Light, a mixture of why a thing is the colour that it is?
As well as why reflection would be angle of incidence is angle of exit.
My current understanding of colour is that the colour of an object is defined by the ability of the electrons in the compound jump different energy levels. I don't know if that in itself is enough to result in all the colour we see.
My current understanding of reflection is that because of wavyness of light when lots of light gets absorbed (to my understanding a single photon exciting a single electron to jump some amount) and reemited (the electron falling back down) together the light ends up forming that angle pattern. Under than understanding single photons don't bounce in the same way rays of light do?
I don't know how correct either of those understandings are, but my understanding has been put together from so many places and I've never heard any source explain either like that so I don't trust they are correct.
* For a pure colour, the colour is simply the energy of the photons. Atoms have discrete stable electron orbits, and electrons moving between these levels will absorb or emit discrete levels of energy in the form of photons, which is why we have spectral lines. Reality is more complicated because part of the energy may be converted to vibrations of the atom itself (phonons).
* Another factor is the perception of colour. In physics to characterize light one measures its spectra, the intensity of the light versus its wavelength (wavelength = speed of light in vacuum / frequency). The perception of colour of these distributions isn't always always what one would expect.
My current understanding of colour is that the colour of an object is defined by the ability of the electrons in the compound jump different energy levels. I don't know if that in itself is enough to result in all the colour we see.
My current understanding of reflection is that because of wavyness of light when lots of light gets absorbed (to my understanding a single photon exciting a single electron to jump some amount) and reemited (the electron falling back down) together the light ends up forming that angle pattern. Under than understanding single photons don't bounce in the same way rays of light do?
I don't know how correct either of those understandings are, but my understanding has been put together from so many places and I've never heard any source explain either like that so I don't trust they are correct.