Ice Bells

During our time at the beach along the Wading River, we discovered some interesting ice formations.

They looked like bells. Which raises the question, how did they form.

There were other, similar forms, most just a little to far for close up shots. In a variety of bell like and non-bell like shapes.

My best guess as to why they look like bells is that as moisture condensed out of the air, it did so on strands of the moss hanging down. And as it condensed gravity pulled it down, so that most of it froze on the bottom. But why did it end where it does? And why the bell shape? My hypothesis is that there was a layer of ice on top of the stream, it was still there in other spots nearby, so the water would hit that layer of ice and then spread out. Freezing in the 'cone' shape that forms the 'bell'. But why the 'cap' at the top of the cone? I have no idea. A puzzlement.

And another bit of ice that makes me smile.

Mind Wandering

I recently found myself in a church, the one two blocks from the house I grew up in. The one where my mom sang in the choir. And where I spent many a Sunday bored to tears for about an hour.

While trapped in a pew I would spend time looking around, day dreaming, and wondering about an optical illusion.

This is the alter as it is today, a bit more open and bright than when I was a school kid.

The illusion has to do with the brown arch at the top of the image.

Or is it a white arch?

At either end of the arch is a corner piece. Sometimes it appears brown and concave. And others, white and convex. At least to me. And has since I was in grade school. How does it appear to you?

🕯  🕯  🕯  🕯  🕯

There was another optical puzzle to occupy my time on this visit.

Look at the candle shadows in the image below (bigafy for best results).

The shadows for the right three candles appear "solid" while those for the left three have a dark center with lighter edges. Curious. The key for me to solve the puzzle was the leftmost candle on the right side. It has a shadow lighter than the other two.

That's because it is only one shadow, from a light to its right, whereas the other two are shadows from two lights, on on the left and one on the right, and from two candles. It just so happens that the geometry of the situation, for the candles on the right, is such that the shadows overlap. So for the shadow to the left of the middle candle, it is the shadow of the middle candle from the light source to the left and the shadow of the right most candle from the light source on the right. The leftmost candle on the right side does not have a candle to its left, so the leftmost shadow is from only one candle.

If you look at the base of the candles on the right, you can see the double shadows as the back wall juts out a bit, and the geometry is no longer such that the shadows overlap.

Here is a text based schematic diagram:

                                                  Double

                         Shadow             Shadow

                                \                      /\

                                  \                  /    \

                                    \              /        \

                                      \          /            \

                                        Left              Middle

                                      Candle            Candle

                          

                   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

                            ^            

                            |    gap between lights and candles

                            v

                   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

                Left Light                                                Right Light 

                   Source                                                       Source

For the three candles on the left, the lights and candles don't quite line up, so the overlap of the shadows is not complete. Thus the dark center to the shadows, that's the overlap.

Kitchen Optics

Les Cowley, the host of the Atmospheric Optics website, uses the term "Kitchen Optics" for everyday optical phenomena all around us.

And a couple of days ago I experienced some literal Kitchen Optics, as evidenced by these images of my kitchen sink.

As I was starting up the coffee maker that morning, I noticed the colors in the sink. The water in the wine glass was acting as a prism, or in this case multiple prisms, resulting in the colors in the sink. Or at least that is what I think is happening.

Les and I are kindred spirits, in that we find these phenomena fascinating. I suspect most people wouldn't even notice, or give them a second glance. I know that at least some readers have become interested as well. And that is cool. And if you haven't, that's ok too. Hopefully you'll enjoy the next post. :-)

I've sent these to Les, and I hope he enjoys them as well. And that they cheer him up. You see, when I sent him my Halo images from last month, to see if it really was a 9° Halo, I received an email stating that Les was recovering from major surgery. Not a response I was expecting nor wanted.

Get well soon Les, get well soon.

Spectrum

The other day I blogged about an optical phenomena I could not fully explain.

I have no problem explaining this one. Again this is in my home office. But this time the cause is obvious. A prism sitting one of a pair of desktop speakers.

Standing on the shoulder of a giant as it were, Sir Issac Newton, we understand how light is refracted by wavelength. The really cool thing about spectra is that it can be used to determine the chemical make up  as well as the speed of objects in the universe.  Sir Issac would surely be amazed but probably not surprised.

If you look closely the writing on the prism stand reads, "Edmund Scientific Barrington, N.J." I bought it on my first and only visit to this legendary optics supplier. Alas, I visited during the store closing sale. So while I missed it's heyday I have a bit of it on my desk, still functioning after all these years.

Another Optical Puzzle

 One morning, and it was only one morning, I saw these colors on my home office window.

The photos came out darker than it really appeared, the sun was up.

I snapped some quick images before it disappeared. I planned to investigate further in subsequent days, but the phenomena did not recur. 

These phenomena are ephemeral. And need to be studied when they occur. I lesson I need to heed.

When Given Lemons ...

... write a blog post.

This past Saturday there was a report of a Lapland Longspur at the PPA, just a few miles from our place. This would be a life bird for our other friend Terry (seen with the binoculars in this post). And as good friends we went to help her find it, hidden, as it were, amongst five hundred or so Horned Lark and a large but smaller number of Snow Bunting, with a few Meadowlark sprinkled in (at any other time we'd be quite happy to see those birds, but today they were just a distraction, and in the way). 

Spoiler Alert: We did not find it.

But that's not what this post is about.

Nope it is about Thin Film Interference.

You see, my bins had fogged up. On the inside. At the center of the objective lens. Highly non-optimal for birding.

So while our small group was standing in a cold windy field scanning for a small bird in a large expanse, I was admiring the curious color pattern preventing me from joining in the fun.

After an hour and a half we gave up and headed home. And once there my bins promptly cleared up. A good thing as they would be needed later in the day.

As far as I know, Terry is still out there looking ...

~~~~~~~~~~

Update: We went back Sunday morning. Terry was there. Patty spotted the bird, after an hour and a half or so of scanning the field. Alas they flew before Terry could get a look.

I'm sure she'll be back.

And my bins fogged up again. Thankfully, they cleared before we left.

Desk Optics

Long time readers of this blog know I'm fascinated by optical phenomena, especially those which exhibit color effects. Because of this interest I tend to notice things that many (most) folks would ignore.

And I label these posts under "Things that Probably Only Interest Me" for no doubt good reason. But It's my blog, so here we go!

Like many people my age, I grew up listening to LP records. Unlike many (so I surmise) I still have a turntable. Although it may be obvious that it doesn't get much use these days.

Clearly I'm not one of those vinyl hipsters.

But what caught my attention one morning as I was sitting down to start my work day was how colorful my previously black turntable had become.

I wonder if the box of (physics) books sitting on it stresses the plastic, resulting in the colors.

~~~~~~~~~~

I have a clear plastic holder for small square note paper. And one morning a few months ago I noticed just a hint of color on my desk.

Moving the holder did not significantly enhance the colors. So I tried putting a piece of plain white paper down on the desk.

And the colors vanished. I do not know what is going on here. We have sunlight streaming through a double pane window, then through a cube shaped plastic paper holder, onto a wooden desk top.

~~~~~~~~~~

Lastly (for this blog post anyway) I spotted these colors on the other side of my desk, in the late afternoon light.

This 'zoomed' out view shows the light source, a windowed door. While hard to see, the door is made of different glass sections, which act as prisms. No mystery as to the source of the color in this case.

🌈  🌈  🌈  🌈  🌈

Another benefit of working from home is I see these things. My desk in the company's office has no nearby windows. And only boring overhead florescent lights. Nothing to challenge my imagination nor spark my wonder.

Look Up In The Sky

And you'll see cool things, like this Lunar Halo.

Even cooler, I spotted it while I was outside listening for owls, and there were three (and maybe four) Barred Owls calling. 

Keep listening!

Weekend Getaway

This past weekend Patty and I, and our friend Marie, traveled to Tionesta, PA for the weekend.

And when we arrived at the Black Caddis Ranch I got out of the car and looked up.

A harbinger of things to come, as we arrived on Friday and it rained all day Saturday.

But we were there for what came out after dark. And it didn't rain Friday or Saturday evenings.

Which as a good thing.

More to come ...

Daylight Time

Patty visited her brother last week. She gave him some plants from our gardens.

He gave her a time piece that had been their father's.

A sundial. Jim, her brother, thought I might like it.

He was right. Patty thought it would look nice out in the garden. I think she meant just set on the ground. As it had a mounting screw hole I was thinking on a post, and told her so.

"Like on a stump?" she asked. Hmmm ...

Perfect.

Moth Light

To attract those fancy, and the not so fancy, moths to our sheet we have a very bright light.

This light.

And while sitting enjoying some F-ing Good Wine, I decided to take a picture of the very bright light with my iPhone.

And I got some pretty interesting results.

Interesting to me anyway. I suspect these are reflections from the compound lens in the phone. Had I been thinking straight (too much wine?) I would have used both lenses.

Next time ...

Dusty Water ...

... plus Physics ...

... equals Colors!

Quételet Scattering.

A Puzzlement

While working in the yard this weekend I cam upon this. A reflection from one of the house windows. I don't know why it is shaped like a kite.

And more interestingly to me, I don't know why it is pink.

You see, from every other angle it is white.

Moving around the reflection nor changing the height of the viewing angle had any effect. If it was white it stayed white. If it was pink it stayed pink. I would have expected it to change colors, through the visible spectrum. But it did not. A puzzlement for sure.

Simple Things That Amuse Me

Coffee cup tornados.

Although the physics are perhaps not so simple methinks.

Not quite as impressive as these: three cup images.

I'll keep watching ...

Psychedelic Sun

A Corona around the Sun.

A somewhat craptastical image, phone cameras are not very good for imaging the sun, or any other really bright object. And shooting through the 'could use a good cleaning' window doesn't help. But by the time I would have gotten a better camera the clouds would have been gone. (And the camera I keep in my briefcase was this day four floors down and out in my car. Grrr.)

Still cool to see.

🌞  🌈  🌞

I've also seen it around the Moon (another not so great image).

And around Venus.

Kelvin-Helmholtz Cloud

Short lived, an accurate description for sure. Like many an atmospheric phenomena.

I initially noticed this cloud formation as I rounded the first turn on my way to work. By the time I got to a spot where I could get a clear image the formation had deteriorated some. Grrrr.

The Kelvin-Hemholtz Instability describes the disturbance caused by the difference in velocity between two fluids. Such as water and air. Or in this case, two different air masses.

The aspiration can be quite stunning, waves in the sky.

Keep looking up!

Sun, Trees, Screen ...

... Light Show.

I was sitting at my desk when I noticed the scene out the window below.

The sun was setting behind the trees and the leaves were acting like pinhole 'lenses' projecting the sunlight. And the screen then acted as a 2D diffraction grating, making the starburst pattern (bigafy to see).

Still sitting at my desk I zoomed in to take this, and the first, images. You can read about the physics behind it here and here. Or you can just enjoy the pictures.

Floating on Air

If you look closely, in the center of the image, on the horizon, you'll see an island that seems to be hovering just above the water. Bigafying the image, by clicking on it, will help.

Here's a crop, with the floating island again in the center on the horizon. Bigatficaiton will no doubt help here as well.

A mirage, caused by temperature variation at different heights in the air above the water, which in turn changes the index of refraction, which causes the light rays to bend. Turning the real into the wondrous.

At least it does for me.

Speaking of Celestial Phenomena ...

Here's a nice example of a 22° Halo seen from my yard the other day.

Keep looking up!

I've Been Demystified!

By Science!

Scientists Demystify the Celestial Phenomenon Known as STEVE

Thanks to Patty Rehn for sending me the link.

And Science!