# What color is this dress? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [February 27, 2015, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742 "2015-02-27T02:07:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Kamino\_Neko](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kamino_neko/32/34_2.png) [@Kamino\_Neko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kamino_Neko)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 6:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742/61 "2015-02-27T06:43:31Z")
> [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > Xkcd is now [on the case](http://www.xkcd.com/1492/). Which FINALLY makes the frigging trim look black in the centre panel. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 6:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742/62 "2015-02-27T06:46:51Z")
This [illusion](http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/01121/same-color-illusio_1121075i.jpg) fools me completely. I know that the two squares marked A and B are the same shade of gray. I can even make a little cut out that covers the rest of the picture and I can see they’re identical. But when I look at the overall picture they look different and I can’t force my mind to see them as being the same. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 7:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742/63 "2015-02-27T07:00:11Z")
> [@Kamino\_Neko](#): > > Which FINALLY makes the frigging trim look black in the centre panel. Yeah, Xkcd did an excellent job of presenting both “sides”. I think it really comes down to how people interpret the background. It looks like bright sunlight to me (and hence I always thought the dress looked blue+black), but not everyone is going to think the same way (certainly not at a conscious level). If I may rant a bit, I think this goes to show that many so-called optical illusions are not illusions at all. Instead, they are our brains making a judgment on incomplete data. There is _no such thing_ as absolute color. There is only color under a certain lighting condition. And lighting conditions vary far more widely than it seems. That our brains can see consistent colors _at all_ is a testament to how well our brains actually work. Black asphalt is brighter under daylight than white paper is under typical indoor conditions–and yet we _always_ see the former as black and the latter white. Our brains reverse engineer it. Very occasionally, they get it wrong. Usually when the context is itself ambiguous (as it is in the dress pic) or artificially removed (as it frequently is in constructed illusions). That our brains get it right the other 99.999% of the time is an astonishing feat. ---
**Author:** ![MeanOldLady](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/meanoldlady/32/10737_2.png) [@MeanOldLady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MeanOldLady)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 7:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742/64 "2015-02-27T07:01:48Z")
Is this some kind of troll? If we’re tallying votes, count me as “I don’t even understand where the black is coming from. It’s white/gold. I guess I can see the blue aspect, but that’s just lighting.” ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 7:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742/65 "2015-02-27T07:02:42Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > This [illusion](http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/01121/same-color-illusio_1121075i.jpg) fools me completely. I think I broke my brain on that one a few years ago. Somehow I trained myself to see the two gray levels as the same (as they are in terms of pure RGB values). Now I can’t see it the “normal” way. Which is bad since if that were a real-world image, the two checkerboard tiles _would_ have been different colors. ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 7:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742/66 "2015-02-27T07:05:37Z")
I have studied color science for many years. I know what color constancy is. I have zero problem with understanding that the blocks [in this image](http://www.handprint.com/HP/WCL/IMG/contrst10b.gif) are the same color or that [the squares here](http://www.huevaluechroma.com/pics/3-4.jpg) are the same color. I get how a blue illumination can affect our perception. But I do not see how one can see this as more white than blue in any capacity. The rest might not be a jet black but it is a washed out dark color and not gold. XKCD doesn’t help anything, that’s a very weak color contrast effect. ETA: Re: **Dr. Strangelove** post #63: it still is an illusion in a sense, but that is a very good point to note. Our brains aren’t being faulty and confused. They are doing a calculation that helps us see the world accurately 99.99% of the time, and we are now seeing the 0.00…000001% of the time where it doesn’t work. ---
**Author:** ![Idle\_Thoughts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/838e76/32.png) [@Idle\_Thoughts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idle_Thoughts)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 7:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742/67 "2015-02-27T07:26:46Z")
> [@elfkin477](#): > > This is confusing. The linked photo is gold and white. But when someone posted what supposed to be the same picture on Twitter today, it was black and blue. Not too confusing: It’s the same dress. The human mind is what makes it confusing due to how we see and process colors. Someone may have already posted this link in here (I haven’t read the whole thing yet), but I find [this one described it best.](http://io9.com/the-what-color-is-this-goddamn-dress-debate-explaine-1688378120) ---
**Author:** ![Idle\_Thoughts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/838e76/32.png) [@Idle\_Thoughts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idle_Thoughts)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 7:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742/68 "2015-02-27T07:36:46Z")
For those of you still seeing it as white (or blue) and gold: Tilt your monitor back a bit or (if your monitor doesn’t move), move your head lower so that you’re looking at the picture of the dress from below (looking upwards at it, while your head is at the same level as your desk/table). It should look the true color now (black and blue)…the color it really is. I also found that looking at the bottom part of the dress (the last three lines of it) helped turn it blue for me. I originally was in the “That is clearly white and GOLD” camp, but now it’s black and blue. ---
**Author:** ![Sophistry\_and\_Illusion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b3f665/32.png) [@Sophistry\_and\_Illusion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sophistry_and_Illusion)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 8:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742/69 "2015-02-27T08:11:27Z")
> [@Suburban\_Plankton](#): > > OK, I hate you. > > I opened that link, which shows a number of different versions of the same photograph, digitally manipulated to show how different levels of lighting make the colors appear differently. That’s fine; I understand that, and it doesn’t bother me in the least./ So after reading that page, I thought I’d bring up the original post (which I still had open in another browser tab) and put it side-by-side with the edited version to compare the two. > > AND NOW I SEE THE ORIGINAL PICTURE AS BEING BLUE AND BLACK!!! > > It’s the same web page I was looking at 5 minutes before. I didn’t close and reopen it; I didn’t refresh it. It was the same pixels, the same its of data, just sitting there on my computer screen waiting for me to look at them. And now THEY HAVE CHANGED COLOR. > > I am NOT happy about this. Me, too. I feel like I have fallen down the rabbit hole. When I saw this yesterday, I thought, “Well, it’s obviously white and gold; this is just another case of the internet being stupid.” And then today I followed the buzzfeed link and saw a dark blue and black dress. “Obviously a different dress,” I think. “Those wacky internet pranksters!” I then later go back to the same tab, and the dress is now CLEARLY WHITE AND GOLD. WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO MY BRAIN!?!?!? ---
**Author:** ![Jragon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e19b73/32.png) [@Jragon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jragon)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 8:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742/70 "2015-02-27T08:14:12Z")
It looks like all four to me. No joke. At the same time. Around the left and right of dress, I clearly see it as black/blue, but as the light reflects off the middle, there’s a pretty hard gradient into gold/white. It’s absolutely clear to me, though, that black/blue is the natural color and white/gold is a lighting/contrast problem. ---
**Author:** ![SeaDragonTattoo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/df705f/32.png) [@SeaDragonTattoo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SeaDragonTattoo)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 8:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742/71 "2015-02-27T08:22:10Z")
> [@levdrakon](#): > > What about people looking at the same monitor, and seeing different things? That’s the room I’d really like to be in! I can only speculate, are they taking turns looking from the same perspective? Are they the same distance and angle from the screen? I’m not certain, so can’t say. If I were there, I would also pull the image up on my phone and see if others would do the same for comparison. ---
**Author:** ![Idle\_Thoughts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/838e76/32.png) [@Idle\_Thoughts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idle_Thoughts)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 8:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742/72 "2015-02-27T08:25:54Z")
**SeaDragonTattoo** , what happened in my case was that I looked at it the first time, then looked at another photo of the same dress, and when I looked back at the first one (same angle, same monitor, same everything), It was clearly a different color. So I don’t think it has anything to do with screen colors or angles viewed, I think it just has to do with it being a good illusion. ---
**Author:** ![Namkcalb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/c89c15/32.png) [@Namkcalb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Namkcalb)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 8:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742/73 "2015-02-27T08:42:07Z")
On a sunny day, with my monitor set to medium, it appears blue and goldy-black ---
**Author:** ![Lord\_Feldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lord_feldon/32/341_2.png) [@Lord\_Feldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Feldon)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 8:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742/74 "2015-02-27T08:50:11Z")
> [@Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](#): > > Anyone who looks at that photo and thinks they are seeing white either has shitty eyesight or a monitor with an awful color display or has the brightness on their monitor up way too high. When I first saw it, I didn’t think I was “seeing white.” I thought I was seeing a representation of a white garment under bluish light (specifically, I thought the main light source was a computer monitor). I was _seeing_ the blue but attributing it to something other than the color of the cloth. (I don’t think it’s white any more, though, and I’m even understanding how it could be black too.) ---
**Author:** ![Sodalite](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/34f0e0/32.png) [@Sodalite](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sodalite)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 9:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742/75 "2015-02-27T09:18:12Z")
> [@Idle\_Thoughts](#): > > For those of you still seeing it as white (or blue) and gold: > > Tilt your monitor back a bit or (if your monitor doesn’t move), move your head lower so that you’re looking at the picture of the dress from below (looking upwards at it, while your head is at the same level as your desk/table). > > It should look the true color now (black and blue)…the color it really is. > > I also found that looking at the bottom part of the dress (the last three lines of it) helped turn it blue for me. I originally was in the “That is clearly white and GOLD” camp, but now it’s black and blue. Pretty much this. I’ve seen it both ways and figured out how to change it on purpose. At first I was only seeing it as dark cobalt blue and black. I looked again later and it was white with gold. The color changed based on where I was. Now if I move the screen on my laptop I can make it change from blue/black to periwinkle/bronze, to light blue/brown, to white/gold and some others. ---
**Author:** ![Tamerlane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tamerlane/32/7602_2.png) [@Tamerlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamerlane)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 9:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742/76 "2015-02-27T09:28:47Z")
> [@Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](#): > > Anyone who looks at that photo and thinks they are seeing white either has shitty eyesight or a monitor with an awful color display or has the brightness on their monitor up way too high. I _mostly_ can’t see it as anything other than white and gold. The mostly comes from **Omega Glory** ’s trick scrolling so only the bottom half of the dress is visible - that worked turning it somewhat blue and brown. But that ONLY worked with the old, dull, poorly calibrated 19" monitor at work. When I got home and checked my reasonably high quality, calibrated HP ZR24w 24" monitor, I now can only see white and gold no matter what I do, how many times I check and which picture ( outside of the corrected versions ) I look at. I have 20/20 vision ( as of ~ 8 months ago ) and no type of color blindness. I really don’t think it is bad vision or ( primarily ) a shitty monitor effect. Looks like differences in neural wiring. To quote from one of the earlier links: _“Our visual system is supposed to throw away information about the illuminant and extract information about the actual reflectance,” says Jay Neitz, a neuroscientist at the University of Washington. “But I’ve studied individual differences in color vision for 30 years, and this is one of the biggest individual differences I’ve ever seen.” (Neitz sees white-and-gold.)_ ---
**Author:** ![Mr\_Shine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mr_shine/32/464_2.png) [@Mr\_Shine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr_Shine)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 10:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742/77 "2015-02-27T10:25:00Z")
I haven’t read the thread. 100% White and Gold. ---
**Author:** ![hogarth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hogarth/32/1773_2.png) [@hogarth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hogarth)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 11:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742/78 "2015-02-27T11:46:19Z")
> [@MeanOldLady](#): > > Is this some kind of troll? If we’re tallying votes, count me as “I don’t even understand where the black is coming from. It’s white/gold. I guess I can see the blue aspect, but that’s just lighting.” According to MS Paint, the trim is: R 120 G 105 B 66 Not even close to R 0, G 0, B 0. EDIT: I see they discussed this in the Wired article. ---
**Author:** ![Alley\_Dweller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alley_dweller/32/430_2.png) [@Alley\_Dweller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alley_Dweller)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 11:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742/79 "2015-02-27T11:49:19Z")
If anyone has seen the [other big news story of the day](http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2015/02/26/breaking-two-llamas-are-on-the-run/), you might appreciate [this picture](https://twitter.com/mec0420/status/571137915109179392/photo/1). [This article in Wired](http://www.wired.com/2015/02/science-one-agrees-color-dress/) has a quote from a neuroscientist who suggests that perhaps night owls might be more likely to see the dress as black and blue, but, believe me, I often go for weeks without seeing natural daylight and I am 100% on Team White and Gold. There is nothing I can do (scroll the picture, look at other pictures, stare at parts of the picture) that makes me see anything but white and gold. I also notice that when I type “what” into the search box in google, the first suggestion it gives me is “what color is this dress.” ---
**Author:** ![Lord\_Feldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lord_feldon/32/341_2.png) [@Lord\_Feldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Feldon)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2015, 12:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742/80 "2015-02-27T12:01:22Z")
After seeing [this](http://brianking.org/post/112201321259), I’ve come to accept that it probably is just a stupid picture of a blue and black dress. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-color-is-this-dress/713742.md?page=5)