Faces on places are aces.
November 23, 2009 8:59 AM   Subscribe

 
OM NOM NOM.
posted by jquinby at 9:05 AM on November 23, 2009 [1 favorite]


AND EACH ONE OF THEM IS TALKING TO ME MAKE THEM STOP
posted by The Whelk at 9:07 AM on November 23, 2009


"Face hello"? If the idea is to call attention to the face, I think the correct pirate-ese translation would be "FACE HO!"
posted by albrecht at 9:11 AM on November 23, 2009


That's pretty neat. Hooray for pattern recognition! Unfortunately, ahoying is punishable by severe reprimand.

Okay, so it's an image I've been saving for the past seven years or so which came about as the result of a long, inebriated conversation about the meaning of the brand name Chips Ahoy! Is one meant to conjure an image of sailing through an ocean of cookie, eventually to arrive at the great islands of chocolate chip within? Or are these chips obstacles to be avoided, lest they rend and capsize this baked-goods-faring vessel? Sadly, I rarely have a use for this picture.
posted by The Great Big Mulp at 9:12 AM on November 23, 2009 [6 favorites]


Pro tip: Eat a handful of mushrooms, wait an hour, and look askance at a newspaper vending machine. Do not stare at It directly.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 9:19 AM on November 23, 2009 [1 favorite]


My favorite by far.
posted by piratebowling at 9:26 AM on November 23, 2009 [15 favorites]


:D
posted by grouse at 9:29 AM on November 23, 2009


i just came in here to post benjamin but piratebowling beat me to it

benjamin is all 'c'
posted by Potomac Avenue at 9:32 AM on November 23, 2009


....So it's a whole blog that's kind of like that Amex commercial.

....which is actually kind of cute.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 9:34 AM on November 23, 2009


I'm pretty sure we can wait until Saturday, and this will still have been the best blog posted all week. Sorry, other blogs.
posted by Caduceus at 9:38 AM on November 23, 2009


The world is colored by the patterns
we EKE from coincideNCE. From image
springs form, concept, empathy.
EaCh of us liVES their own World
conSTRucted by the greY MAtter,
our wORLDS CONNECTED only by
the tenuous idea of reality.
posted by Salvor Hardin at 9:43 AM on November 23, 2009 [2 favorites]


I wonder if there's a subconscious desire that causes designers to replicate face-like patterns when designing new objects. The two circles with a smaller circle underneath (two eyes and a nose) pattern comes up a lot, and in some cases it's not clear that there's any underlying engineering reason why that design is necessarily superior to putting, say, the small one on top, or some other arrangement.

I've also wondered about this with US-standard electrical outlets. Most people set them up with the ground prong on the bottom, although there is a decent argument for mounting it the other way. (If the plug pulls partially out of the socket and the ground is at the top, it's less likely that something is going to fall onto the 'hot' prong and cause a short/fire.) The easy answer is that most people put the ground on the bottom just because of tradition/familiarity, but I wonder if it also doesn't have something to do with an intrinsic pleasantness of the pattern.
posted by Kadin2048 at 9:47 AM on November 23, 2009


Previously.
posted by mkb at 10:00 AM on November 23, 2009 [1 favorite]


I'm pretty sure we can wait until Saturday, and this will still have been the best blog posted all week. Sorry, other blogs.

It is I who am sorry, for not only do I know of a superior pareidolia collection, but it's maintained by the brilliant Wayfinder, musician for the insane German demogroup farbrausch. There is enough entertainment in those two links to ruin your productivity for the next month.
posted by jake at 10:05 AM on November 23, 2009




I'm sorry, but the meme requires text in white all-caps Impact with a 2px black stroke saying HAPPY CHAIR IS HAPPY or whatever on each one.
posted by Rhomboid at 10:12 AM on November 23, 2009


Right now there's a commercial on TV (I forget what it's for) that shows a series of photos like this -- at first all the photos are sad faces, then the ad introduces the product, and it switches to a series of happy faces.

It always makes me think how much I'd like to see about a half hour of such images in sequence, played in a full theater. The best part would be hearing the crowd's reactions upon finally seeing the faces in the pictures. You could have some especially impenetrable shots, where the face wasn't immediately visible, and you'd hear a bunch of scattered "ohhhhhh, I see it" exclamations throughout the theater. It would be awesome.
posted by hifiparasol at 10:12 AM on November 23, 2009


For once I will be glad when a gimmick blog gets a 6-figure book deal
posted by Damn That Television at 10:12 AM on November 23, 2009 [2 favorites]


You know, this is a great post for a Monday morning. Thanks!
posted by Lutoslawski at 10:13 AM on November 23, 2009


NOW EVERYTHING I SEE, IT HAS A FACE

I find this frightening
posted by Askiba at 10:19 AM on November 23, 2009


omigosh faces everywhere
posted by TwelveTwo at 10:20 AM on November 23, 2009


smiling happy cars 1 2
posted by crapmatic at 10:28 AM on November 23, 2009


NOW EVERYTHING I SEE, IT HAS A FACE

Whatever it is I think I see
Becomes a Tootsie Roll to me

posted by dammitjim at 10:33 AM on November 23, 2009


Faces
All around different faces I see
Some are happy, some in misery
They express joy and pain
No two faces are the same.
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 10:38 AM on November 23, 2009


I wonder if there's a subconscious desire that causes designers to replicate face-like patterns when designing new objects.

There is, in fact, a conscious desire to do this--seen in products like cars and watches (the angry eyebrows often set at 10:09).
posted by weapons-grade pandemonium at 10:40 AM on November 23, 2009


This is, awesome, clap clap, clap clap clap.
posted by andreaazure at 10:41 AM on November 23, 2009


...the flashlight with your name in maternal cursive plays over every cm. of the walls, the rheostats, CD, InterLace poster of Tawni Kondo, phone console, desks' TPs, the face in the floor, posters of pros, the onionskin yellow of the desklamps' shades, the ceiling-panels' patterns of pinholes, the grid of the upper bunk's springs, recession of closet and door, boys wrapped in blankets, slight crack like a creek's course in the eastward ceiling discernible now, maple reglet border at seam of ceiling and walls north and south no floor has a face your flashlight showed but didn't no never did see its eyes' pupils set sideways and tapered like a cat's its eyebrows' V and horrid toothy smile leering right at your light all the time you've been scanning oh mother a face in the floor mother oh and your flashlight's beam stabs jaggedly back for the overlooked face misses it overcorrects then centers on what you'd felt but had seen without seeing, just now, as you'd so carefully panned the light and looked, a face in the floor there all the time but unfelt by all others and unseen by you until you knew just as you felt it didn't belong and was evil: Evil.
posted by rusty at 10:43 AM on November 23, 2009 [1 favorite]


I was hoping this was about the A Team, but it's pretty good on its own.
posted by Pantengliopoli at 10:45 AM on November 23, 2009


Extras: The city is a happy place
Mailbox: 'Cause everything has a face
Car : You can always find a parking space
Extras: But beware the big bad wolf!
posted by The Whelk at 10:49 AM on November 23, 2009


omg i just saw it
posted by Potomac Avenue at 10:55 AM on November 23, 2009


Like Francois Robert.
posted by mrgrimm at 11:09 AM on November 23, 2009


Pareidoliastic! I had a pareidoliasm.
posted by Halloween Jack at 11:27 AM on November 23, 2009


IS THIS THAT "FACE-BOOK" INTERNET THE KIDS LIKE SO MUCH?
posted by louche mustachio at 11:37 AM on November 23, 2009 [1 favorite]


Salvor Hardin: "The world is colored by the patterns we EKE from coincideNCE. From image springs form, concept, empathy. EaCh of us liVES their own World conSTRucted by the greY MAtter, our wORLDS CONNECTED only by the tenuous idea of reality."

When reading this comment, I can't help but hear it in the voice of Mr. DeMartino from Daria.
posted by xedrik at 11:41 AM on November 23, 2009


Normally I see faces everywhere, but here's one that had to be pointed out to me and will be stuck in my head forever:

Charles Manson.
posted by louche mustachio at 11:53 AM on November 23, 2009 [1 favorite]


March of the Traffic Control Robots
posted by hydrophonic at 11:58 AM on November 23, 2009


here's one that had to be pointed out to me and will be stuck in my head forever:

Dude, I think I hate you now. Also:

Charles Manson.
posted by louche mustachio

Eponysteria!
posted by jquinby at 12:00 PM on November 23, 2009


"Face hello"? If the idea is to call attention to the face, I think the correct pirate-ese translation would be "FACE HO!"

Pirate pedant.
posted by Zambrano at 1:04 PM on November 23, 2009


Angry BBQ hates winter.
posted by Rhaomi at 1:21 PM on November 23, 2009 [4 favorites]


Do you see faces in things THAT NO ONE ELSE CAN SEE? You are so alone. CRY NOW!
posted by gorgor_balabala at 2:35 PM on November 23, 2009


It's amazing what kind of organization and pattern recognition the mind has. And it's all innate. I'm thinking that even young children would have seen the faces in those pictures.
posted by consilience at 8:19 PM on November 23, 2009


The world is colored by the patterns
we EKE from coincideNCE. From image
springs form, concept, empathy.
EaCh of us liVES their own World
conSTRucted by the greY MAtter,
our wORLDS CONNECTED only by
the tenuous idea of reality.


HE COMES
posted by secret about box at 10:07 PM on November 23, 2009 [1 favorite]


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