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Exhibits

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Light, Color & Seeing

Adapting to Color
Adapting to Color

Change your perception of color by flooding your eyes with colored light.

Where:   Bechtel Gallery 3: Seeing & Reflections

All Eyes on Me
All Eyes on Me

Situate yourself at just the right place in space in front of this parabolic mirror array and you’ll see dozens of your own eyeballs peering back at you.

Where:   Osher Gallery 1: Human Phenomenon

Ames Chairs
Ames Chairs

What we see can depend on what we expect to see.

Where:   This exhibit is not currently on view.

Animation Tower
Animation Tower

Quick-changing views create the illusion of motion.

Where:   Bechtel Gallery 3: Seeing & Reflections

Aurora
Aurora

A reflector stretches light from colored tiles into long bright ribbons.

Where:   Bechtel Gallery 3: Seeing & Reflections

Bird in a Cage
Bird in a Cage

Stare at a bird’s eye for 30 seconds, then look into the empty cage. You’ll see a ghostly bird—of a very different color—inside the cage

Where:   Bechtel Gallery 3: Seeing & Reflections

Blood Cells in Your Eye
Blood Cells in Your Eye

Gaze into the eyepiece at the blue light, looking for bright specks moving in short bursts against the background, and feeling your pulse as you watch them.

Where:   Gallery 4: Living Systems

Bright Black
Bright Black

At this exhibit, find out how subjective brightness can be as you struggle—and fail—to correctly decide whether the squares you see are black or white. 

Where:   Bechtel Gallery 3: Seeing & Reflections

Café Wall Illusion
Café Wall Illusion

These tiles aren't really crooked–they just look that way.

Where:   Crossroads: Getting Started

Change Blindness
Change Blindness

Something changes each time this picture blinks . . . but you probably won't see it.

Where:   Osher Gallery 1: Human Phenomenon

Cheshire Cat
Cheshire Cat

Make your partner's face disappear, leaving only a smile.

Where:   This exhibit is not currently on view.

Chromoscope
Chromoscope

A color photo is three pictures in one.

Where:   Bechtel Gallery 3: Seeing & Reflections

Color Conflicts
Color Conflicts

When can reading get in the way of speaking?

Where:   Osher Gallery 1: Human Phenomenon

Colored Circles
Colored Circles

Overlapping pools of red, blue, and green create a Venn diagram of additive color. 

Where:   Bechtel Gallery 3: Seeing & Reflections

Colored Shadows
Colored Shadows

Step in front of this wall, and you’ll make shadows of various colors—yellow, magenta, cyan, red, green, blue, and yes, even black—that wiggle, jump, and dance along with you.

Where:   Bechtel Gallery 3: Seeing & Reflections

Corner Reflector
Corner Reflector

This reflector has you cornered: It always sends light back in the direction from which it came.

Where:   Bechtel Gallery 3: Seeing & Reflections

Countless Colors
Countless Colors

How many colors can you make by mixing red, green, and blue light?

Where:   Bechtel Gallery 3: Seeing & Reflections

Disagreeing About Color
Disagreeing About Color

Which of the outer dots best matches the center dot? Ask a few people and chances are you’ll get a few different answers.

Where:   Bechtel Gallery 3: Seeing & Reflections

Disappearing Act
Disappearing Act

An animal that blends in with its environment is much easier to see when it's moving than when it's still.

Where:   Crossroads: Getting Started

Disappearing Glass Rods
Disappearing Glass Rods

When light passes from one clear medium into another, it (usually) bends—a phenomenon called refraction. Distortions caused by refraction are part of why you can see objects that are clear.

Where:   Crossroads: Getting Started

Disappearing Rings
Disappearing Rings

Lower these rings into the Bay and see just how far you can see into the water. One of the San Francisco Bay’s defining features, sediment flows from the delta change with the seasons. This exhibit is based on a scientific observational instrument called a “secchi disk,” which scientists use to determine water clarity.

Where:   Gallery 5: Outdoor Exhibits

Drip Chamber
Drip Chamber

Liquid glycerin drips down, creating unique shapes and shadow patterns. 

Where:   This exhibit is not currently on view.

Everyone Is You and Me
Everyone Is You and Me

By adjusting the light levels on either side of this half-silvered glass, you and a friend can merge your faces into a single composite face.

Where:   This exhibit is not currently on view.

Floater Theater
Floater Theater

Floater Theater is an intimate theatrical environment that whimsically prompts participants to explore the fascinating, commonly experienced phenomenon of eye floaters.

Where:   This exhibit is not currently on view.

Flourish (Bloom)
Flourish (Bloom)

This 3-D sculpture is animated when spun under a strobe light. The bloom’s animation effect is achieved by progressive rotations of the golden ratio, phi (ϕ), the same ratio that nature employs to generate the spiral patterns we see in pinecones and sunflowers.

Where:   Osher Gallery 1: Human Phenomenon

Gray Step
Gray Step

With the rope hanging down, the left and right sides of the board appear identical. Lifting the rope shows the dramatic difference that your eyes missed—and continue to miss, as soon as you let the rope fall again.

Where:   Bechtel Gallery 3: Seeing & Reflections

Hoop Nightmares
Hoop Nightmares

Your brain adapts quickly to a warped view of the world, turning baskets into air balls.

Where:   This exhibit is not currently on view.

Image Relay
Image Relay

Lenses transmit an image of your face across space.

Where:   Bechtel Gallery 3: Seeing & Reflections

Jacques Cousteau in Seashells
Jacques Cousteau in Seashells

There’s more to seeing than meets the eye.

Where:   Ray and Dagmar Dolby Atrium

Magic Wand
Magic Wand

Wave the wand quickly and see an image appear.

Where:   Bechtel Gallery 3: Seeing & Reflections

Mirrorly a Window
Mirrorly a Window

Confusing sensory information can be profoundly disturbing.

Where:   Osher Gallery 1: Human Phenomenon

Monochromatic Room
Monochromatic Room

Things look oddly colorless in this room because they’re lit by light of only one color—a sodium vapor lamp of the type often used for streetlights. 

Where:   Bechtel Gallery 3: Seeing & Reflections

Mood Lighting
Mood Lighting

Sit down in a cozy chair and bathe your brain in a bubble of color of your choosing, dialing up anything from amber to violet. As you spend a few moments with each color, you may feel a shift in your own emotional hue.

Where:   This exhibit is not currently on view.

Perspective Drawing Window
Perspective Drawing Window

Tracing on the glass produces precise perspective.

Where:   Gallery 5: Outdoor Exhibits

Pixel Table
Pixel Table

Create myriad colored shadows with mirrored tubes.

Where:   Bechtel Gallery 3: Seeing & Reflections

Robot Dance
Robot Dance

Quick-changing views create the illusion of motion.

Where:   Bechtel Gallery 3: Seeing & Reflections

Rotating Shadow House
Rotating Shadow House

A rotating structure made of laths casts shadows that slowly change, calling to mind the shifting light of a day or a season and producing unexpected variations. Benches allow for relaxation and quiet watching.

Where:   Gallery 5: Outdoor Exhibits

Silage Beach
Silage Beach

Are the stripes spinning . . . or are you?

Where:   Bechtel Gallery 3: Seeing & Reflections

Soap Film Painting
Soap Film Painting

Soap film hits the big time at this exhibit, featuring a giant square soap bubble the size of a picture window. The cascading colors you see here arise from overlapping light waves that reflect from the front and back surfaces of the soap film—a phenomenon called interference.

Where:   Bechtel Gallery 3: Seeing & Reflections

Sophisticated Shadows
Sophisticated Shadows

If you think shadows are a straightforward business, prepare for a surprise—actually, a whole bunch of surprises. Combining various light sources in various ways, you’ll quickly discover that there’s nothing simple about a simple shadow. 

Where:   Bechtel Gallery 3: Seeing & Reflections

Sun Painting
Sun Painting

Created by artist Bob Miller, this classic Exploratorium exhibit is a “live” painting that uses light from the Sun as its palette.

Where:   Bechtel Gallery 3: Seeing & Reflections

Triple-Aye Lightstick
Triple-Aye Lightstick

A sweeping glance creates images that appear and disappear in the blink of an eye. This phenomenon, called persistence of vision, is also at work in videos and movie projections, which also flash on and off rapidly.

Where:   This exhibit is not currently on view.

Watch Water Freeze
Watch Water Freeze

Ordinarily, water freezes too slowly to be appreciated. Here, polarized light and an ultra cold slab let you watch water crystalize rapidly in real time. The colorful mosaic of ice that forms is different every time.

Where:   Fisher Bay Observatory Gallery 6, Mezzanine

Your Father’s Nose
Your Father’s Nose

How does it feel to mix your face with someone else’s?

Where:   This exhibit is not currently on view.

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