Friday, October 5, 2018

Making a Hollow-Mask Illusion


The "Hollow-Mask Illusion" involves tricking the viewer into thinking a negative form is positive.


Creating this effect involved:
1) Making a negative mold from the face of the original sculpt (which is by Jake Hebbert). I used Magic Sculpt for this.
2) attaching that to a positive sculpt of the base
3) Lighting everything in the scene - except the hollow face - with a light from the upper right. I used a gobo on a wire to block light on the hollow face.
4) Lighting only the hollow face with light from the lower left, using an oval mask to shield everything else.


A computer generated version of this is called the "Rotating Mask Illusion."

You can make your own interactive version of this out of paper. 
Magic Sculpt

1 comment:

Linda said...

The Haunted Mansion at Disneyland has examples of these, right after you exit the first elevator ("this room has no windows and no doors...")