Gently Shake The Screen, Make The Possum Boogie

Submission 13,143

Part of a series on "Shake Your Screen" Optical Illusion. [View Related Entries]

About

Gently Shake The Screen, Make The Possum Boogie refers to a series of image macros utilizing the “Shake Your Screen” Optical Illusion where the content inside of a black circle surrounded by QR code-like patterning appears to move when you shake your phone or monitor gently or shake your head from side-to-side. In 2021, people began photoshopping characters and animals into these illusions and encouraging viewers to shake their devices to make the character dance, originating with a possum.

Origin

On February 14th, 2014, an optical illusion was posted to 9GAG^[2] showing eight distortion-filled blue circles surrounded by a black background, which is further surrounded by a QR code-like pattern of connected white squares (shown below). The post encourages viewers to shake their phone or monitor to see the blue circles move. It gained over 18,000 upvotes in seven years.

The image is a version of the "fluttering heart illusion." It is described in a 2003 publication on NCBI^[7] as:

The fluttering-heart illusion is a perceived lagging behind of a colour target on a background of a different colour when the two are oscillated together. It has been proposed that the illusion is caused by a differential in the perceptual latencies of different colours, a differential in rod-cone latencies and rod-cone interactions.

On March 17th, 2021, Instagram^[1] user possum.sauce posted an image macro showing a faded image of a possum surrounded by a similar black background and white patterning resembling a QR code around the edges with the top-text "gently shake the screen. make the possum boogie" (shown below). When done correctly, it looks like the possum is wiggling. The post gained over 18,500 likes in six months and was reposted across social media numerous times over the course of the year.

Spread

As the possum image spread across social media, it inspired numerous photoshops replacing the image of the possum with other animals and characters. On May 14th, 2021, Redditor u/IDKShrug_7 posted a version of the image to /r/memes^[6] using the Robots character Bigweld, gaining over 18,000 upvotes in four months (shown below).

On June 14th, Instagram^[3] page @milliethefrog posted a version with a frog in the middle, gaining over 40,000 likes in three months (shown below, left). On June 22nd, Instagram^[4] page @monkey.posting made a version of the image with an orangutan in the center, gaining over 22,500 likes in a comparable span of time (shown below, right).

On September 5th, Instagram^[6] page @bingus.official posted a version of the meme using an image of Bingus the cat dancing, gaining over 58,000 likes in two weeks (shown below).

"Shake Your Screen" Optical Illusion

The “Shake Your Screen” Optical Illusion refers to a fetish drawing category that grew popular on Japanese Twitter in September 2019. The meme consists of portraying a female character with large breasts with a particular design surrounding her cleavage and an invitation for the reader to shake their phone. The design is an optical illusion that will trick the eye into de-synchronizing the movement outside the picture and the movement inside the picture, giving the illusion that the breasts are actually bouncing up and down.