What Colour is a Mirror?

in #challenge7 years ago

mirror1

An object most of us see every day is a mirror.

Some of us use it for a minute or so; Others may use this object for several hours.

The main characteristic of this object is that it reflects everything that is set in front of it. It looks like a window, but it isn't see-through, it rather shows us the picture behind us. It is made of glass. It doesn’t seem to have a colour, at least not on the front side.



QUESTION

What is the colour of the plate the mirror is applied to?




mirror2

Looking forward to your answers

NJOY

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The color of a mirror is .... green!
Here is a proof for it.

Good video!
In theory the colour is not green. In practise maybe indeed due to imperfections of the mirror glass.

a mirror has dynamic color like your computer screen :)

nice idea :)

the colour of a perfect mirror is white. the colour of our mirrors is slightly to the green.

Hi @edje, been reading some of your comments re HF19 - as you know, I've just joined so was not aware of the comparisons between pre and post HF19. Strikes me most people can't tell the difference between proportional, linear and flat distributions. Anyway, this isn't the place, but not sure where is - maybe a chatroom - and btw left you a msg, thanks for the link.

OK, back on topic! But people think mirrors are silver because that's what the reflective backing is made from, or aluminium or whatever. Without the reflecting backing a mirror would be a window. But silver is not a colour of the spectrum, but we know the difference between white and metallic. If you look through a block of glass so that you catch the face with total internal reflection, then one can argue that that face is acting as a non-metallic mirror :-) what do you think?

Hahahahaha, that is a good one! Well it'll be combination with not so perfect glass, since perfect glass will not reflect anything :) But yeh indeed, the face being the non-metallic mirror, or the replacement of the silver/alu usually at the back of the glass of the mirror, is a valid one...although it'll be the imperfection of the glass causing the reflection I would say. But most people will probably not have an argument against the face being the reflector, so they may be convinced with such argument.

So what is the refractive index of perfect glass?

I would say absolute zero! But not on the edges though.

if n=0 then c=infinity.

Colour of its reflection :D

that will be most of the time all sort of colours :)

Hahaha. Exactly

By the fact that under the glass, there is a layer of alloy, the color of a mirror is alloy / silver (more or less).

That is what a lot of people think.

Philosophically speaking, the color of a mirror, is what every single human see in it....... think ... think... think...

Smile :)

:D :D :D

i think is silver but who know :)

Lot of people think that it is silver. It is however not correct. The video of @moffay explains it well. In effect he provided the right answer, although I was looking for the answer for a perfect mirror. This is the colour white, since we perceive something being white when all frequencies of our sunlight are reflected, and that is exactly what a mirror does, reflects everything. Each colour has its own frequency. An object we perceive as blue, absorbs all frequencies except the one for the colour blue which is reflected of the object and therefore we see the colour blue.

This post received a 1.5% upvote from @randowhale thanks to @edje! For more information, click here!

I quote "A mirror might look silver because it's usually depicted that way in books or movies. However, it's actually the color of whatever is reflected onto it. A perfect mirror has specular reflection, meaning it reflects all light in a single direction equal to what it receives."

Source: https://www.livescience.com/34427-what-color-is-a-mirror.html

p.s. I wanted to thank you for upvoting my latest post and thought of saying thank you; post upvoted & followed.

A perfect mirror has specular reflection, meaning it reflects all light in a single direction equal to what it receives.

Absolutely correct, and it is therefore the colour white, since we perceive something to be 100% white when all the frequencies are reflected and no frequency is absorbed by the material a perfect white light is signing on. The sun is a source that creates perfect white light.

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