I was scrolling through Twitter last week when I came across #ThatDress. I was upset, because I thought I was going insane. I’m Team Blue and Black, and I just assumed the majority of Team White and Gold were just pretending to see what they saw – to be different. It wasn’t until I sat down for lunch the following day with a good friend who insisted the dress was White and Gold. Since, I’m practically hairless with a thousand-yard stare.
I’ve compiled the best explanations for #ThatDress, which I hope will save a lot of people some grief.
1. It’s overexposed
Okay, so the first explanation is that the photo is simply overexposed, hence why so many people are seeing different colours because our brain is trying to determine what colour it is. Anyway, here’s a gif that explains what I mean:
2. Something incredibly confusing and you’ll have to bear with me
This explanation was like reading a philosophical passage. I don’t know if that’s because I’m a bit stupid, or whether this is so confusing that it begs more questions than answers. Here goes.
The dress is both colours. The colours that we see say a lot about ourselves. What colour you see, is in fact a consequence of how your eyes have evolved. The brain has to try and ignore light, so when a colour is illuminated in front of us, our brain balances the colour omitted from the light and the colour of the object itself. So we are left with the colour of the object.
The important part? Camera’s do the same thing! It’s called white balance. Many people have speculated #ThatDress has confused this system. Some people are looking at the image and discounting the blue for white, the black for gold, or the white for blue and the gold for black.
See why I got confused?
3. A neuroscience Student with an 8 minute video that will blow your mind
This vlogger uses her knowledge of all thing neuroscience to offer an explanation. It’s an 8 minute journey on how we perceive colour and why there is such a divide. Possibly one of the best explanations out there! Have a watch below:
4. The Young Turks offer their advice
So these guys spoke to a bunch of experts and put it into one video and here it is:
We could probably spend all year looking through the various explanations on the colour of this damn dress, but I think we’re all going to have to agree that it’s black and blue, sorry.
I hope these 4 explanations have put your mind at rest. Who knew the world would be so divided over such an ugly dress?
What did you think of #ThatDress and the explanations for the division? Comment below!
