Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1999/01/09
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]I looked up "rainbow" in MS Encarta (1996). They say "When the sunlight enters a raindrop it is refracted, or bent, by and reflected from the drop in such a way that the light appears as a spectrum of colors. The colors can be seen, however, only when the angle of reflection between the sun, the drop of water, and the observer's line of vision is between 40° and 42°". They go on to add that if the sun is low in the sky, the rainbow appears high, and vice versa. If the usn is more than 42 degrees above the horizon, no rainbow can be seen because the light goes right over the viewers head. Rainbows seem like panaramas in that they never look as good on film--my film, at least--as they did to the observer en locus. But as the above paragraph suggests, there is no "rainbow lens." The extent of a rainbow varies depending upon the height of the sun. Sincerely, Joe Stephenson