Visual Effects
Length contraction refers to measurements of position made at simultaneous times according to a coordinate system. This could naively lead to a thinking that if one could take a picture of a fast moving object, that the image would show the object contracted in the direction of motion. However, it is important to realize that such visual effects are completely different measurements, as such a photograph is taken from a distance, while length contraction can only directly be measured at the exact location of the object's endpoints. In 1959 Roger Penrose and James Terrell published papers demonstrating that length contraction instead actually shows up as elongation or even a rotation in a photographic image. This kind of visual rotation effect is called Penrose-Terrell rotation.
Read more about this topic: Length Contraction
Famous quotes containing the words visual and/or effects:
“I may be able to spot arrowheads on the desert but a refrigerator is a jungle in which I am easily lost. My wife, however, will unerringly point out that the cheese or the leftover roast is hiding right in front of my eyes. Hundreds of such experiences convince me that men and women often inhabit quite different visual worlds. These are differences which cannot be attributed to variations in visual acuity. Man and women simply have learned to use their eyes in very different ways.”
—Edward T. Hall (b. 1914)
“to become a pimp
Or deal in fake jewelry or ruin a fine tenor voice
For effects that bring down the house could happen to all
But the best and the worst of us . . .”
—W.H. (Wystan Hugh)