Reflection Of Light | Laws of Reflection | Types of Reflection

Reflection Of Light

Reflection of light is illustrated in bellow Fig. At the point when a beam of light from air along the way AO falls on a plane mirror M, it is avoided along the way OB.. The ray AO is called incident ray while the ray OB is called reflected ray. The angle between incident ray AO and normal N, i.e, <AON is called the angle of incident represented by i. The angle between reflected ray OB, i.e, < NOB is called the angle of reflection represented by r.

Fig. 1

Now we can define the phenomenon of reflection as:

  When light in a certain medium falls on the surface of another medium, a part of it turn back in the same medium.

Laws of Reflection

 (i) The incident ray, the normal, and the reflected ray at the point of incidence all lie in the same plane.

 (ii) The angle of incidence is equal to the angle of reflection i.e., i=r

Types of Reflection

 Nature of reflection depends on smoothness of surface. For example, a smooth surface of sliver reflects rays of light in one direction only. The reflection by these smooth surfaces is called Regular Reflection. Most of the object in everyday world are not smooth on the microscopic level. The rough surface of the objects reflect the rays of light in many directions. Such type of reflection is called diffuse reflection. Regular reflection and diffuse reflection both are shown bellow.