Stairs To Eternity…

Just a quick newsflash here – after more than a month, finally I have managed to fix the “Top Rated Illusions” section. I’m talking about that nice little block at the end of our sidebar, one that gives you a list of all time highest rated illusions. The list is now automatically updated once per hour, so if you think some illusions deserve to be there, be sure to rate them accordingly! For the illusion part, you may think these stairs below were digitally manipulated, but I dare to day it’s just an illusion. Can you figure out how the author did this?

146 Replies to “Stairs To Eternity…”

  1. i know this sounds stupid but i would call this a stairway to heaven since its a never ending stairway into the sky

  2. Haha. Yeah It’s is just a pyramid made to look like it is going back, but it just goes straight up

  3. I’m not sure what you fixed with the highest rated illusions list, but it is not very effective currently – most articles on the list only have a few votes, and are probably there by chance.

  4. blocks of stone on top of each other, creating a pyramid almost like the temples of the mayan and aztec civilizations. Great illusion though!

  5. Pretty good illusion if not looked at too closely. The work done to make the actual structure must’ve been extensive. Photography is very beautiful. I like it a lot. Illusion wise, i give it 4 stars. Good, but simple.

  6. The stairs aren’t very long. Just above a person head. They get narrow and smoler steps too fast. It gives the sensation of being very long. Very good perspective illusion.

  7. wow first comment.
    I think it is either a statue or the author has done something to it because there is a line going through it that definitely wouldn’t be there in real life.

  8. That’s just like an egyptian pyramid exept smaller , you can’t see the other sides and every step gets smaller

  9. I would venture to guess that it is a sculpture fabricated to look as if it were stairs when observed from one specific point, however I am stumped as to the nature of what appears to be a twisted wire crossing upwards and to the left in front of the object and the trees in the background. It makes no sense as it appears to be only a few feet above the ground in front of the structure. The only other explanation I could come up with is that the stairs are actually a picture suspended horizontally but that would mean it is protruding from (what appears to be) the top of the slope a very long way. It would be difficult to support such a picture let alone a structure that distance. This is a very effective illusion. Either that or it really is an astounding structure.

  10. i think i have seen this before, but it looks like a statue that has been taken from a very deseptive angle.

  11. I don’t think it’s photoshoped, it a good one!

    I am probably the th to write so, but there is a mistake in the intro “but I dare to day it’s just an illusion.”

  12. Once you get past the first 3-4 steps, it goes more up than out, and the steps graduate down to about 1cm by the top, so the whole thing is about 2.5-3m high.

  13. They aren’t stairs, it’s just a marble obelisk. The ‘steps’ aren’t getting further away towards the top, they really are getting smaller, just like they look like.

  14. I’m guessing it must be a pyramid of some sort. That is very interesting – I have to force myself to see it as a pyramid or my eyes keep reverting back to the illusion.

  15. I’m guessing that the background is just a painted backdrop and so are most of the steps going up, the foreground is an artificial scene created on a set.

  16. From about the 8th step from the bottom, the shadows don’t need to align to the step below it, so you can just make a ribbed patterns creating the illusion of ‘going up’.

  17. the triangle effect, where its just the stairs are a drawn triangle, but with detail and background added to it

    on another hand, i cant believe that the ‘chop cup: wheres the ball?’ video is not in the top ten. that was one of the most awesomest videos ever

  18. erm, there only stairs till above eye level, then its just a verticle tower made to look like stairs

  19. Guess I’ll be listening to my old Led Zeppelin albums again. Very nice illusion. My guess is a pyramid face with an exaggerated vanishing point. I’d love to see a photograph from a different perspective.

  20. Its a pyramid that just gets smaller and smaller vertically giving the illusion that it extends outward toward the water. With or Without the illusion, its a beautiful photograph.

  21. make sure you look at the picture when it is smaller and don’t let the title deceive you. its just a small white pyramid.

    great illusion but i think you should talk about the illusion first, then about anything unrelated.

  22. id say that its a not a really long stair, but rather, a triangular stair with the stairs shrinking and the photo taken at a certain angle..cool illusion!

  23. I think it’s marble or stone slabs cut into very precise sizes, and stacked one on top of another. The great part of this piece is that every slab has to be an exact size. Good illusion.

  24. Yeah, it’s all about the angle. Kinda like the 3D chalk drawings.

    I would like to see it from another angle.

  25. Forgot to say that it is like a statue standing right in front of you, with the steps getting darker and smaller all the way up, so it looks like it reaches the sky when you stand right in front of it.

    At least, that’s what I think.

  26. It’s a pyramid shape that uses forced perspective. Kind of like when you’re a kid and you draw those railroad tracks that look like they’re going into the distance. Pretty neat and always effective.

  27. Yup. The flat part of the stairs (where you’d step)are not flat but beveled angles. It could be (we can’t see the whole thing) that it’s a beveled pyramidal shape overall. The illusion is that the beveled “steps” are flat and that you could actually step on them. You couldn’t or you’d like slip off. The distance illusion is the size of the “steps” getting smaller as the pyramidal shape reaches it’s point.

  28. At the end of your post, it says, “For the illusion part, you may think these stairs below were digitally manipulated, but I dare to day it’s just an illusion.” You may want to fix the word “day”” and change it to “say”.

    However, nice illusion. I love the site.

    Last, but not least. FIRST!!!

  29. It’s a statue that goes to a point…taken at the right angle it looks as though they are stairs going towards the heavens. Nice illusion.

  30. Seems to me that it is a kind of staircase pyramid where each “step” is actually sloping. You can see the angle on the sides and that it varies forming a perspective from the correct angle, thus making a staircase.

    I may be completely wrong, but that’s what I see.

  31. nice one but it appears to be a pyramid shaped structire with grooves cut into it made to look like stairs

  32. Wait a minute…we think that it’s a stairway to heaven but it’s just a sculpture right before our eyes

  33. I was thinking it is actually a sculpture of a pyramid with fine gradients getting smaller each time.

  34. I’m guessing it just goes directly up
    and is only a metre or so high

    (it’s not actually going
    diagonally upwards towards the sky)

  35. the stairs are not stairs in real, its just a cone/ tower/ pyramid. when shot from an angle looks like stairs to eterniy… nice illusion!

    I need to appreciate the photographer for the angle, the angle covers nicely the stairs on all sides except the front and little on left

    -Nesar

  36. this is just a tower cleverly built to look like some stairs to heaven with the tiers gradualy getting smaller i presume a photo from the back would look the samen as this

  37. hey think I’m the first to comment
    by the way i suppose it means that “one has to travel along way before reaching heaven”

  38. I don’t know if this is a legitimate term or not … (and if it isn’t, I’m taking credit for coining it) … but I’d call this technique: “forced parallax”

  39. it is a very stratigically placed “pyramid” if you will… just look at it closely it is rather interesting to see something like this though. kudos… i give it 2 thumbs up.

  40. @Tom; There’s no Parallax in a photograph. You need two different perspectives or motion, as I understand it.

    This would be called “Forced Perspective”.

  41. My guess is the 4/5 first steps are real and they’re stuck in a wall….the wall is painted or got some huge photograh with the sea and rock glued to it..

  42. lol it’s sidewalk art…..wher someone uses chalk sets, specific ones, and different shades of some colors to add the effect, because do u notice the line that is on the background that goes thru the bush and the stairs? it’s drawn ona sidewalk….

  43. Just a hint… there’s a suspicious line running through the bottom half. I dunno what for.. maybe a mirror beside a mirror?

  44. It’s just block piled up vertically on top of each other, progressively getting smaller and smaller, up until the top brick is barely visible from the perspective the photo was taken.

  45. i think it is a triangular statue in the shape of a pyramid . and was cracked or maybe painted for the cracks, because if you look closely , the only steps with cracks on it is the first two . id say its just a slanted pyramid type shape .

  46. I vote for a solid sculpture about 2 to 3 meters high and perfectly vertical
    Also I keep hearing this old Led Zeppelin tune in my head.

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