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This paper provides an overview of the many different ways that light interacts with surfaces in the natural environment to provide useful information for visual perception. It begins with a discussion of how the concept of light has evolved over the course of human history. It then considers a wide variety of optical phenomena including Lambert's laws of illumination, the effects of microscopic surface structure on patterns of reflection, the bidirectional reflectance distribution function, the refraction of transmitted light, chromatic dispersion, thin film interference, sub-surface scattering, the Fresnel effects, indirect illumination from multiple reflections, caustics, and the structure of the light field. The primary goal of this discussion is to provide the necessary background information to help students and young researchers more easily understand the scientific literature on the perception of 3D shape and material properties from patterns of image shading.