The bizarre optical illusion which paints a brunette woman on a blank canvas

An optical illusion has surfaced online in which readers are instructed to stare at the white dot at the centre of a negative of a woman's face.

After about 15 seconds, participants are then instructed to glance at the white blank space to the right of the photo.

The almost demonic figure transforms into the beautiful full-colour face of a young brunette woman.

This optical illusion is known as a 'negative afterimage' and is caused by cells located in the eyes, called ganglion cells, which send messages to the brain by coding – or identifying - colours in pairs of primary colours.

'The code for all the hues we can experience in the light spectrum, this information is relayed from the back of the eye to the brain via three opponent neuron channels,' Dr Juno Kim from the University of NSW School of Optometry and Vision Science told Daily Mail Australia.

Aside from the greyscale black and white channel, we also have a red and green channel and a third blue and yellow channel so that 'we can code for any hue that's in the environment'.

'When you look at something that, for example, is yellow for a long period of time, you stimulate the cells that are positively sensitive to yellow – so in the yellow and blue channel,' Dr Kim said.

'The cells' activity increases and after a bit of time the activity fatigues and declines.

'When you then direct your gaze at a uniform background – let's say a grey wall - then what happens is that the cell doesn't return to its resting activity, it goes much lower than that.

'It's that decline – the weakening of the yellow code - that codes for the opposite colour to become stronger, so you'll see blue.' 

Thus, in the image of pictured above, the cells in our eyes that identify blue become fatigued and weaken, stimulating it's opposite hue – yellow- to become stronger, showing us a more natural skin tone. 

(dailymail.co.uk)