Thread by @FreyaHolmer

found a sphere at the office!🔴

here's a quick demo of metallic reflections~

note how the color of the window's reflection on the sphere changes

even though the sphere is metallic red, it doesn't exclusively reflect red and absorb the rest, it depends on the angle

at a high grazing angle - only reds reflect

at a low grazing angle - all wavelengths reflect, hence all colors in the light from the window is preserved!

by the way - this happens with transparent materials as well, they too reflect light at low grazing angles!

for instance, look at the difference in transparency of the water at the shore vs the perfect mirror at the much lower angles further away

📸 by @nicolesy

note that this has *nothing* to do with distance, it's only the angle that matters!

if you were to lie down on that shore, it would be just as reflective close to you

if you were 400m above the lake looking straight down, the whole thing would be much more transparent

if you want to read more about the Fresnel effect, here are lots of words and equations~

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fresnel_e…