Waves & Optics
Start with traveling disturbances, then build interference, boundary behavior, diffraction, imaging, and resonance from the same wave language.
One wave language explains ripples, sound, light, images, and resonance.
Frequency, wavelength, amplitude, phase, and speed form the shared vocabulary. Once waves overlap or encounter boundaries, interference and geometry create the richer phenomena we call optics.
Wave Motion
How does a disturbance carry a pattern through space?
Build optical behavior from wave behavior.
Geometric optics is a powerful approximation, but the path begins with the wave model that explains when ray behavior works and when it breaks.
Two waves can have the same frequency and amplitude yet add very differently because their peaks and troughs arrive with different phase.
Reflection, refraction, and diffraction are different ways a wave responds when its environment or allowed path changes.
Lenses and mirrors redirect many portions of a wavefront so light from one object point converges or appears to diverge from an image point.