14 DAY TRIAL // If you're a “Lord of the Rings” fan but don't really like Legolas (go ahead and burn me at the stake, but I'm one of these people), you'll totally love the video below.
The footage made it only this past June 30, when it was posted on YouTube by the folks behind Minute Physics, and it explains how Legolas' elf eyes defy physics.
In a nutshell, the video makes a case of how, due to the behavior of light and how sight works, Legolas would not have been able to see the riders of Rohan as clearly as he supposedly did in “The Two Towers.”
Courtesy of the laws of physics and the anatomy of the eye, even those with the coolest sight possible can at best distinguish objects that are at least one centimeter (0.39 inches) in size and are located at a distance of 100 meters (328 feet) tops.
As detailed in the video, this means that physics should have made it downright impossible for Legolas to clearly see the riders, who were at a distance of some 24 kilometers (14.9 miles) from him and his companions.
Then again, Legolas is an elf, and unless one wants to start calling him a liar, perhaps it's best to let magic explain his extraordinary eyesight.
