Easily solve “spot the difference” pictures within seconds

June 8, 2007 by Rob Dunn |

Remember those ‘Spot the difference pictures’ puzzle games when you were a kid?  Remember how long it took you to find them all?  I had troubles - enough so that I was the last person to finish them and go out and play kickball!  No longer, I say!

Introducing a sure-fire way to find all the differences in “spot the difference” picture puzzles in a matter of seconds.  Only two requirements:

  • You must have that “magic eye” skill used with those goofy pictures from the 90’s (involving crossing your eyes)
  • The “spot the difference” pictures should be side by side for this technique to work.  If they are below and above each other, just rotate the pictures/page so they are side by side.  If they are skewed, you can tilt your head a bit…although you’d probably look a little funny.

Ok, once you have found a suitable picture…

  1. Stare at the pictures, begin to cross your eyes.
  2. You should see a third image appear between the two pictures.
  3. Focus on the middle picture, adjusting the tilt of your head so both pictures line up exactly.
  4. Once you’ve focused on the image, all the differences should look “luminescent”.

*This picture from AllStarPuzzles (click this link for the full size version)

Spot all 21 differences!

The trick is to cross your eyes so that your left eye is looking at the right image, and your right eye is looking at the left image.  Once they both line up, you should be focused on a joined image (a mesh of the two).  The differences will “glow” because one eye is seeing something different than the other.

The real trouble to this technique is to convince your eyes to lock on to the third image, but once you get the hang of it, it should take you no time at all. 

Now go and impress your drunk friends!

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19 Comments »

Comment by hale
2007-06-08 21:55:51
Cool idea! imma destroy those puzzles now
Comment by jimmy
2008-05-03 19:02:09
Since i was about 14 i thought i was the only one who knew this, i forgot i could do it and then when i was about 20 i saw these games machines appear in pubs which had spot the difference on them. i realized i could do this again,i could spot the difference in literally <3 seconds ( to the amazement of my mates and sometimes some other random people) this was fun as it paid for my nights out (extra 200 quid from 2 machines was nice every week) at that point i decided to go and rinse as many machines as i possibly could… then they somewhat unfairly upgraded all machines with this game to make it IMPOSSIBLE to achieve the jackpot.. yes i have tried many many times but they really do cheat you. it is 100% impossible now (most unfair). Anyway it is a neat trick that has other uses sometimes aswell. gives you eye strain the first times you do it but you get used to it.
 
 
Comment by Jen
2007-06-09 00:34:18
AWESOME!

Where can I find more examples?

 
Comment by adrian
2007-06-09 01:39:37
the guy in the second photo is different from the one in the first.
isn`t he?
 
Comment by fett Subscribed to comments via email
2007-06-09 08:41:00
very efficient method, i must say
 
Comment by fett Subscribed to comments via email
2007-06-09 08:44:35
oh, i forgot: it actually doesn’t matter whether you cross your eyes (left eye on the right picture, right eye on the left) or look straight through (left -> left, right -> right), as with those 3d pictures. The latter method is much easier to me, though.
 
Comment by Stavros
2007-06-09 12:16:31
Looking at them straight is easier for me as well, but you’re limited in the size of the stereograms you can look at this way.
 
Comment by cool
2007-06-09 16:37:23
Kudos that was cool!
 
Comment by alex
2007-06-09 18:30:07
It helps me actually to uncross my eyes from a crossed position.
 
Comment by MaN|acZ
2007-06-09 23:24:12
wow..this is really cool… Thanks for the info
 
Comment by Greg Trasuk
2007-06-10 06:38:13
Easier, and less likely to give you a headache, just turn the pictures upside down. That way your brain sees the images rather than interpreting the shapes into meaning. In other words, you see “square, circle, arc” rather than “person”.
 
Comment by Frank
2007-06-10 09:16:44
For more great pictures visit this side:

http://www.fotocommunity.de/pc/pc/display/777504

 
Comment by Devin
2007-06-10 13:31:00
Very cool.
 
2007-06-10 13:52:26
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Comment by Anonymous
2007-06-11 03:31:31
I’ve actually been doing this for years. I don’t remember whether I got the idea from stereo pairs or wallpaper images, but I’m pretty sure it was one of the two.
 
Comment by Angela
2007-07-18 16:18:31
Niiiice… that’s awesome!
 
Comment by Cobin
2007-09-02 03:15:18
I’ve actually been doing this trick for years. The thing is you’re not crossing your eyes towards each other. If you focus on a distant object and you stick your finger into view without changing focus, you’ll see two fingers. This is because the brain combines the two focused images from far but the finger is at different angles to each of the eyes. This parallax error can be used to view two similar foreground images at once while actually focusing in the distance. With practice comes speed. For instance, focus far away again and stick up both your pointer fingers into view, unless you had some bad sawmill accident then you can just use pens…. you can set your fingers farther and farther apart and practice making them combine into one finger that is a combination of both in between the the left and right finger. I’ve never thought my super secret cheat to this bar room favorite would get out.
 
Comment by abigail
2007-10-20 15:54:20
I can see a couple…I wanna do another one!
 
Comment by hadiya
2007-12-31 17:35:56
i found about 18 or 19 (cant remember… lol) differences in that thing…..
its cool
 
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