Best Illusion of the Year Contest
The Best Illusion of the Year Contest is an annual recognition of the world's illusion creators awarded by the Neural Correlate Society. The contest was created in 2005 by professors Susana Martinez-Conde and Stephen Macknik as part of the European conference on Visual Perception in La Coruna, Spain. It has since transitioned to an online contest where everyone in the world is invited to and vote for the winner.
The contest decides on the most impressive perceptual or cognitive illusion of the year. An illusion is a perceptual or cognitive experience that does not match the physical reality.
As human experience is generated indirectly by brain mechanisms that interact with the physical reality, the study of illusions offers insight into the neural bases of perception and cognition. The community includes neuroscientists, ophthalmologists, neurologists, and visual artists that create illusions to help discover the neural underpinnings of illusory perception.
The Best Illusion of the Year Contest consists of three stages: submission, initial review, and voting of winners. The initial review is conducted by a panel of judges who are world experts in the science, art, and science education. The judge panel narrows the submissions to the Top Ten finalists, and viewers from all over the world can vote for the winner online. The top three winners receive cash awards.
Neural Correlate Society
The Neural Correlate Society is a nonprofit 5013 organization that promotes research into the neural bases of perception and cognition. The organization serves a community of neuroscientists, ophthalmologists, neurologists, and artists who use a variety of methods to help discover the underpinnings of the human experience.The NCS hosts a variety of events, including the Best Illusion of the Year Contest, that highlight important new discoveries to the public.
Champions of Illusion
The Illusions
Award Recipients
The following table details the first, second, and third place recipients from each year of the contest since its inception.| Year | First Place | Second Place | Third Place |
| 2005 | Title: Motion Illusion Building Blocks Created by: Arthur Shapiro & Justin Charles | Title: Two-Stroke Apparent Motion Created by: George Mather | Title: Elusive Arch Created by: Dejan Todorović |
| 2006 | Title: The Freezing Rotation Illusion Created by: Max Dürsteler | Title: The Infinite Regression Illusion Created by: Peter Tse | Title:The Bar-Cross-Ellipse Illusion Created by: Gideon Caplovitz & Peter Tse |
| 2007 | Title: The Leaning Tower Illusion Created by: Frederick Kingdom, Ali Yoonessi, & Elena Gheorghiu | Title: The Illusory Contoured Tilting Pyramid Created by: Pietro Guardini & Luciano Gamberini | Title: Where Has All the Motion Gone? Created by: Arthur Shapiro & Emily Knight |
| 2008 | Title: Filling in the Afterimage After the Image Created by: Rob van Lier & Mark Vergeer | Title: Ghostly Gaze Created by: Rob Jenkins | Title: Rolling Eyes on a Hollow Mask Created by: Thomas Papathomas |
| 2009 | Title: The Break of the Curveball Created by: Arthur Shapiro, Zhong-Lin Lu, Emily Knight, & Robert Ennis | Title: Color Dove Illusion Created by: Yuval Barkan & Hedva Spitzer | Title: The Illusion of Sex Created by: Richard Russell |
| 2010 | Title: Impossible Motion: Magnet Slopes Created by: Kokichi Sugihara | Title: Counter-Intuitive Illusory Contours Created by: Bart Anderson | Title: Two Sinusoids: 6-1 Perceptions Created by: Jan Kremlacek |
| 2011 | Title: Silencing Awareness of Change by Background Information Created by: Jordan Suchow & George Alvarez | Title: Grouping by Contrast Created by: Erica Dixon, Arthur Shapiro, & Kai Hamburger | Title: The Loch Ness Aftereffect Created by: Mark Wexler |
| 2012 | Title: The Disappearing Hand Trick Created by: Roger Newport, Helen Gilpin, & Catherine Preston | Title: When Pretty Girls Turn Ugly: The Flashed Face Distortion Effect Created by: Jason Tangen, Sean Murphy, & Matthew Thompson | Title: Color Wagon Wheel Created by: Arthur Shapiro, William Kistler, & Alex Rose-Henig |
| 2013 | Title: Rotation Generated by Translation Created by: Jun Ono, Akiyasu Tomoeda, & Kokichi Sugihara | Title: Tusi or not Tusi Created by: Arthur Shapiro & Alex Rose-Henig | Title: Through the Eyes of Giants Created by: Arash Afraz & Ken Nakayama |
| 2014 | Title: The Dynamic Ebbinghaus Created by: Christopher D. Blair, Gideon P. Caplovitz, and Ryan E.B. Mruczek | Title: Flexible Colors Created by: Mark Vergeer, Stuart Anstis, and Rob van Lier | Title: A Turn in the Road Created by: Kimberley D. Orsten & James R. Pomerantz |
| 2015 | Title: Splitting Colors Created by: Mark Vergeer | Title: Ambiguous Garage Roof Created by: Kokichi Sugihara | Title: The Day it Rained on Lowry Created by: Michael Pickard |
| 2016 | Title: Motion Integration Unleashed: New Tricks for an Old Dog Created by: Mathew T. Harrison and Gideon P. Caplovitz | Title: Ambiguous Cylinder Illusion Created by: Kokichi Sugihara | Title: Silhouette Zoetrope Created by: Christine Veras |
| 2017 | Title: Shape from motion only Created by: Hedva Spitzer, Dana Tearosh, Niv Weisman | Title: Skye Blue Café Wall Illusion Created by: Victoria Skye | Title: Dynamic Müller-Lyer Illusion Created by: Gianni A. Sarcone |
| 2018 | Title: Triply Ambiguous Object Created by: Kokichi Sugihara | Title: Movement Illusion with a Twist Created by: David Phillips, Priscilla Heard and Christopher Tyler | Title: The Worm’s Eye View Illusion Created by: Michael Pickard and Gurpreet Singh |
| 2019 | Title: Dual Axis Illusion Created by: Frank Force | Title: Change the Color Created by: Haruaki Fukuda | Title: The Rotating Circles Illusion Created by: Ryan E.B. Mruczek and Gideon Paul Caplovitz |