Lens Design Fundamentals

A large part of this book is devoted to a study of possible design procedures for various types of lens or mirror systems, with fully worked examples of each. The reader is urged to follow the logic of these examples and be sure that he understands what is happening, noticing particularly how each available degree of freedom is used to control one aberration. Not every type of lens has been considered, of course, but the design techniques illustrated here can readily be applied to the design of other more complex systems. It is assumed that the reader has access to a small computer to help with the ray tracing, otherwise he may find the computations so time-consuming that he is liable to lose track of what he is trying to accomplish.

Advanced undergraduate and graduate students studying optics.

The Work of the Lens Designer. Meridional Ray Tracing. Paraxial Rays and First-Order Optics. Chromatic Aberration. Spherical Aberration. Design of a Spherically Corrected Achromat. Oblique Pencils. Coma and the Sine Condition. Design of Aplanatic Objectives. The Oblique Aberrations. Lense in which Stop Position Is a Degree of Freedom. Symmetrical Double Anastigmats with Fixed Stop. Unsymmetrical Photographic Objectives. Mirror and Catadioptric Systems. Eyepiece Design. Automatic Lens Improvement Programs. Index.