An optical illusion that makes others think you have blue eyes

Just by looking at this woman’s eye color, what is your first impression of her eyes? This is blue, right? However, in reality, this photo has no blue in the woman’s eyes at all and all she’s experiencing is just a baffling optical illusion.

The phenomenon recently exploded onto the internet when famous biologist Dr. Dean Jackson posted a video explaining the science behind the stunning image.

In the video, Jackson explains that by applying a red filter to a black and white photo of a woman, we see her eyes as blue. But in fact, it is impossible for blue light to pass through the red shade.

Instead, the woman’s eyes are gray—just as they were before the filter was applied—and our brains have simply formed the bright blue we seem to see whenever we look into her pupils.

But why does this happen? As the biologist explains, our brain detects pigment — the gray area around the pupil — and assumes that the red filter has trapped blue light. “So it’s trying to help us, as it should help our brains, by putting blue back into the picture for you,” Jackson explains.

Of course, this isn’t the first time our brain has “played” with the colors it actually perceives and what our eyes actually see – just this optical illusion is a small lesson in how our vision often fails to distinguish between fantasy and reality.