The exciting game of perception and illusion.
At phaeno, seeing becomes an experience! Fascinating exhibits about perspectives and optical illusions show how our brain interprets reality - and sometimes leads us astray.
What is real? And what is only in our heads?
"Perspective is the key to realisation - if you learn to see differently, you also learn to think differently. Our visitors playfully discover how subjective perception is - and how much fun science can be." ~ Dominik Essing, curator at phaeno
People are standing in the same room - one seems tiny, the other huge. But as soon as they swap places, the picture changes abruptly. What's going on here?
The Ames room is distorted in a trapezoidal shape - the floor, walls and ceiling are askew, but constructed in such a way that everything looks completely "normal" from the right perspective. This deliberate illusion utilises the way our brain normally interprets rooms: It assumes right angles and parallel lines - and that's exactly what misleads us.
Our brain automatically "calculates" the depth and size of a room - based on experience from its own world. In Ames space, however, these empirical values are deliberately undermined. This creates an optical illusion in which size and distance are completely misjudged. A great demonstration of how visual perception works - and why we shouldn't always trust our own eyes.
Step inside and experience how your balance goes haywire! In the Inclined Room, water seems to flow uphill, people lean against "straight" walls and you suddenly feel askew yourself.
Unlike the Ames Room, this room really is slanted - but your brain thinks everything is straight. This brings your senses into conflict: your eyes and sense of balance contradict each other. The result? An amazing feeling and lots of amazement!
Science you can feel - and laughter guaranteed!
In science, we speak of a "sensory conflict". Your brain has to constantly synchronise information from different senses in order to provide you with a stable picture of the world. In this room, we will show you how quickly this "reality" can become unstable - in the truest sense of the word!
What do you see - columns or figures? At first glance, they appear to be simple pillars standing next to each other. But if you concentrate on the spaces in between, angel silhouettes appear. This interplay between figure and background shows impressively how strongly our perception is influenced by expectations and focus. You can switch - but never see both at the same time.
How is a shadow created? And why can a small witch look bigger than a large house?
In this exciting exhibit, you can build your own shadow scene with various figures such as a house, fir tree, wolf or witch. In the process, you will playfully learn how distance, size and light interact. All the figures are available in three different sizes - but be careful: Only the right distance from the light source will result in equal shadow lengths!
This exhibit shows in a playful way how perception, physics and maths are connected - and how easy it is to be deceived. The focus is always on having fun!
