Dragon illusion. All time favourite for me I think. Do you see it?
Oh no, of course not. It has got to be this way around. Very important.
It has got a solid body but a hollow head, which is peculiar.
Because when you move it, either when I move the dragon
or you move your angle of observation
you get this extraordinary effect that the neck seems to be separated from the
rest of the body, as if it is a live creature,
able to move its head left or right independently.
all I am doing is rocking it up and down,
and your brain is interpreting it as a solid head,
which it is not,
and it has got some wonderful movement, keeping its beady eye on you!
The original version which Steve Wagner designed in 1996
was a coloured one, this one here, which he gave out
at a Gathering for Gardner. And here are two of his friends. It is like a family triplet,
with two other colours, red and green. And you can download this below. It is a wonderful thing to make.
As you move your vision by walking around, or back and forward, or up and down, you get this
fantastic apparent movement of the dragon's head, as if it is alive! Quite incredible.
And then, if instead we
move the dragons themselves, this is what happens. They all move together, look at that!
Beautiful.
That is about as far as I can go, I think. And then back again.
I remember that Steve Wagner told me
that when he was making them, he spent hours and hours getting the eyeball in just the right place,
to make it look sinister, as if it is suddenly going to bite your fingers off with its jaws.
So you get a slight sense of menace to it, which is what you need to make the illusion work well.
I played around with the design a little bit, and one of the versions I came up with was this one here,
which is made from transparent plastic.
If you hold it the 'wrong' way round, which looks sensible,
it doesn't do anything at all. It has to be the hollow head which is towards you, and then
you get this fantastic effect. A marvellous illusion. It looks so animated and so real.
I will show you how to make them now, because we have just made this available to be downloaded.
This is what you get, it is the original design that was handed out at Gathering for Gardner in 1996.
It takes about 20 minutes or half an hour to cut out and make. Here is one I have
cut out.
You need to keep the outside part to hand because it shows where all the fold lines are.
There is a long fold line here, and I use a ruler to help me make a precise fold.
For the head, you have to have a valley fold there...
and you have to make a mountain fold there...
There is one little
mistake they made here - they call it a valley fold but in fact it is a mountain fold for the ears.
You have to fold it like that (Tim demonstrates) to make it work.
So that takes a couple of minutes
to do the folding. And then the last bit is very easy. Simply put it together...
you have got slots at the back for the base.
The base is quite straightforward, it is not hollow.
It is a solid base for the dragon.
The interesting bit is the top bit, which comes at the end.
So, that is the base made.
There he is. Now the last stage, where we have to give him a hollow head.
So I fold it here,
and I have got a bit of Blu Tack there... and there... with a bit of luck it will hold.
Yes, it does, just about. And now it is ready for the magic. Either you move, or I can move the dragon,
to show it working. Extraordinary. So, it has to be a hollow head, and then you will experience
absolute magic with this. You just make it from a single sheet of paper like that...
probably about
half an hours work. But my goodness, I have had so much fun with this. I have made hundreds
of dragons over the years, and given them out to so many adults and children,
over the 20 or so years
since they first came out. It is quite the best illusion I have seen. Pure magic!