. While Jay gets technical with his notion of "occular centrism," Kraus lets us feel what it means to watch or be watched. Her approach to the male gaze, the fashionable term for good old fashioned voyerism, is that it is natural. Sure, it one can analyse it as a by product of the failure of the industrial revolution to liberate people from work and to bring about more leisure time for the masses (by implication create greater equality - fewer people watching each other in the negative sense). Krauss is right when she insists that looking is a normal, natural occurance in contemporary society. She is also on target about the obsession Americans have with time, and that sight is the quickest method of human understanding. A great book!

      4 out of 5 stars unconfortable platform to contemporary culture.......2000-02-09

      Through a carefully structured narrative agenda, Rosalind Krauss is able to foreshadow, a compromised and descriptive text, about the contemporary use of the word "understand", specially if applied to the modernist arts and its criticism. Greatly to the advantage of us, lesser audiences, every thesis is exhibited with both academic rigor and narrative richness, permiting thus, the emergence of rich and useful images, powerful to illustrate, vinculate, even sometimes explain, many of the contemporary works of other theorists, that come to the text sometimes to expose, sometimes to poison, the general arguments around modernist production and the understanding of arts. Great for abbandoning oneself into insomnia, it is common to find provocative images, greatly to the advantage of self-involment in the arguments, and to the further underdstanding of the actual state of simbolical exchange, in the present tense. The involment in contemporary thought and debate, and the well constructed historical narrative, provides the text with an surprisingly effective mirror to look at our culture at an compromisingly close viewpoint, in wich many constitutive arguments of contemporary culture today are reflected just as the many of the historical lies that are still at use now at the "explaining" of the artistic pulsions, and its assimilation by the artistic institutions.
      The Nature of Visual Illusion
      Average customer rating: Not rated
        The Nature of Visual Illusion
        Mark Fineman
        Manufacturer: Dover Publications
        ProductGroup: Book
        Binding: Paperback

        NeuropsychologyNeuropsychology | Psychology & Counseling | Health, Mind & Body | Subjects | Books
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        Similar Items:
        1. Visual Illusions Visual Illusions
        2. The Science of Illusions The Science of Illusions
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        ASIN: 0486291057

        Book Description

        Fascinating, profusely illustrated study of the human visual perception system explores the psychology and physiology of vision, including such topics as light and color, motion receptors, the illusion of movement, kinetic art, how we perceive size, how our eyes move, phantoms of the visual system, and more. Over 100 illustrations.

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