Over the past few hours, the Internet has been racking its collective brain trying to figure out the backstory to what, on the surface, seems like a relatively straight forward photo. The photo above has been spreading across the web like wildfire, but when I first stumbled across it, I couldn’t for the life of me figure out what the big deal was.
After all, the caption I saw attached to it simply said, “Crazy shiny or not at all shiny?” The answer seemed rather obvious.
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At first glance, the photo looked to be nothing out of the ordinary. The legs are clearly shiny, right? I wasn’t sure where the controversy lied or what the debate even was. But once I saw another caption that read, “Shiny legs or just white paint?” my mind was blown.
Alas, there I was thinking that the legs above were wrapped up in some weird form of plastic or oil when it could have simply been white paint all along. Upon closer inspection, I realized it was ridiculous that I didn’t spot the paint from the get-go. For crying out loud, there are art tools littered across the floor in the background.
As to the story behind the photo, it initially appeared on Instagram but gained newfound fame once it started making the rounds on Twitter earlier today.
Now as opposed to the annoying debate surrounding the blue/gold dress, we won’t need a team of scientists to come in and bore us to death with their research. On the contrary, we can go straight to the source itself.
The photo was originally posted to Hunter Culverhouse’s Instagram account. Speaking to Insider, Culverhouse explained that the crazy optical illusion happened purely by accident.
“I had some white paint left on my brush and put random lines on my legs,” Culverhouse explained. “[It] turned out to be a completely confusing picture for everyone on the internet. The first time I posted it, it didn’t go completely crazy. But then I reposted it again and other big accounts started to post it and share it. Then it took to Twitter and YouTubers started tweeting about it as well.”
