A baffling optical illusion featuring a horse has taken the internet by storm, leaving viewers scratching their heads as a monochrome image miraculously bursts into full colour before their eyes.
The Viral Phenomenon Explained
The illusion was shared by Dean Jackson, known on social media as @beatonthebeeb, on 22nd November 2025. It features a black and white image of a horse standing among sunflowers and paving stones. The trick, according to Jackson, requires viewers to focus intently on the horse's eye throughout his one-minute explanation video.
He reveals that the apparent colour transformation occurs due to a scientific phenomenon called retinal fatigue. During the clip, Jackson superimposes psychedelic colours over the original image – such as turning the sunflowers blue – which he states are purposely added to fatigue specific receptors in your retina.
When I remove them only the ones that are needed to colour the picture should be stimulated, Dean explained in the video, which concludes with a countdown before looping back to the start.
Viewer Reactions to the Mind-Bending Trick
The clip has generated a wave of astonished comments from users who tried the illusion for themselves.
One impressed user remarked: For a split second it was so much more colourful than I thought.
Another user described the experience as wild, noting: When I looked to the side at the flowers, it immediately went black and white. I’d shift my focus back to the eye and the colours came back! Incredible!
Others were surprised by the intensity of the effect, with one person stating: I definitely wasn’t expecting it to be so vivid. Another user even reported being jump scared by the sudden burst of colour, causing them to blink and reset the illusion.
A final user perfectly summarised the interactive nature of the trick: That's so cool. when I look away from the eye it's black and white again, but if I look back into the eye the colour came back.
The Science Behind Optical Illusions
So how do these visual tricks actually work? Optical illusions don't just deceive the eyes; they exploit how our brains process visual information.
As explained by How Stuff Works: Our perception of optical illusions is controlled by our brains. For instance, the brain can effortlessly flip between different interpretations of a two-dimensional image to create a three-dimensional perception.
The fundamental research in this field is so significant that the 1981 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded, in part, to David Hubel and Torsten Wiesel for their discoveries in how the brain interprets signals from the eyes.
They identified a stepwise process where each nerve cell or neuron in the brain is responsible for a specific detail in the pattern of the retinal image. Despite this advanced understanding of how different brain regions handle colour, form, motion, and texture, scientists acknowledge that the complete picture of how these messages combine to create our overall perception remains a complex mystery.
