February 7, 2010 by Vurdlak with 64 Comments
I received this peculiar photo back in January, which was sent to me by one of our fans. With your help, together we can solve the mystery behind it. What is so strange about it, you might ask. Well, some of you may see it as an ordinary photo, of what seems to be a simple column wall, surrounded by rippling water floating behind it. But many may see the columns differently. Some of my colleagues argued that the columns are themselves immersed in water, and that lower part of the column-wall is actually just a reflection on a fluid surface. What is it then? Few of you may even guess that the reflection is in fact part of the wall that can be seen through water surface. However, this solution is unacceptable for many reasons, but just to name one – simple physics shows us that water bends light, so if we were seeing what is below the surface, it would be bent in a way similar to this one. Lets discuss this!
(35 votes)
Ther is no reflection, if it did, the bottom piece would have a ripple-like effect to it. So therefore, it is most-likely AN OLD BRIDGE NEAR SOME WATER
Water never spends much time at the same level… Any concrete that has been touching water for more than a few minutes… would be wet. Nice try.
Its just pillars by water, ripples displace light too.
But what makes you say it cant be posts under the water as it bends light? As you know, impossible shapes have been created by replicating the bends/perception in the opposite way :)
Daz x x
Umm…the rail at the bottom of the photo is in direct sunlight, the underside of the top rail is shaded.
Bottom rail has a seam (bottom left corner) — the top rail does not.
I reckon this is a total trick of the mind. Imagine the water isn’t there. This would then just be a wall with holes in it. Now the water indeed is there and the darker patch of water and the angle of the photo tricks us into seeing things that aren’t there.
Mark
If you don’t look directly at the picture, look from the corner of your eye, its a pretty good illusion.
In the bottom right corner there is sunlight, but in the top right there is no sunlight. Therefore, it is just a couple of old concrete collomns near some water
Its just a photo of some columns in front of water!
I believe the cement structure is a guardrail next to a body of water, there is a bridge or other structure that goes over the body of water in the background creating a shaddow on the water, where the photographer has don a good job linning up the shaddow with the center of the spindles in the rail.
Great photo. See photos of Bayshore blvd in Tampa FL near Tampa General Hospital…
Ryan has got it right, but I don’t think the photographer did a good job lining up the columns. But that might be the engineer in me speaking. And again,there is direct sunlight on the ridge on the bottom, but the top would be in the shade.
There nothing immerse into water. It’s just a wall of columns . Water is down there, very far of the columns. Nothing’s strange on this photo. Not for me, at least.
umm those pillars are in front of the water O_o
It’s not very good i don’t think.