June 16, 2010 by Vurdlak with 50 Comments
Before I started writing this, I’ve browsed our #Lego collection for fun. It has dozens of interesting posts, some of them even I completely forgot about. What I’ve noticed is that most of the themes repeat themselves, specially impossible triangles (I think there is no need to post any more triangles for some time now). Anyhow, I’ve collected rest of the unpublished Lego illusions, and decided to close the trend. First one is obviously most complex, but I have some doubts whether photoshop has been used. Rest of the collection should be free of digital manipulation, but fortunately I have you to judge. Can you guess how each of them was built?
(21 votes)
I don’t think Photoshop was used in any. For the first one it appears that the man on the left is sitting in a low area and his back leans up against a risen piece that extends the rest if the way. Pretty neat
Damn that’s cool! Now we just need pictures from different angles to see how they were built! (I’m quite skeptic when it comes to illusions, guessing is not for me ;) )
I think I have my avatar sorted – a good time to test it I guess
Anyway, a great set of lego ones where I suspect sum cheating has been done and not really in the spirit of lego.
Starting with the last one, I suspect the bar going from top left down to bottom right has been cut at the yellow and also the red bar below it. The reason is that the yellow brick is slightly bigger than the yellow brick next to it which is supposidly closer to the viewer.
The second one down with the robot is easy and no cheating involved, just camera angles
The first one also I suspect easy, with the wall built up behind the left character but the wall end hidden by the left arm.
The third one I think is the hardest to explain and I suspect some glue has been used to hold the bricks on the top together. Note the bar at the top is only 8 lumps long unlike the stuff below it which is 10 lumps long, so another bit of carful camera work.
So, I think they are possible with out photoshop, although I would not want to reproduce some of these with my lego.
I’ll only speak about the first (most complex) one, because the others are done in the same way that we’ve always seen them done.
Besides, the first one’s pretty clever. The red strip isn’t continuous, but the seated figure on the left covers the join. He’s seated in a trough, but the center section behind him (on which the other figure is seated) is raised.
Really good work!
These are really cool!!! ive seen the first one before but i still have no idea how they were done!!!
Love the site btw !!!!
Oooooh. In color. What a nice touch. Looks like what I used to step on at night when the kids were little.
so…confusing D:!
The first one isn’t impossible: The part in the middle where the guy is sitting is a block, and it stops so the other guy can sit between the 2 other ones.
The last one is amazing :)
garrrrrr so confusinggg
really cool!!!
am i first?????
First and the last one seemed to be photoshopped. You can see a slight shadow of errors in photoshop work on both. The other two according to me are just the angle in which the photos were shot. Even the second one, they have placed the lighting in such a way that the shadows will come in favour with the photo. Background of the third one plays a huge role in fooling our eyes…
wow very bizzare think will get sons lego out and try these
Too cool. The one with the guys sitting on it (impossible object 2) is obvious; just look behind the guy on the right. Similarly, impossible object 4 can be resolved by looking closely. The other two, however, will take a lot more effort to discern. I especially like object 3; can’t make it stay still long enough to figure out where the offsets are.
the first one hurts my brain :|
Number 1 seems to be easy not much of an illusion here, I think number 2 was done with a camera angle. As for 3&4 I honestly don’t know. I’m anxious to see other comments. Yes indeed.
Number 1 could just be designed, not photoshop
Number one is obviously a Photoshop.
Looking behind the left guy, you will see that the red wall is continuing by one brick (you can see the small gap between two bricks going from top to bottom, indicating the red one being a wall). Following it, you will realize that there are no gaps between the following 3 bricks and then suddenly a front-back gap appears (indicating the red one being a floor tile). Same with the yellow, just in reverse.
The other three were nicely done, though I think the fourth cut two bricks short as “A Snail” already mentioned.
the solution might be the angle that the creation is taken at
yeah, I’ve seen these done before………it’s all in the angle that the photo was taken
The first one was tricky but I think it is a few blocks left out so The guy on the left can sit in that place and his head and hand are placed so you can’t see that the blocks stop at his body and are not under him. The rest are well done with angles of the camera and all the blocks are not connected where they seem to be. No sharp eyed enough to see exactly where they are unconnected though.
kewl
Not very good! The first one is pathetic….
I think that the bottom one mau be photoshoped. The lighting is just too weird. Also i think i see a reflection of more bricks that arent pictured on the bottom right side of the triangle.
The first is simply a matter of correctly producing a PHYSICAL 3D model and being conscientious about the angles…
I like lego and illusions,so I love this.
I like many other things to,but I’m not going to list them.You probably know why.
Discover Magazine has an online gallery called “Wrong by Design: Why Our Brains Are Fooled by Illusions”: http://tinyurl.com/2detqww
I want to know why some of the blocks in the last image are reflective and the others have a matte finish.And the reflections on those blocks don’t make sense.
actually I think Photoshop was used to blur the joints of the red LEGOS between the two men.
I think I understand how the first two are built but I suspect the last one to be photoshoped. Anyone who sees the solution for the last one?
Sorry, since there are four I understand the first three. The last one seems really impossible to built with simple Lego, no matter what the perspective.
The first one is edited. The construction has been blurred in the middle where it switches from being a grove to being a ridge.
Being a long-time lego owner and builder, I still have no idea what the deal with the next 3 is.
I think they are all pretty cool the only on that looks simple to me is the second one. With all the time I’ve spent with legos I could never come up with something like these wow.
those are the Gayest lego men I have ever seen!
The first one is photoshopped. If you zoom in on the red you can see in the middle were it has been blended.
I have recreated all of there and it is all done by the perspective of how you look ate it. The first one the lego guys are actualy hiding the secrets. The Wall-E one the far back pillar is not actually conected to the first one.
#3
Is also done with camera the illusion points are not conected same with #4
@ Nate, they’re all photoshopped. The whole point of an “impossible square” is that it is actually impossible to make.
@ A Snail: It’s not cheating to make an illusion with photoshop. By definition an illusion is something that LOOKS like something else but ISN’T. lol
This is simply a (well done) new take on an old illusion that’s usually only sketched but now has been duplicated using pictures and photoshop.
Let’s just say there’s a reason why the little blue lego guy’s left left is black. Wink wink nudge nudge.
the first one, if you look closely you will see that the lines that make up the pieces of the thing the guy is sitting kinda fade away but you can see it still kinda so, photo shop maybe was involved
WALL-E in second one :D
I like playing with legos and I think all of them can be built….the trick here lies in the angle of the camera shot. :-). Don’t think photoshop was used (at least in majorly contributing to the creation of the illusion) in any.
The last two have been digitally manipulated (the backgrounds have been cut out). It’s more obvious on the last one because of reflections on the sides of blocks and the light edges.
However, the only structure that seems to be edited to me is the last. But that’s probably because I just can’t make sense of it.
Great post. Keeps us guessing.
for all who think the first one stops at the left guy…your wrong. look at the lines tween the different blocks. near the left guy they are angled more down then near the right guy.
When did Lego men get correctly proportioned bodies?
none was photoshopped, i think. they’re all about angles.
Ok, in my opinion, the first one can be pulled off, but in this particular version, it has been edited, du to the lack of lines for the tile edges around the area where it transitions from low to high…
2,3 camera trick
1,4 digital editted
all are real guys, it’s just about camera angles as “someone” says somewhere before me
The first one has been edited but just to mess with the lines between blocks (some lines even disappeared on the red and yellow blocks behind the guy on the left), otherwise the thing is real. Look at the guy on the right: at this point the construction looks to be 3 2×2 blocks wide, but when you look at the guy on the left, the construction’s base is clearly 4 2×2 blocks wide. The blue and green flat tiles are at the same level(look at the upper right corner), there’s just another row of blue flat tiles behind the guy on the right and you only see the tip of them; it looks likes it’s higher that the red flat tiles but it’s not. And of course the guy on the left is hiding the joint.
Wait how is the third one impossble??? or am i just stupid:)