How Do Polarized Sunglasses Work?!
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 8 ก.พ. 2025
- Many of us have polarized sunglasses, but how does an optical polarizer actually block light? It has to do with the polarization of electromagnetic waves and the vibration of atoms in transparent solids.
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The weirdest thing I’ve noticed while looking through polarized sunglasses is my brother, but I doubt that had to do anything with the polarization.
LOL, LMAO
Haha!!
Ha
@Jamal Joziah scamm, and the next comment is scam too... ../.
@@prosperityx_TMC They've been hiding underneath popular comments all over the channel (and my friend's channels). Thanks for letting everyone in this thread know. I've reported all of them as a spam.
finally, an explanation that truly explains how polarization of light actually works. thanks and subscribed
late but yeah subbed too :-)
I accidentally discovered that rainbow light is highly polarized.
I was driving home from a long day at work. Behind me was a clear and very sunny sky and ahead was a rather large rainstorm producing the most vivid rainbow I had ever seen.
I was wearing my polarized sunglasses (if it wasn't clear from context) and like I said it was a long day so, without changing my gaze (I was driving after all) I stretched my neck to the side and suddenly the rainbow practically vanished. It completely shocked me and was totally unexpected. 🤩
Omg wow!
Re: rainbow: I hope to try this someday! In physics class, my partner noticed my Mac M1 laptop polarized into a deep purple, and his iPad polarized into black. We're curious as to why!
Nick! I just found you about a week ago, and I've subscribed and watched damn near everyone of your video's. And not one video have I not watched to the end. You are simply awesome at putting together these videos and more importantly explaining physics and science to a noob like me who has no education other than developing a super strong interest in physics in my late 30's. Please keep them coming. Thanks so much for what you do!!
Glad you like them :-)
Your animations are top notch now, great job!
Robert Sparkman ikr. He deserves way more views
This channel needs more subscribers. As person who love these type of content, how has TH-cam hidden a creator such as you for so long ! Loving the vids
The coolest thing to see through polarized sunglasses are stress patterns in materials, especially glass, and especially car rear windshield glass. For many modern cars, usually a checkerboard pattern may be seen when the polarization axis is at the correct orientation. (Tilt your glasses a bit if you don't see them right away.) This is due to the tempering, done to control fragmentation when the glass breaks, by blowing cool air onto its surface while it is still hot and being shaped. The checkerboard actually shows the location, and sometimes even the shape, of those cool air nozzles.
I've seen this! It's a brilliant way to engineer parts. You can make it out of clear plastic first to see where the stress points are.
I was looking at some high cirrus clouds made of ice crystals. The sun was above at just the proper angle that when I looked at them with polarized glasses, I saw a color light show in the clouds. Rainbows were interacting like a plasma fractal putting on such an incredible color show, my mouth was literally hanging open in complete awe. It looked like a psychedelic light show in the sky and went on for hours.
I have always loved the coloured patterns you get looking at things like transparent plastic boxes through polarisers.
Another excellent video. You always take the topic one step deeper than most popular science presentations, and you make it easy to follow as well. Thank you!
It's nice to hear the depth is appreciated :-)
This is the best explanation of polarization ever, and that's not even the title of the video. It's beaten MIT's lecture on this topic.
Nick, the most amazing thing I see with polarized glasses is the true dominant color of the daytime sky. With polarized glasses, the violet that we normally can't see, comes right out clearly visible and dominant in color.
I have a degree in physics, but this helped me understand light polarization better - especially glare reduction. Thank you!
Whoa this is my first time on this channel and I love it! It's like @SmarterEveryDay meets Craig Middlebrooks from Parks and Rec
Great video! 2 questions:
1. Do polarized Sunglasses protect your eyes from the sun's UV rays?
2. Are all polarized lenses the same? For example, a $10 polarized pair of sunglasses from the gas station versus a $200+ dollar Oakley or ray ban?
1. Usually yes. But it's not the polarisation filter that does it. Glass offers a little UV protection anyway, but typically have an additional UV protection layer added to filter out the rest. Plastic lenses are actually better at filtering out UV inherently.
2. It depends. Here in the UK our sunglasses are marked with the UV rating, so it's entirely possible to find a cheap pair of sunglasses that are just as protective as an expensive pair. In terms of the polarisation filter, cheaper glasses are likely to have this applied to the front of the lense so are more prone to this wearing out over time. More expensive sunglasses will have the film sandwiched between two other layers so they'll last longer.
Excellent. That clears that up. You’re really good at this; keep ‘em coming.
This is such a good explanation. I’ve never seen such a good explanation of this before
After finally a lot, I finally found a clear visual example. Thank you a lot.
Glad I could help 🤓
this was a really great video that explained this perfectly, always wondered how polarized lenses let you basically see through water. I use them when fishing every time, never go fishing without them. there is a reason all the pro bass catchers wear them, because it gives you an advantage when you can spot fish without a radar.
the weirdest thing I noticed was actually by polarized filter in my camera while I was playing with near the river with sun in front of me, than I noticed that when the angle is perpendicular to the surface, than you can make a nice photos of the rocks and fishes beneath the surface :)
great video editing man! one of your best so far! making quality videos like this takes time but it'll be worth it! keep it up!
I had a class in college that we used polarizers at 90º to each other to see residual tensions on acrilic components by puting the part between them and shining light through it. it was cool!
Polarizers are useful like that.
I'm learning about polarimetry this semester and you just explained this brilliantly! Thanks :')
Glad I could help 🤓
Finally a proper explanation of polarization! I cry the tears of joy.
I was motivated to look up this video because I just noticed that my polarized sunglasses allowed me to see much further while driving through blizzard conditions
great stuff! been looking for a video that really explained this phenomena for a while
Glad I could help! 🤓
At last, a decent description of polarisation that I can understand! Many thanks Nick.
I cover my phone camera with my sunglasses to take better pics of clouds. ;-)
Buck Rogers wow good idea I think I will actually use that when I eventually have too
oh damn i didnt think about that
Yeah good 💡
I've found it's best not to wear polarizing sunglasses while mountain biking. The ground can have different surface conditions and sometimes they vary wildly from one section of trail to another. Being able to anticipate how grippy the surface is before I actually get to it is important when taking corners at high speed. Usually the best riding conditions are a day or two after it rains so the ground is wet but just starting to dry out. However, there is a situation that can occur where the trail seems to become "greasy". I don't know exactly why this happens but the coloration of the dirt can actually have a sort of sheen like you might get from an oil stain. I don't think there is actually oil on the trail. It's more like the mud itself takes on an oil-like property. But being able to spot the greasy dirt vs the grippy dirt is pretty important. But polarizing glasses essentially erase this information from your vision. The sheen completely vanishes unless you sort of tilt your head.
Great job Nick! :) Love your videos :)
I don't really have any sunglasses stories because I don't wear them often. But I just wanted to say since this is the first new video since I started following, after binging a number of your videos and noticing how virtually all of them have people saying you should have more followers, you have one more now. This is awesome stuff. Keep it up! Always excited for more
Welcome :-)
I remember when we studied polarised lenses in school, and I thought this would be an interesting replacement for blinds/curtains, and then I realised someome had already done it...
@The Science Asylum, How have you not reached 100k+ Subs yet? Love learning, keep it up!
This channel always has a video of the strange phenomenon I'm curious about. keep it up nick!
love your work nick!
That was an awesome explanation.nice work mister 👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍
Your Concepts and Explanations Are Great much better than the Books. And Great Animations Tooo ...
I broke the display of my iPhone and got it replaced. After replacing, I wasn't able to see anything on the screen with a polarized sunglass on and the phone in a portrait position. I was able to clearly able to the contents on the screen when I rotated it.
Till now, I was thinking that the new display was a fraudulent one!
Nope! Just a different design :-)
Why did I waste me time going to lectures when I could just watch Nick. These videos give me more of an intuitive feel for things which are otherwise just memorised. Many thanks to you sir.
Wow my friend your on your way to 50k subscribers congrats 😀 & I love your videos very educational
this is my first time on this channel and I love it!
The way he started the video is crazy😆.. and I love it. I must be one his 'hey crazies'🤣🤪
I really enjoyed making that intro.
hats off to you man !!! great animation and explanation !!!
Best video so far about this subject.. Thumbs up 🙌
Hey chandler keep up the good work love your videos and can't wait to see you cross 50k subscribers☺☺
Thanks for teaching us general relativity.
Thank you, I'm very interested in the photoelasticity phenomenon, so this video really helps understanding some basic things :)
I realised that polarised glasses give you X-ray style vision into water at the beach on a hot summer day. It removes the glare coming off the surface and frees the view a few meters down. Found that endlessly fascinating. Sure the water must be clear.
Damn. Learned something new today.
Thank You for the great explanation!
Thanks! Wanted this answer a long time.
Thank you! You helped me with a project as I don't have polarized sunglasses to test this out myself!
Glad I could help.
The weirdest thing I’ve noticed while looking through polarized sunglasses is on high end German cars you can see the film in between the windshields as purplish green color!
I work out side and i love them I got some oklays , and i can see so much better it just makes everything look better
Years ago when I was making my own telescope mirrors I learned a way of testing the glass to see if it was free of internal stresses. You take two polarizing filters, sunglasses will work, and turn them 90 degrees to each other and look at the glass blank and if you see a Maltese cross then the glass blank has internal stresses and should not be used.
When I was much younger I noticed spots when looking at water with sun glare only at certain angles. After having Lasik surgery polarized glasses have a smoky haze. I've always been able to see patterns in the polarized glasses but now it's just a haze that completely goes away with non polarized glasses.
Recently I got my hands on the 3d cinema glasses and finally did the experiment with a mirror. Also when I move them like in 5:33 looking through them from the outside then it works, but when i look through them from the inside, then screen becomes yellow in one direction and blue in the other.
You have the best science content on TH-cam
Fabulous! I finally cleared out my doubts. Thanks a lot
Glad I could help! 🤓
Another concise explanation for something as common as sunglasses thanks
To me the cool thing about this video is not about the polarization of light but how the glass does not actually passes light through instead its atoms absorb the light and re-emit the light again. At least this is what I understood from 2:00-2:35.
Indeed!
Absolute great work sir. Keep it up.
Thanks to making such helpful video
It cleared my concept for class 12th examination
Thanks a lot for this fast and rich explanation.
So cool, I have always wondered about how these work, Thank you!
Super cool! Thanks!
You are doing a great work. Keep it up!
I am very glad to see that you are making your videos. Please keep making them
01:20 it's crazy you found a microphone small enough to capture the sound of an electron jumping to a higher energy level.
😆 I was _shocked_ when I learned that's what they sounded like 😉
Amazing explanation!
Great topic, thanks for sharing!
your videos are great, I dont get why you are not more popular XD
he'll get there :-)
Amazing physics of our universe and greatly explained nick
Seven years late, but the weirdest thing I've seen through polarized sunglasses is the sharp specular reflections off of the tips of water waves when the Sun is at a low angle. They become intensely bright LED blue for some reason. XD
The weirdest thing I've seen (on-topic) without polarized sunglasses is the polarization direction of the blue sky via the Haidinger's Brush phenomenon, caused by the pigments in the retina of the eye having a slight radial? anisotropy. It's pretty cool!
Genius channal for everyone👌👍👏💕
great explanation !
The most beautiful description on web
Thanks! 🤓
@@ScienceAsylum your sincerely
I have noticed on some occasions that groups of identically oriented LCD monitors setup to display to the public are sometimes not identically polarized.
When looking at the whole group through polarized sunglasses, most of them can be seen, while others appear black. Then when I tilt my head to the side, the black monitors can then be seen and the others have turned black.
It would appear that the manufacturing process can be a bit inconsistent with respect to the LCD polarization.
Interesting...
How come there’s only one such video on polarisation on yt!?!??! Anyways this video was realllllly good and very helpful.
Woah just when I thought I knew everything about this topic. I was wrong. Nice videos keep it up!
I cant see a single thing on my phone when its vertical, but when I turn it horizontal, everything is visible. My old Iphone's screen is visible from all angles but there's a funky rainbow pattern. My laptopscreen (thank god) is visible in the normal position but just black when I turn it 90 degrees. Cool stuff!
When wearing polarized sunglasses while using my Canon camera, viewing the LCD screen in landscape orientation and everything is all good. Looking at it in portrait orientation and "poof" everything disappears - its a blank screen.
Does air work like glass and so succeeding layers of air absorb the light and air atoms wiggle creating their own light?
The fact that the direction changes is probably the most helpful thing for me to understand that weird paradox about putting a polariser in between two perpendicular ones where the centre one at 45° let's in more light 👍
Yep. I recently made a YT Short about it: th-cam.com/users/shortsP9hOvdTAHLg
@@ScienceAsylum Yeah it's really cool and I'm currently trying to understand spin (which your other video really helped with btw) and thinking of it similar to polarisation is quite helpful the fact that measuring it actually changes it
@@TomtheMagician21 Yep! Photon spin isn't just similar to polarization. Photon spin _is_ polarization, just the circular kind instead of the linear kind 👍
@@ScienceAsylum Oh wow! How does that work if the spin is perpendicular compared to parallel with the direction of travel? That's really cool!
Absolutely excellent video! - From a Teacher
Great explanation
At the beginning of 3D movies in cinemas there is a short moment where you can’t see anything with your right eye through the 3D glasses. Is that because of polarization?
I've never noticed, but that's probably because that segment is only from one of the projectors. I have a video on 3D glasses if you're interested: th-cam.com/video/-SMpGiNVymU/w-d-xo.html
Please follow up with circular polarisation, and the quantum voodoo that happens with 3 polarizers !!!
The sun reflection of the cars are awesome
This explains it perfectly, my goddamn teacher took an entire hour to make it make sense. I guess my professors' brainwaves are polarized in the direction those electron clouds in my neurons leave out.
Good one bud XD
I noticed car windshields and Auto Glass have a checkered grid of dark spots on them when looking with polarized glasses. Why is that? Great vid btw.
Craig Symalla loads
That glass has been tempered and the uneven cooling creates patterns in the glass. I'd guess those patterns create filters for light that are further filtered by your sunglasses.
I believe it is to do with stress. As ML says, the uneven cooling creates the pattern, specifically a pattern of variable stress. The stress then causes the glass to interact differently with polarised light at different locations in the glass. Polarised light and perspex models, that behave the same way in stress as glass, are used by some engineers to identify locations of great stress in e.g. an intended bridge design.
once in awhile, one stumbles upon something worth keeping, kinda like a swiss knife, keep that cuz u never know when u might need something it offers... u sir is a swiss knife. u will become useful to me someday 100%. sub'd.
The weirdest thing I noticed when looking through sunglasses is that I can see the polarization of light. (Google for Haidinger's Brush). I noticed it around the time we got our first LCD screen for our computer over a decade ago, but just though it was inferior technology to CRTs causing it. I had no idea what it was, assumed everyone saw it, and never said anything. One day, I got a pair of polarized driving glasses to help with glare from the sun while driving to college, and was startled when I noticed it EVERYWHERE I LOOKED while wearing them, but most especially when looking at the sky from certain angles. After a while, I noticed that I could still see if VERY faintly when I took off the glasses, and I guess I've trained myself to notice it now. It fascinated me at first being able to see what kinds of display screens are polarized and which ones are not without needing test equipment, but everyone though I was super weird when I would point out that their screen was polarized. Nobody cares, so I don't mention it, but I can still see it now. Certain times of the day (on clear days), I can see it from certain angles in the sky, and on pretty much every computer display and TV made in the last couple of decades, but it is very faint, and I have to work to notice it most of the time. It doesn't bother me at all.
The human eye can (sometimes) see polarization unaided. It's a weird effect.
I could see a pattern on my cars front window screen of lines horizontal and vertical in a kind of monochrome colour pattern. With the sun glasses on. Good vid pal top effort gone in I can see.
Great video!
As onw having experiments with polarization( student over here), I must say, that it can produce fun outcome if material between one polarizer and second one( Analizer) is organic... Aka efect of hirality of the biological molecule and preferenses of one type over the other, which makes many of biological materials opticly active materials, aka rotates linear polarization around light direction... Realy fun stuff if you know what to do with it.
When you look through polarized sunglasses at hardened glass, ie. a rear car window, there's a rainbow coloured pattern in the glass you don't see otherwise.
You're seeing the stress points in the glass :-)
Right, but what is the physics behind that...
Most perfect sir...thanks.... 🇮🇳
I don’t know if it is weird or not but the first thing I noticed about my polarized glasses is being able to see the design in tinted windows. About quarter sized dots running parallel across the window. It took my a while to get use to that.
What you're seeing are stress points in the glass. We actually take advantage of it in engineering when designing parts of machines. We make the part out of transparent plastic first to see if there are unexpected stress points we need to fix in the design before we actually make the part.
@@ScienceAsylum that’s awesome!! Why do those points only show up with tint and polarized glasses?
Explain Molecular chirality and why it polarizes light.
Yesss! First like and comment! Great job Nick!
the explanation of the vid is so clear