Educational Media Awareness Campaign/Physics/POTD 9


The Formation of a Rainbow
1. Spherical droplet
2. Places where internal reflection of the light occurs
3. Primary rainbow
4. Places where refraction of the light occurs
5. Secondary rainbow
6. Incoming beams of white light
7. Path of light contributing to primary rainbow
8. Path of light contributing to secondary rainbow
9. Observer
10. Region forming the primary rainbow
11. Region forming the secondary rainbow
12. Zone in the atmosphere holding countless tiny spherical droplets.
Diagram showing how primary and secondary rainbows are formed. Click on the image for a full size version which you can freely re-use and modify. Print it and use it for your lessons, integrate it into your pages on Wikiversity, or use it in other learning resources and websites. Use the links below to find more images like this one.

Guide to rainbow media - Prism images - Light images
Mechanics images - Electromagnetism images - Optics images - Atomic physics images
Images relating to physics in general


This image is a part of the
Educational Media Awareness Campaign, raising awareness among educators about the availability and usage of millions of free internet media in education.