The Notebooks

SIXTH BOOK ON LIGHT AND SHADE. The effect of rays passing through holes (213. 214). 213. PERSPECTIVE. If you transmit the rays of the sun through a hole in the shape of a star you will see a beautiful effect of perspective in the spot where the sun's rays fall. [Footnote: In this and the following chapters of MS. C the order of the original paging has been adhered to, and is shown in parenthesis. Leonardo himself has but rarely worked out the subject of these propositions. The space left for the purpose has occasionally been made use of for quite different matter. Even the numerous diagrams, most of them very delicately sketched, lettered and numbered, which occur on these pages, are hardly ever explained, with the exception of those few which are here given.] 214. No small hole can so modify the convergence of rays of light as to prevent, at a long distance, the transmission of the true form of the luminous body causing them. It is impossible that rays of light passing through a parallel [slit], should not display the form of the body causing them, since all the effects produced by a luminous body are [in fact] the reflection of that body: The moon, shaped like a boat, if transmitted through a hole is figured in the surface [it falls on] as a boatshaped object. [Footnote 8: In the MS. a blank space is left after this question.] Why the eye sees bodies at a distance, larger than they measure on the vertical plane?. [Footnote: This chapter, taken from another MS. may, as an exception, be placed here, as it refers to the same subject as the preceding section.] On gradation of shadows (215. 216). 215. Although the breadth and length of lights and shadow will be narrower and shorter in foreshortening, the quality and quantity of the light and shade is not increased nor diminished. [3]The function of shade and light when diminished by foreshortening, will be to give shadow and to illuminate an object opposite, according to the quality and quantity in which they fall on the body. [5]In proportion as a derived shadow is nearer to its penultimate extremities the deeper it will appear, _g z_ beyond the intersection faces only the part of the shadow [marked] _y z_; this by intersection takes the shadow from _m n_ but by direct line it takes the shadow _a m_ hence it is twice as deep as _g z_. _Y x_, by intersection takes the shadow _n o_, but by direct line the shadow _n m a_, therefore _x y_ is three times as dark as _z g_; _x f_, by intersection faces _o b_ and by direct line _o n m a_, therefore we must say that the shadow between _f x_ will be four times as dark as the shadow _z g_, because it faces four times as much shadow. Let _a b_ be the side where the primary shadow is, and _b c_ the primary light, _d_ will be the spot where it is intercepted,_f g_ the derived shadow and _f e_ the derived light. And this must be at the beginning of the explanation. [Footnote: In the original MS. the text of No. 252 precedes the one given here. In the text of No. 215 there is a blank space of about four lines between the lines 2 and 3. The diagram given on Pl. VI, No. 2 is placed between lines 4 and 5. Between lines 5 and 6 there is another space of about three lines and one line left blank between lines 8 and 9. The reader will find the meaning of the whole passage much clearer if he first reads the final lines 11--13. Compare also line 4 of No. 270.] On relative proportion of light and shadows (216--221). 216. That part of the surface of a body on which the images [reflection] from other bodies placed opposite fall at the largest angle will assume their hue most strongly. In the diagram below, 8 is a larger angle than 4, since its base _a n_ is larger than _e n_ the base of 4. This diagram below should end at _a n_ 4 8. [4]That portion of the illuminated surface on which a shadow is cast will be brightest which lies contiguous to the cast shadow. Just as an object which is lighted up by a greater quantity of luminous rays becomes brighter, so one on which a greater quantity of shadow falls, will be darker. Let 4 be the side of an illuminated surface 4 8, surrounding the cast shadow _g e_ 4. And this spot 4 will be lighter than 8, because less shadow falls on it than on 8. Since 4 faces only the shadow _i n_; and 8 faces and receives the shadow _a e_ as well as _i n_ which makes it twice as dark. And the same thing happens when you put the atmosphere and the sun in the place of shade and light. [12] The distribution of shadow, originating in, and limited by, plane surfaces placed near to each other, equal in tone and directly opposite, will be darker at the ends than at the beginning, which will be determined by the incidence of the luminous rays. You will find the same proportion in the depth of the derived shadows _a n_ as in the nearness of the luminous bodies _m b_, which cause them; and if the luminous bodies were of equal size you would still farther find the same proportion in the light cast by the luminous circles and their shadows as in the distance of the said luminous bodies. [Footnote: The diagram originally placed between lines 3 and 4 is on Pl. VI, No. 3. In the diagram given above line 14 of the original, and here printed in the text, the words _corpo luminoso_ [luminous body] are written in the circle _m_, _luminoso_ in the circle _b_ and _ombroso_ [body in shadow] in the circle _o_.] 217. THAT PART OF THE REFLECTION WILL BE BRIGHTEST WHERE THE REFLECTED RAYS ARE SHORTEST. [2] The darkness occasioned by the casting of combined shadows will be in conformity with its cause, which will originate and terminate between two plane surfaces near together, alike in tone and directly opposite each other. [4] In proportion as the source of light is larger, the luminous and shadow rays will be more mixed together. This result is produced because wherever there is a larger quantity of luminous rays, there is most light, but where there are fewer there is least light, consequently the shadow rays come in and mingle with them. [Footnote: Diagrams are inserted before lines 2 and 4.] 218. In all the proportions I lay down it must be understood that the medium between the bodies is always the same. [2] The smaller the luminous body the more distinct will the transmission of the shadows be. [3] When of two opposite shadows, produced by the same body, one is twice as dark as the other though similar in form, one of the two lights causing them must have twice the diameter that the other has and be at twice the distance from the opaque body. If the object is lowly moved across the luminous body, and the shadow is intercepted at some distance from the object, there will be the same relative proportion between the motion of the derived shadow and the motion of the primary shadow, as between the distance from the object to the light, and that from the object to the spot where the shadow is intercepted; so that though the object is moved slowly the shadow moves fast. [Footnote: There are diagrams inserted before lines 2 and 3 but they are not reproduced here. The diagram above line 6 is written upon as follows: at _A lume_ (light), at _B obbietto_ (body), at _C ombra d'obbietto_ (shadow of the object).] 219. A luminous body will appear less brilliant when surrounded by a bright background. [2] I have found that the stars which are nearest to the horizon look larger than the others because light falls upon them from a larger proportion of the solar body than when they are above us; and having more light from the sun they give more light, and the bodies which are most luminous appear the largest. As may be seen by the sun through a mist, and overhead; it appears larger where there is no mist and diminished through mist. No portion of the luminous body is ever visible from any spot within the pyramid of pure derived shadow. [Footnote: Between lines 1 and 2 there is in the original a large diagram which does not refer to this text. ] 220. A body on which the solar rays fall between the thin branches of trees far apart will cast but a single shadow. [2] If an opaque body and a luminous one are (both) spherical the base of the pyramid of rays will bear the same proportion to the luminous body as the base of the pyramid of shade to the opaque body. [4] When the transmitted shadow is intercepted by a plane surface placed opposite to it and farther away from the luminous body than from the object [which casts it] it will appear proportionately darker and the edges more distinct.