Seeing optics in a new light From Sight to Light The Passage from Ancient to Modern Optics A. Mark Smith University of Chicago Press, 2015. 469 pp

Johannes Kepler and the transition to modern optical theories The transition from "ancient" to "modern" theories of light occurred, in part, as a result of the publication of Johannes Kepler's theory of retinal image formation in 1604, which demonstrated that images are projected by the eye's lens onto the retina. In From Sight to Light , historian A. Mark Smith places Kepler's theory in broad historical context, arguing that this advance represented a radical break from tradition, as opposed to an incremental advance in a long-evolving field. Reviewer Christopher Dainty welcomes this authoritative account of the evolution of our understanding of light and optics.