Alexandria Soquiña

REFLECTION
& REFRACTION
R E F R A C T I ON

“You’re a refraction of the one light. You’re

a waveform of light. You’re a fractal, a
pattern that continuously changes.”
C Reflection at a Refraction at a
O
N
Spherical Surface Spherical Surface
T
E
N
T

01 Reflection at
Plane Surfaces
Refraction at Plane
Surfaces
 01 REFLECTION AT PLANE
SURFACES
IMAGE or VIRTUAL IMAGE: the result of an object
point P formed by a mirror; the apparent source of
reflected rays.
OBJECT DISTANCE: s, the distance from the object
to the mirror.
IMAGE DISTANCE: s’ , the distance from the virtual
image to mirror.
REAL IMAGE: the image resulting from the outgoing
rays that actually pass through an image point.
 SIGN RULES FOR OBJECT
AND IMAGE DISTANCE
OBJECT DISTANCE: When the object is on the same
side of the reflecting or refracting surface as the
incoming light, the object distances s is positive;
otherwise, it is negative.
IMAGE DISTANCE: When the image is on the same
side of the reflecting or refracting surface as the
outgoing light, the image distance s’ is positive;
otherwise, it is negative.

s = s’ plane mirror
 LATERAL MAGNIFICATION
  For object height y and image height y’ , the
lateral magnification m is;

m=
or a plane mirror, the lateral magnification m is unity. In other
words, when you look at yourself in a plane mirror, your image is
the same size as the real you.

ERECT: when the object and image are in the same direction
INVERTED: when the object and image are in opposite directions
REVERSED: in a plane mirror, the orientation of the image versus
the orientation of the object; the right side of the object “appears” to
be the left side of the object thereby appearing reversed.
 02 REFLECTION AT
SPHERICAL SURFACES
CENTER OF CURVATURE: the center of
the geometrical sphere of which the mirror is
curved, C.
VERTEX: the center of a spherical mirror
surface, V.
OPTIC AXIS: the line through the object
point, P, the center of curvature, C, and the
vertex, V
 SIGN RULES FOR THE
RADIUS OF CURVATURE
WHEN THE CENTER OF CURVATURE C
IS ON THE SAME SIDE AS THE
OUTGOING (reflected) LIGHT, THE
RADIUS OF CURVATURE R IS
POSITIVE; OTHER WISW, IT IS
NEGATIVE.
 
+ = spherical mirror
 PARAXIAL RAYS: rays from P
that make sufficiently small
angles with the optic axis and
intersect P 0 after being reflected (and thus
are close to the axis and nearly parallel to it) using
paraxial approximation.
FOCAL POINT FOCUS: with an object distance
very far from a spherical mirror, the incident rays
after reflection converge to a point F given by R/2.
FOCAL LENGTH: the distance, f from the vertex
to the focal point; f = R/2
 FOCAL POINT OF A
CONCAVE SPHERICAL
MIRROR
1. Any incoming ray parallel to the optic axis is reflected through
the focal point.
2. Any incoming ray that passes through the focal point is reflected
parallel to the optic axis.
For spherical mirrors, these statements are true only for paraxial
rays; for parabolic mirrors, they are exactly true. 1 s + 1

 + = spherical mirror  + = spherical mirror

VIRTUAL FOCAL POINT: the focal point for a convex mirror

that appears to come from behind (or beyond) the mirror.
 03 REFRACTION AT PLANE
SURFACES
When a ray of light enters a denser
medium it is refracted towards the normal in
such a manner than the ratio of the sine of
the angle of incidence to the sine of the angle
of refraction is constant, this constant being
called the refractive index n.
 03 REFRACTION AT PLANE
SURFACES
(i) The incident ray, the refracted ray and the
normal to the refracting surface at the point of incidence
all lie in the same plane.

(ii) The ratio of the sines of the angle of incidence (i)

and of the angle of refraction (r) is a constant quantity μ
for two given media, which is called the refractive index
of the second medium with respect to the first.

(sin i / sin r) = constant = μ

 03 REFRACTION AT PLANE
SURFACES
When light propagates through a series of layers
of different medium as shown in the figure, then the
Snell’s law may be written as

μ1sin 1 = μ2sin 2 = μ3sin 3 = μ4sin 4 = constant

In general, μ sinθ = constant 
 03 REFRACTION AT PLANE
SURFACES
When light passes from rarer to denser medium it
bends toward the normal as shown in the fig.
According to Snell’s law
μ1sin θ1 = μ2sin θ2
When a light ray passes from denser to rarer medium it
bends away from the normal as shown in the fig. b above
For a given point object, the image formed by refraction
at plane surface is illustrated by the following diagrams.
 The same result is obtained for the
other case also. The image distance
from the refracting surface is also known
as Apparent depth or height.

Apparent shift = Object distance from refracting surface –

image distance from refracting surface. Δy (apparent shift) t =
1 - μ-1 where t is the object distance and μ = μ1/ μ2

If there are a number of slabs with different refractive indices

placed between the observer and the object.

Total apparent shift = ΣΔyi

 EXAMPLE GIVEN
 A person looking through a telescope T
just sees the point A on the rim at the bottom of a
cylindrical vessel when the vessel is empty. When the
vessel is completely filled with a liquid (? = 1.5), he
observes a mark at the centre, B, of the vessel. What is the
height of the vessel if the diameter of its cross-section is
10cm?
 SOLUTION
It is mentioned in the problem that on
filling the vessel with the liquid, point B is observed
for the same setting; this means that the images of point
B, is observed at A, because of refraction of the ray at C.
For refraction at C :sin r / sin i = μ1= 1.5
sin r =AD / AC = 10/ √( 102+ h2), where h is height of
vessel
 04 REFRACTION AT
SPHERICAL SURFACES
The same way that the Law of Reflection is the
basic tool we use to develop the theory of mirrors, Snell's
Law is the basic tool that we use to develop the theory of
lenses.

In this section, we will discuss single refraction for a

circular boundary, where a beam of light passes from one
medium into another .

In other words, we shall be undertaking a study of lenses.

 FOCUS
Consider a convex circular boundary
(of radius R and center of curvature O) between two
regions

Optical Axis x
A
y

z F
B O

n1 n2
 If rays coming in from infinity are close to the
optical axis, then we will be dealing with small
angles, and the small angle approximation
sin(w) = w will be good. We assume that the
angles x, y, z as labelled above are small enough so the
approximation holds, and we now proceed to find the focus of this
setup.

When the ray hits the point A, it refracts according to Snell's Law;
using small angle approximations, this reduces to n1x = n2y. Also,
the angle sum theorems for lines and triangles yield z = x - y.

Using radian measure, AB = Rx, and the

relationship AB = fz = f(x - y) holds approximately. Hence, keeping
in mind our simplified Snell's Law, we have
 The same equation holds for a concave
boundary; for brevity's sake we shall omit the
proof. In this case, the focus is the spot from
which the refracted rays seem to diverge.
 THE IMAGE OF A POINT
In discussing refraction, we can use the same
ray tracing techniques that we used for mirrors. Here, we
consider a ray that is bent to intersect the focus, and a ray through
the centre of curvature (which is therefore not bent).
Observe the following convex boundary.
 We see that the image is inverted and shrunken,
and that it is located in the second region.
As with concave mirrors, concave refractive
boundaries have three cases. When the source
is beyond the focus, we get a diminished, upright image in front
of the source, located between the focus and the centre of curvature.

The image must be between the focus and the centre because we are
travelling from an area of low index to one with a high index; the refracted ray
cannot be bent past the normal line.

When the source is between the focus and the centre of curvature, the image is
again diminished and upright.
 The image must be located between the
focus and the centre, and in front of the
source.
 Finally, the source could be located between
the centre and the boundary. In this case, the image is
shrunken and upright.

The image will be located between the boundary and the centre; it will
also be behind the source. This is an easy consequence of the geometry;
since the source is in front of the centre, the ray that goes through the
centre must go backwards to intersect the line that goes through the focus.
 PRECISE LOCATION OF
THE IMAGE
The image below provides a method for finding the
image of an object after refraction at a convex boundary.
 The source is located at S, and the image
will be located at I. The centre of
curvature is at O, and the radius is R. The
angle x can presumably be measured, and the angles
of incidence and refraction are related using our small angle
approximation of Snell's Law. Using the angle sum theorems
for lines and triangles, and radian measure, we find that

so that our small angle Snell's Law is given by

n1(x + y) = n2(y - z)
 Using radians, the arclength AB = Ry.
For small angles, AB = sx = iz holds.
Substituting these formulas into our Snellian
approximation gives

In fact, the equation holds for concave

boundaries as well, provided we use sign
conventions for our measurements s, i, R.