@bjbalas
Vision Scientist, Dad, Would-be artist & dreadful chess player. Check out my new #visionscience textbook here: https://www.routledge.com/Practical-Vision-Science-Learning-Through-Experimentation/Balas/p/book/9781032691121 All opinions my own.
Hey #visionscience friends - I'm looking to touch base with someone who knows lots about color, esp. contrast/assimilation effects. I'm working on a video about something and I'm worried I'm getting tangled up in part of the explanation. Thanks!
After spending the last ~2 years studying face #pareidolia, I am confident that the best ones are the ones expressing mild panic.
Damn. Listen, the only award I actually covet is an Ig Nobel. I loved attending the lectures in undergrad and I hope they can come back to the US someday.
New YouTube video on my SeeingScience channel about partnering with Fargo's Plains Art Museum on this month's Kid Quest! We worked with the Kid Quest team on incorporating #face #pareidolia into the art kids were seeing in the collection and making in the studio. Enjoy! #sciart
I'm not a gambler, but if I was, this is how I'd roll.
100 years of the Fargo Theatre! We're looking forward to the 20's Soiree this weekend and excited to see the documentary (which apparently features our kid talking about how much she loves David Lynch). 🎥🍿🎉
Just freakin' incredible.
👁️🌕
#Pareidolia #Pareidolie #Iseefaces #FacesInThings #FacesInPlaces #ThingsWithFaces #Moon #NationalPark #Utah
©️Photo: Elliot McGucken
I love my new VR Headset! 😀
#Pareidolia #Pareidolie #Iseefaces #FacesInThings #FacesInPlaces #ThingsWithFaces #VR
I thought this business about Jim Carrey possibly having a doppelganger required a response from someone who thinks a lot about the #Science of #FaceRecognition. Enjoy! youtube.com/shorts/PpPU_...
Still learning the ropes at YouTube, but I've got a new version of my Ames Room video set up as a Short now! Check out the #science of how linear perspective cues can lead you to make big errors when judging object size! #psychscisky #visionscience youtube.com/shorts/a0uPD...
My wife spotted a rebel meadowlark in ND a few days ago!
This thread has some incredible #sciart for you to marvel at. Give @artologica.net a follow for more!
Just put up a new YouTube short about a classic #cogsci experiment: Our poor memory for what a penny looks like! Given that the penny is retiring, I thought it was worth talking about this great piece of #psychology history. Enjoy!
The kiddo just put up her first article over at Medium! This one's a great discussion of Shelley Duvall's performance in The Shining, so go check it out if you like #HorrorMovies and great pop-culture writing! #FilmSky #HorrorSky
A new #science of #chess post over on my lichess blog! This time I'm looking at a study demonstrating that stronger players make automatic predictions of next moves that affect their perception for better and for worse. Enjoy!
Just finished reading @jesselonergan.bsky.social's fantastic DROME. To borrow a word from the book, this one feels "elemental." So many beautiful panels and pages, and the way movement stands out as a core component of the narrative was fascinating. Def. going to read and re-read this one.
Now published in Perception (@pec-ipe.bsky.social)!
Schulz-Hildebrandt, H. (2026). When purple perceived only at fixation: A fixation- and distance-dependent color illusion. Perception, 0(0). doi.org/10.1177/0301...
I'm incredibly excited for this year's Fargo Film Festival! This year I was a jury member, so I can tell you that there's a bunch of excellent submissions coming to the newly-renovated Fargo Theatre in a few weeks. Get yourself to Fargo and check out some great films!
Thought I'd share this scratch-art portrait of the Log Lady in honor of #TwinPeaks day. Like so many of my portraits, it looks a little like a combination of the person I was trying to draw and someone I know personally (in this case, one of b's grade-school teachers).
This is great!
The kiddo is almost certainly going to watch the pilot for the umpteenth time on this #TwinPeaks Day and I might just have to join her.
Gearing up for our Spectacular Science Celebration at #NDSU tomorrow and thought I'd post a quick video of one of the demos we'll have out: The tiny Ames Room! #visionscience #stemeducation
I've got a new #visionscience #scicomm video for you! In this one, I talk about one of our recent papers about face #pareidolia - enjoy! #PsychSciSky #STEMEducation
You don’t need Disney-level resources and drawing skills to create animation.
People have made classics with sand and a source of light. With magazine clippings, or their own bodies animated via stop motion. There’s no barrier to entry, as we explore: animationobsessive.substack.com/p/sand-and-a...
A flapper in a bat costume with spread wings against a backdrop of sun rays
A woman and her collie in a forest of birch trees, their forms interplaying with the brown of the background
A well-dressed lady inspects several hats in a nicely-appointed milliner’s shop. She is picked out from the black background by the red buttons and detailing on her long coat.
A young lady poses in front of a beach umbrella, the shadow tones merging her figure with it.
C. Coles Phillips was an illustrator born in Springfield OH, a longtime staff artist at Life magazine & Good Housekeeping’s sole cover artist from 1912-14. He was famous for his “fadeaway girls,” figures which use the background color & negative space to fill in the blanks.
#historyofillustration
Movie night at home with WAITING FOR GUFFMAN. We were waaaay past due for showing this to the kiddo and it was absolutely as funny as I remembered. #movies
My Mid-Western Dad streak continues: First, I was interviewed about snow shoveling a few months ago. Now, I'm lurking in the background of the photo accompanying a local news story about the Kiwanis Pancake event I volunteered at today. #dadenergy
Excellent #ValentinesDay post from @blaisebalas.bsky.social about #HorrorMovies and #Romance and why they go together so well. Go read and subscribe for your regular fix of great pop culture writing! buttondown.com/blaisebalas/...
Anna Atkins' blue algae and the dawn of photography boingboing.net/2026/02/12/a...
