Easy enough. Watch the shadows folks. He walks in front of his light source before he pours the liquid, watch the shadows and glares on the machine behind him. More than likely a good use of camera position. It more than likely is downhill as the water flows, but due to the pillars and the angle of the filming, both done on purpose mind you, it appears to be uphill. There is no pooling, which would happen with an uphill slope, and the pace of the water suggests not a steep downhill, but more a gradual slope that’s hard to see with the human eye.

Very fun though!

I don’t have access to watch the video (corporate militia and all) but it reminds me of a similar build years ago. The builder ran a small pump at the bottom that had water pumped to the top of the waterfall. Some water flowed down the aquaduct while the rest fell over the falls. The water flowing down gave the illusion of moving against gravity because of the light background and, well, movement.

Not to sound like a know-it-all douche but the fact that it is an impossible structure makes it very obvious that what you are looking at is an optical illusion that is only convincing because of the camera angle that was chosen. As with any of those, if you were to rotate the camera a few degrees either way you would see how the structure was tricking you.

Sort of reminds me of the paper dragon illusion.

So the structure can be made to look like it is uphill when it is in fact going down hill. How come the water falls from the ACTUAL lower point onto the wheel then? There is more to this trick than meets the eye.

why two videos? could be a more technical approach. between A and E the water flow looks like its comming out of a nosle. small pump bringing the water from C up to A and E?

Nice trick!

Or…maybe he did the impossible?

Time to redraw that flux capacitor :P

as mentioned in the explanation link, watch at 0:45 in the video, you see the water kinda stall and then surge up near the top. if you continue watching that area, you can see the water splashing from being poured there. it is definitely two videos put together.

Here is my explanation– a combination of CGI, illusion, and trickery:

1. The woodwork is real in the sense that he did construct something that from the right angle only LOOKS like the Escher’s waterfall. However, I don’t believe the waters runs through it in real life. This is where the CGI comes in.

2. When he pours the water, the water escapes through an exit right after the trough (hidden by the water wheel).

3. The illusion part of the video, which is water going uphill to the waterfall is done in CGI, and it’s very easy to do so. Simulating water flow upwards with CGI in straight lines is CGI 101.

4. And lastly the water dropping from the fall onto the wheel is real. This is the trick part. I believe he has a tube going up to the fall portion (obstructed inside or behind the inside column), and he probably triggers this with his free hand since he’s mostly outside of the camera view. It could also be started by someone else in the room, that part is irrelevant.

Anyhow, that’s my theory and if you can agree that Escher’s waterfall can be built to appear as such from a specific point of view (without running it, just as a still image), the rest I assure you is possible. Points 2-4 are 100% feasible.

People, stop calling it a hoax! -_- Its not fake. Its a illusion, in reality, its gowing DOWNHILL not UPHILL -_-

Cool! Well done.

Guy is a troll of epic proportions. Love it!

While the explanation is almost certainly correct, the details are not. The device is certainly made possible by forced perspective and the precise positioning of the camera. But the diagram given is flawed. If you look at the man’s shadow at 0:05, you can see that the whole upper front surface goes simultaneously into shadow. Therefore the position of the two parts of this panel in the diagram cannot be so. I suspect that the whole front upper panel is one piece and is positioned to block the actual front panel of the lower section.

If you look at 43 seconds in and watch the water go it looks totally fake and computer generated. The water kind of “skips frames” of video.

Certainly a lot of you people are getting trolled. It’s called an illusion. And also Daley the build is easy. Follow the posts and they all align on the structure itself.

At 39 seconds, watch which way he looks while he goes to pour his water. He gives it away, lol

Yep this is CGI.

1. Rendering mistake #1: there are 2 main sources of light, one on the right casting a shadow of the structure on the ground toward the left, and one light on the left that should cast a shadow on the ground toward the right… but it is missing (contrary to shadows on parts of the structure itself)!

2. Some other mistakes: the contraption itself is too bright compared to the ambient level of light; the white buckets are darker. And the texture of the upper parts of the wood contraption feels unrealistic; there is almost no grain.

3. Most importantly, the poster wrote “ImD-student” in his profile which refers to http://www.intermediales-design.de which is an education establishment offering concept / 3D modelling courses.

5. The poster also subscribed to the “indymogul” youtube channel which is a online community dedicated to DIY filmmaking.

The water you are about to see is real.

The camera angles have been changed to dupe the innocent…

There are more than 2 lights, I count 4 at least. watch where he walks past from 30-36 over and over and you will see that different parts cast shadows at not only different angles but different intensities.

If it’s CG it’s a masterful job at applying moving shadows to the CG. If it’s a physical object and just angle, then he also chose the zoom on the camera to be in the 60-80mm range to really flatten depth as well to increase the efect.

There’s a cutline right through the middle of the whole contraption. Watch the video in 1080p and have a look at the topmost roof, the one above the waterfall edge.

think this might answer it?

I don’t understand how this could work, so… uhm ITS CGI!

wait, i hear a bell ringing. must be time to eat.

Loathe as I am to agree with him, I think M4CGYV3R hit it exactly on the head. The pump is the thing that’s got me most confused.

Anyone who says this is CGI clearly has never actually done any computer modeling or animation. It’s not as easy as they make it look in the movies. A design student would have neither the time nor the funding to make an image that looks as true-to-life as this does.

There is a (not so simple) way to construct a device that achieves this illusion without the need for CG. It uses a modification of [David Goldman]‘s idea (one segment longer, so the top cantilever is actually part of the bottom.

Since the base tapers down as it gets “higher”, you can assume that that uses that taper as a ramp for the water. But rather than a one way ramp, it can be a two way ramp, where the inside draws the water back to a collecting area below the wheel. Simply attach a tube to the top, and then a pump from that pool up the tube. Either use a switch or a timer so the effect seems “continuous” and you are done. Doing it this way also explains why the water went from just a small amount to a giant torrent at the end. For those that say there is no motor sound, that’s easy to cover up, simply record the sound later by turning it off and pouring water yourself.

Building that is pretty damn hard though, and good CG artists could do it well enough to fool people given enough time.