Kaleidoscope

You’ve seen small kaleidoscopes, but now it’s time to put yourself in the picture! Duck into this three-way mirror and watch how you stretch into infinity in all directions.

Explanation

The three mirrors form an equilateral triangle. This triangle’s sides are all the same length and its corners all form the same sized angle (60°).

Light reflects off you and onto each mirror’s surface. It then reflects off the surface, and bounces into the other mirrors, creating multiple reflections of you!

Your image becomes darker as it gets further away because light has been reflected off the mirrors multiple times. Each time the light strikes a mirror, some of the light energy is absorbed. The mirror actually becomes a tiny bit warmer as it absorbs the energy of the light!

Extras for Experts

What would happen in the angle between the mirrors decreased? The numbers of images would increase! This is because the decreasing angle allows light to bounce between the mirrors more times.

When the two mirrors are at at 0 degree angle to each other, the number of images is theoretically infinite because light bounces back and forth between the mirrors without escape. But because the mirrors are absorbing a little bit of the light energy each time light hits them, your images keep getting darker so that they are not truly infinite.

Questions to Ask

Kaleidoscopes contain a lot of symmetry. Can you think of any other symmetrical objects found in nature?

Try an Activity

Disgustoscope
A normal kaleidoscope makes beautiful patterns by reflecting beads or coloured paper into symmetrical patterns. The disgustoscope’s angled walls cause the reflections to form a sphere shape.

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