Flat Mirrors - Physics

An image is said to be virtual when the reflected rays instead of meeting actually appear to meet and an image is said to be real when reflected rays actually meet.

The image formed on a flat or a plane mirror is said to be virtual because the reflected rays instead of meeting actually appear to meet. Also, one characteristic of every virtual image is that it always erect that means that they will be right side up.
But, real images are always inverted that means that they will be upside down.

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Another characteristic of real images is that because the rays come together, the image can be projected onto a screen. If you held up a screen to a mirror, you wouldn't get an image. That's because the rays are diverging instead of converging.

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Plane Mirrors and Reflection

A mirror is a reflective surface that does not allow the passage of light and instead bounces it off, thus producing an image. The most common mirrors are flat and called plane mirrors. These mirrors are made by putting a thin layer of silver nitrate or aluminium behind a flat piece of glass.

When you place an object in front of a mirror, you see an image of the same object in the mirror. The object is the source of the incident rays, and the image is formed by the reflected rays. An image formed by reflection may be real or virtual. A &#;real&#; image occurs when light rays actually intersect at the image, and become inverted, or turned upside down. A &#;virtual&#; image occurs when light rays do not actually meet at the image. Instead, you &#;see&#; the image because your eye projects light rays backward. You are fooled into seeing an image! A virtual image is right side up (upright).

In flat, or plane mirrors, the image is a virtual image, and is the same distance behind the mirror as the object is in front of the mirror. The image is also the same size as the object. These images are also parity inverted, which means they have a left-right inversion.

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