You remember the photo. It was 2017, and suddenly your Twitter feed was a war zone because of a single Vans sneaker. Some people saw pink and white. Others—and I’m one of them—saw teal and gray. It felt like the world was gasping for air as we collectively realized that our eyes might be lying to us. This wasn't just some viral glitch or a cheap prank. It was a massive, unintentional experiment in human biology.
The "what color is the shoe" debate followed in the footsteps of "The Dress" (black and blue or white and gold?), but the shoe was different. It felt more grounded, more everyday. Most of us have a pair of Old Skool Vans in the closet. We know what they look like. Yet, staring at that specific photo, the divide was absolute. You couldn't "unsee" your version once you saw it.
The Viral Origin of the Sneaker Debate
It started with a Facebook post from a user named Nicole Coulthard. She posted a photo of a friend's shoe, asking for help because two people saw different colors. The internet did what it does best: it exploded. Within hours, millions were weighing in.
The shoe in the original photo is actually a Vans Old Skool sneaker. If you go to a store and buy them, they are pink with white stripes and white laces. That is the factual reality of the physical object. But the photo? The photo is a mess of weird lighting and poor white balance. Because the lighting was so tinted—likely a flash in a dark room or a specific type of artificial bulb—it threw our brains into a tailspin.
Why Your Brain Thinks Teal is Real
Basically, your brain is a giant correction machine. It doesn't just "see" light; it interprets it. This is a concept called color constancy.
Think about it this way. If you take a white piece of paper outside at noon, it looks white. If you take that same paper into a room lit by a warm, orange candle, it still looks white to you. But if you took a photo of it, the camera would show the paper as orange. Your brain "subtracts" the orange light because it knows the paper is supposed to be white.
💡 You might also like: Easy recipes dinner for two: Why you are probably overcomplicating date night
In the case of the shoe, people whose brains assumed the photo was taken under "warm" lighting (like a yellow indoor bulb) subtracted that warmth and saw the shoe as its true colors: pink and white. However, if your brain assumed the photo was taken under "cool" lighting (like blue-toned shadows or fluorescent lights), it subtracted the blue. When you subtract blue from pink, you're often left with a muddy gray or teal.
It's wild. It means two people can look at the exact same set of pixels and reach two diametrically opposed conclusions.
The Role of Photoreceptors and Biology
We have these things called rods and cones in our eyes. Cones handle color; rods handle low light. But the way our brains process the signals from these cells isn't uniform.
- Circadian Rhythms: Some researchers, like Pascal Wallisch from New York University, suggested that our daily habits might influence how we see these viral images. He found that "early birds" (people who spend more time in natural daylight) tended to see The Dress as white and gold, while "night owls" (who spend more time under artificial light) saw it as black and blue. While the shoe didn't get as much academic scrutiny as the dress, the principle remains: your environment trains your brain on how to interpret "bad" lighting.
- Top-Down Processing: This is where your expectations change your perception. If you've owned pink Vans, you're more likely to see pink. Your memory overrides the visual data.
The lighting in that specific shoe photo was "ambiguous." There wasn't enough background information for our brains to settle on a single light source. Without a "reference point"—like a clear white wall or a known skin tone in the frame—the brain just makes its best guess.
The Marketing Aftermath
Vans didn't plan this. You can't manufacture this kind of viral lightning in a bottle. But they certainly benefited from the "what color is the shoe" craze. It kept the brand at the center of a global conversation for weeks.
📖 Related: How is gum made? The sticky truth about what you are actually chewing
Honestly, it's the kind of engagement marketing teams dream of. It wasn't an ad; it was a puzzle. It was a "you had to be there" moment for the internet. Even now, years later, bringing up the shoe at a dinner party is a surefire way to start an argument. It hits on a deep, existential fear: that we don't all experience the same reality.
The Truth About the Colors
Let's settle it once and for all. If you were to take a color picker tool in Photoshop and click on the "white" laces in that viral photo, the hex code would come back as a dull, greenish-gray. The "pink" part of the shoe would register as a muted teal or blue-green.
Technically, the pixels in the image are teal and gray.
However, the object in the image is pink and white.
So, everyone is right, and everyone is wrong. If you are describing the pixels on your screen, it's teal. If you are describing the physical shoe that exists in a box somewhere, it's pink. The conflict arises because some people describe what they see, while others describe what they know the object to be.
👉 See also: Curtain Bangs on Fine Hair: Why Yours Probably Look Flat and How to Fix It
How to Test Your Own Perception
You can actually "force" your brain to switch colors if you try hard enough. I've done it. If you stare at the teal parts and imagine a bright, warm sun hitting them, they might start to shift toward pink. If you look at the "gray" laces and tell yourself "those are just white laces in a shadow," the pink might pop out.
It’s a bit like those Magic Eye posters from the 90s. It’s all about where you place your mental focus.
Why This Matters Beyond Shoes
This isn't just about footwear. Understanding what color is the shoe helps us understand how we perceive everything from art to eyewitness testimony. It shows that human perception is subjective. We are all walking around with filters over our eyes, shaped by our genetics, our sleep schedules, and our past experiences.
It's a humbling reminder. If we can't agree on the color of a sneaker, how can we expect to agree on the complex nuances of politics or social issues? Our brains are built to take shortcuts. Usually, those shortcuts work perfectly. But every now and then, a blurry photo of a sneaker comes along and shows us the cracks in the system.
Actionable Insights for the Curious
If you're still fascinated by how your brain tricks you, here is how you can explore this further without needing a degree in neuroscience:
- Check your monitor settings: If you’re seeing one color and your friend sees another on the same screen, check your "Night Shift" or "Blue Light Filter." These settings physically change the color output of your device and can trigger the color shift.
- Isolate the colors: Take a screenshot of the shoe and crop it until you only see a tiny square of one color. Without the context of the rest of the shoe, your brain will stop trying to "correct" the lighting, and you'll see the raw pixel color (which is usually teal/gray).
- Look at other illusions: Search for "Adelson's Checker-shadow illusion." It’s the gold standard for showing how shadows change our perception of gray vs. white. It's even more mind-blowing than the shoe.
- Trust the source: When in doubt about a product's color online, always look for "user-submitted photos" in reviews. Professional studio lighting is meant to show the "true" color, but home photos show you how the object reacts to the messy, real-world lighting we actually live in.
The shoe debate might be an old meme, but the science behind it is evergreen. It’s a perfect example of why "seeing is believing" isn't always the best advice. Sometimes, seeing is just your brain making a very educated, very stubborn guess.