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📘 How do mirrors work?

You stand before a mirror and see a room apparently continuing behind the glass. Yet no light is arriving from that hidden space. Light from a lamp first reaches your face and surroundings, then some of it strikes the mirror and returns to

3
lessons
~15 min
to learn
Adults
level
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What you’ll learn

  1. Make light return in orderApply the law of reflection and distinguish specular from diffuse reflection to explain why a smooth surface preserves an image.Mirrors redirect existing light at equal angles, and their microscopic smoothness keeps neighboring rays ordered instead of scattering the scene.
  2. Build an image behind the glassExplain the roles of a metal coating and glass support, construct a plane mirror’s virtual image, and resolve the apparent left-right reversal.A thin reflective metal film preserves light paths, while backward ray tracing places an upright virtual image behind the glass and reflection reverses depth rather than choosing left or right.
  3. Bend the surface, change the jobCompare plane, convex, and concave mirrors and connect curvature, focal behavior, field of view, magnification, and telescope design.Convex mirrors spread rays for a wide view, concave mirrors can magnify or focus, and precision telescope mirrors scale the same reflection law into a light-gathering instrument.

Questions this course answers

Why does a smooth mirror form an image while a white wall usually does not?

Both surfaces reflect, but a mirror’s aligned microscopic surface normals produce specular reflection that preserves spatial information; a rough wall scatters it.

Where are the angles in the law of reflection measured from?

The angle of incidence and equal angle of reflection are each measured relative to the local surface normal.

Why is the image in an ordinary plane mirror called virtual?

An eye or camera can see the image, but no real rays converge at its apparent position behind the glass, so a screen there cannot capture it.

What does an outward-curving convex mirror provide?

A convex surface makes rays diverge, producing reduced virtual images that fit more of the surroundings into the mirror.

Grounded in trusted sources

  • 25.2 The Law of Reflection — OpenStax — https://openstax.org/books/college-physics-2e/pages/25-2-the-law-of-reflection
  • 2.1 Images Formed by Plane Mirrors — OpenStax — https://openstax.org/books/university-physics-volume-3/pages/2-1-images-formed-by-plane-mirrors
  • 2.2 Spherical Mirrors — OpenStax — https://openstax.org/books/university-physics-volume-3/pages/2-2-spherical-mirrors
  • Why doesn’t a plain, white piece of paper reflect light, but a mirror does? — MIT School of Engineering — https://engineering.mit.edu/ask-an-engineer/why-doesnt-a-plain-white-piece-of-paper-reflect-light-but-a-mirror-does
  • Frequently Asked Questions — Richard F. Caris Mirror Lab, University of Arizona — https://mirrorlab.arizona.edu/content/faq
  • Optics — NASA Science — https://science.nasa.gov/mission/hubble/observatory/design/optics/

Every Wunder lesson is built from real, reputable sources — never invented.

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