Colour, Filters and Lenses

This lesson covers the behaviour of light with respect to colour, filters, and dispersion — as required by the Edexcel GCSE Physics specification (1PH0), Topic 4: Waves. You need to understand how white light produces a spectrum, how colour filters work, and why objects appear different colours in different lights.

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Dispersion of White Light

White light is not a single colour — it is a mixture of all colours of the visible spectrum. When white light passes through a glass prism, it is split into its component colours. This process is called dispersion.

How Dispersion Works