These pictures are made only of random dots. Put on your 3D glasses, look at the middle and wait a moment: a hidden shape floats out of the dots!
No glasses? You can still play in practice mode: the hidden shapes are coloured in so you can find them. The real magic needs red-cyan, red-green or red-blue 3D glasses.
✨ Levels
This is a game, not an eye test.
Do you have 3D glasses? Red-green, red-blue and red-cyan glasses all work.
You can change this any time from the menu.
3D GLASSES
Your glasses
Check the 3D
How deep?
Less depth is easier on the eyes. More depth pops out more.
1. Hide the green bar
Put the glasses on and cover the eye behind the green lens, so you look only through the red lens. Slide left until the green bar disappears.
2. Hide the red bar
Now cover the eye behind the red lens, so you look only through the green lens. Slide left until the red bar disappears.
3D mode is just a fun way to play. If your eyes feel tired, take a break or play without glasses.
HOW TO PLAY
Put on your 3D glasses (red lens over your left eye, unless you swapped them in the setup).
Hold the phone at arm's length and look at the middle of the dots. Give your eyes a few seconds: the shape often appears slowly.
Tap the shape you see. Five pictures make a level: get 3 right for ⭐, 4 for ⭐⭐ and all 5 for ⭐⭐⭐.
Each shape you find with your glasses goes in your sticker book.
Later levels have tiny shapes, gentle depth, shapes that sink behind the dots, two shapes at once and secret floating paths.
Win 6 stars to open Make your own: draw a shape and turn it into a magic dot picture for a friend.
HOW DOES IT WORK?
Your eyes are about 6 cm apart, so each eye sees the world from a slightly different place. Your brain compares the two pictures to feel how near or far things are. This is called stereo vision.
In a magic dot picture, each eye gets the same random dots, except inside the hidden shape, where the dots are moved a little sideways in one eye's picture.
Look at either picture alone and there is nothing to find: just dots. Only by comparing the two can your brain find the dots that moved, and it feels them as a shape at a different depth.
Moved one way, the shape floats in front of the screen. Moved the other way, it sinks behind it.
The scientist Béla Julesz made the first pictures like this with a computer around 1960. They showed that the brain can find depth with no other clues at all.
The 3D glasses make sure each eye gets its own picture: the red lens lets one through and the other lens the other.
Some people don't see depth in pictures like these, and many need a few seconds. Both are fine: this is a game, not an eye test.
CAN'T SEE IT?
Check the glasses: the red lens goes over your left eye. If it still looks flat, try ↔️ Swap eyes in the setup.
Give it time: hold the phone at arm's length, look at the middle of the dots and wait a few seconds without moving.
Check the setup: turn the screen brightness up, and make sure each lens hides one of the coloured bars.
Some eyes find magic dot pictures hard to see, and that's okay. This is a game, not an eye test.