Second Place - Natural Category

Title: Inverted Chicago
Student: Robert Boesel
School: John Hersey High School, Arlington Heights, IL
Teacher: Mary Ernst

The view of Chicago from the John Hancock Center building is right-side up in the background, but the glass goblet and the water in it invert the image, making it upside down. The goblet in the picture acts as a double convex lens, or, since the goblet lens is thicker in the middle, a converging lens. Chicago’s skyline is unquestionably the focal point of the lens, so, by drawing three rays — one parallel to the axis and through point F, another passing through F’ and emerging parallel, and a third passing through the center of the lens and continuing in the same direction — the image point is found as being oppo site of the actual image point, resulting in an inverted image.