Non-ideal Reflectors

Real material, other than mirrors and chrome

Snell's law, however, applies only to ideal mirror reflectors. Real materials, other than mirrors and chrome tend to deviate significantly from ideal reflectors. At this point we will introduce an empirical model that is consistent with our experience, at least to a crude approximation.

Empirical model

• microscopic surface variations

• light just slightly offset from the ideal reflected ray

In general, we expect most of the reflected light to travel in the direction of the ideal ray. However, because of microscopic surface variations we might expect some of the light to be reflected just slightly offset from the ideal reflected ray. As we move farther and farther, in the angular sense, from the reflected ray we expect to see less light reflected.