If light travel in straight lines, why is it some photos of night traffic, the lights from cars vans are bent?

Question

Also, in the photos, it seemed that the light follows the same arc as the curve of the road.

Answer 1

That is an effect of the lens, not the light.

Answer 2

Well, light doesn't always travel in straight lines!

When light goes from the air into a prism, different colors in the light are bent by the different medium (glass) and go in different directions.

When light is travelling through air, it gets scattered by the air molecules - that's why the sky is blue, or why sunsets are red.

Put a pencil in a glass half full of water. Does the pencil still look like a solid, straight pencil?
Put a drop of water on a piece of glass, and hold it up to a window. Still think all light travels in straight lines?

Finally, light travelling past something really massive, like the Sun, actually travels in a *curve* because the gravity of the Sun warps space!

Answer 3

In many night photos, the shutter of the camera is left open longer. So the light from the cars is coming from multiple locations as they travel, hitting the film in multiple locations. This is why anything in motion blurs on film. The slower the speed of the shutter, the more blurring. This is why it is very important that if you want a clear, focused picture taken in lower light that you brace the camera well-tripod or stable surface are best.

Answer 4

Because they're going around a curve; the photograph traces the arc of the light.

Answer 5

Only in Newtons world and even there not so ofen as you will like it. Learn about difraction end interference for more.