In an age where computers and software are easily able to be guided into creating optical illusions, the days of pressing your nose to a piece of paper and slowly walking backwards to generate illusory effects are gone past.
If you’re interested in seeing visual trickery with real substance, constructed from real materials for the purpose of wowing your eyes and brain, check out these cool Lego optical illusions!
1. Never-Ending Staircase
Right-angles on a small structure present an opportunity for fantastic optical trickery and this never-ending staircase is a perfect example of this principle!
2. M.C. Escher Scene
Looking like a page straight from the scrapbook of famous illusory paintier M.C. Escher, this fantastic scene features Lego men moving up and down staircases at impossible angles.
3. Impossible Triangle
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A common but never disappointing optical illusion built from Lego is the so-called impossible triangle. Achieved by using a deceivingly slanted block to top the highest point of the triangle and give the impression of a change in direction, this illusory Lego construct serves as a perfect example of the wonders that can be achieved using only small toy building blocks.
4. Impossible Trangle Part 2
This impossible triangle was created with the effects of color on the eyes and brain being kept in mind, using a black and white color scheme to create a whole new level of optical trickery.
5. Vertical Terrace
Another Lego sculpture reminiscent of M.C. Escher, this recreation of a common terrace gives a hint of height with the clever placement of the ladder; it goes nowhere but sideways!
6. Penrose Staircase
Yet another Lego creation taking a page from the book of Escher is this depiction of the Penrose Staircase, a seemingly endless ascension to nowhere at all thanks to the clever use of vanishing points.
7. Warped Chess Board
Perfectly parallel lines or a warped mess of a chess board? The use of well-placed cogs on this board give the illusion of warping where only perfectly straight Lego lines occur; removing the black and white cogs instantly allows the eyes to see the symmetry that exists in reality!
8. Castle of Illusion
All is not as it seems in this fantastic Lego creation! Depending on the angle from which it is viewed, this castle sports various features achieved by using strategically placed vanishing points to give the impression of spaces, holes and walls that simply do not exist.
9. Doorway of Depth
Is this Lego man standing in a normal doorway or one with more depth than meets the eye? This simple yet fascinating creation is a perfect example of the ease with which Lego optical illusions can be constructed and displayed.
10. Escher Relativity Recreation
Given M.C. Escher’s great importance to the very idea of optical illusions, we’ll end with an almost perfect recreation of his famous Relativity piece, done entirely in Lego bricks! Commissioned by the Hong Kong Science Museum, Lego sculptor Henry Lim set to work making Lego equivalents of several of Escher’s famous lithographs; this one stands above them all!
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