When my eccentric grandmother gave me this window ornament I thought it was pretty, but didn't realize how it related to physics yet. I sat in my kitchen pondering what kind of photo I would take for my physics photo project one day, discarding idea after idea. Then, as my gaze strayed to the window, the ornament caught my eye. The idea for this photo probably would have gone right over my head had I not noticed that the image of my backyard in the globe was inverted. When I saw this I realized that the sphere was actually a lens, kindly inverting this real image for me. You see, the globe is a convex, or converging lens. And since the lens is spherical, the center of curvature is the very center of the globe. This lens is convex because the surface curves outward and the image is real because it forms on the other side of the lens as the object. Had the image been virtual, the backyard within the globe would have been blurry or bigger than the actual backyard. This photo also deals with refraction of light as the light bends as passes from air into glass and into air again. This is a perfect example of how physics pops up in our daily lives in the most unexpected of places.
