Blog 14-Reflections

While we were waiting to perform in Advance Theater's Shakespeare Festival, my friends and I were taking pictures to help the time pass more quickly. In the photo above, several different physics concepts are pictured.  

The first is electricity.  The lights behind us are in parallel circuit. Some of the bulbs are out (probably the filament burnt out), but the rest of the lights are still able to be turned on.  

The second concept is reflection.  The mirror behind us reflects all the light from the objects in front of it.  From this angle, the photographer is visible in the reflection because her object's (i.e. her body) incidence angle is visible in the reflected angle.

The virtual images are of an equal distance from the mirror as the actual objects.

Blog 13-BEACH DAY

A few weeks ago I went with some friends to the beach. When we went into the water, I brought my waterproof (only up to ten feet) camera with me. 

Anyways, we took a bunch of pictures that day, but I didn't really go through them until recently. One of the pictures that I thought belonged in the trash bin actually shows a great example of refraction. In the picture below, part of the lens is out of the water and part is below the water. The viewer can see the way light bends in the different mediums.

In image in the water appears larger than the real object. In addition, this light is bent differently in air than water due to the different indexes of refraction.  The index of refraction of air is about 1 whereas the index of refraction for water is 1.33.  By using Snell's Law, we could predict the angle of refraction at which the rays of light were shot off from the surface of the water.

Also, it is slightly difficult to see, but this photo also exhibits total internal refraction.  The image of my friend's body is reflected on the surface of the water. However, the angle of refraction is too large, so some of the light rays are reflected back from the surface or the water and are sent downwards/along the surface of the water, as shown.