In 3D computer graphics, the image plane is that plane in the world which is identified with the plane of the monitor. If one makes the analogy of taking a photograph to rendering a 3D image, the surface of the film is the image plane. In this case, the viewing transformation is a projection that maps the world onto the image plane. A rectangular region of this plane, called the viewing window or viewport, maps to the monitor. This establishes the mapping between pixels on the monitor and points (or rather, rays) in the 3D world.
In optics, the image plane is the plane that contains the object's projected image, and lies beyond the back focal plane.
Famous quotes containing the words image and/or plane:
“I know not what the younger dreams—
Some vague Utopia—and she seems,
When withered old and skeleton-gaunt,
An image of such politics.”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)
“with the plane nowhere and her body taking by the throat
The undying cry of the void falling living beginning to be something
That no one has ever been and lived through screaming without enough air”
—James Dickey (b. 1923)