An 8x5 rectangle. If the bottom left corner is considered (0, 0), then two lines are drawn within the rectangle, from (0, 4) to (8, 1) and from (1, 5) to (7, 0). The smaller two regions of the four these lines cut the rectangle into are shaded. What is their combined area?
It is symmetrical across the diagonal so we will only look at the top left quarter, then multiply by 2 when we are done. Because it is 1/4 of the rectangle it has area 1/4 of the original. 1/4 x 8x5 = 10. This leaves two right triangles and the grey area. The top right triangle has a base of (8/2)-1=3 And height of 5/2=2.5 Area = 1/2 x 3 x 2.5 = 3.75 The bottom left triangle has height of (5/2)-1=1.5 And base of 8/2=4 Area = 1/2 x 1.5 x 4 = 3 Top left grey area is the area of the the quarter minus the areas of the two right triangles = 10 - 3.75 - 3 = 3.25 There are two of these gray areas so final answer is 2 x 3.25 = 6.5
detailed annotation for screen readers here: 4 lines have been added to the original depiction. the first set of 2 lines make a triangle shape using coordinates (4, 2.5) to (4, 0) to (7, 0). the second set of 2 lines make a triangle shape using coordinates (4, 2.5) to (8, 2.5) to (8, 1)
The description doesn’t match the image. The image shows two lines that intersect. The description’s lines would not intersect as stated. My answer is for the image, not the description.
The first line’s coordinates should be 0,4 to 8,1. The second should be 1,5 to 7,0.
Huh. I got 7.5 square units. Now I’m rechecking my calculations frantically. Lol.
I guess there’s no rule against posting your work.
I divided it in half down the middle and made a note to double my answer at the end.
The whole half rectangle has an area of 20. The trapezoid below has an area of (2.5+4)*4/2=13. The triangle above has an area of 3*2.5/2=3.25. 20-13-3.25=3.75. Multiplying that by 2 (because that 3.75 is only the area of the top left half of the shaded portion) gives 7.5.
Edit: Bah! Never mind. Found my mistake. 3*2.5/2=3.75, not 3.25. With that fix I get 6.5.
You’ve got it, it’s 6.5. I actually posted this problem because I originally found the answer using trig, which seemed a bit too brute-force-y, especially considering the original source for this problem - I wanted to see if others could/would find the simpler solution that I assumed existed. And you did ^_^
The issue there is it isn’t a kite: The two longer sides don’t have equal length - they’re sqrt(73)/2 and sqrt(61)/2. So it’s a decent approximation but not quite exact.
One doesn’t really see this if the image is oriented like that. Rotating your phone or your head so that the vertical axis matches the long diagonal of the ‘kite’ makes this difference more obvious.
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