Elon Musk optical illusion is absolute nightmare fuel

What's better than an utterly perplexing optical illusion, you ask? An illusion that features a celebrity, of course. Business mogul Elon Musk has taken over the wacky world of optical illusions today with this mind-bending (and slightly disturbing) design. 

This illusion, created by The Sun, looks fairly normal, right? Well, if you look a little closer, you may realise that there's something off about this upturned pic. If you turn your device around so the photo is the right way up, you can see a terrifying edited image of Musk. Loving this brain-boggler and fancy some more? Check out our round-up of our favourite optical illusions. 

When you flip the illusion, you can see that Musk's eyes are actually the wrong way around. The design uses the famous Thatcher effect phenomenon. The Guardian explains that "when we’re presented with an inverted face, we aren’t easily able to process information about configuration, so we instead rely on information about the individual features alone," meaning that we don't see anything wrong in the photo until its the right way around. 

You can even create your very own topsy-turvy illusion by heading over to ThatcherEffect.com and inserting a pic of your choice (brace yourselves though, the results are nightmare fuel). And if that doesn't satisfy your craving to create your own mind-bogglers, then check out this online optical illusion maker we discovered earlier this week.  

If you'd like to have a go at making your own unsettling optical illusions, then why not download Photoshop and get creating? Or if you'd rather just admire some more brilliant mind-bogglers, then make sure you check out our roundup of our favourite trompe l'oleil illusions. 

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