Physics Animation: movie of a spherical mirror with increasing convexity

This animation shows a mirror that changes from a flat (plane) reflecting surface to convex spherical reflecting surface. The parallel tubes on the table in front of the mirror illustrate how the reflected image changes. The blue cube illustrates how just how minified the image becomes. This effect makes convex spherical mirrors very useful when a wide field of view is needed. Examples include security mirrors in shops, mirrors on roads with sharp bends and mirrors in cars ("objects are closer than they appear"). Compare the effects with those in the companion graphic of a distorting mirror.