Lens (optics) in the accompanying diagrams), while "negative" "R" means that rays reaching the surface have already passed the center of curvature. Consequently, for external lens surfaces as diagrammed above, and indicate "convex" surfaces (used to converge light in a positive lens), while and indicate "concave" surfaces. The reciprocal of the radius of curvature is called the curvature. A flat surface has zero curvature, and its radius of curvature is infinity. If "d" is small compared to "R" and "R", then the "thin lens" approximation can be made. For a lens in air, "f" is then given by As mentioned above, a
Crepuscular rays Crepuscular rays Crepuscular rays (more commonly known as sunbeams, sun rays, splintered light, or god rays), in atmospheric optics, are rays of sunlight that appear to radiate from the point in the sky where the Sun is located. Shining through openings in clouds (particularly stratocumulus) or between other objects, these columns of sunlit particulates are separated by darker cloud-shadowed volumes. Despite seeming to converge toward the light source, the rays are in fact near-parallel shafts of sunlight. Their apparent convergence is a perspective effect. This phenomenon mimics the way parallel railway lines or long hallways, for example, seem to seek