Optical system design is a skill every optical scientist or engineer will need at one time or another in their career, even for solving some of the simplest problems. The job market for lens design and illumination optics, two sub-categories of optical system design, is starving for educated and skilled people in optical system design; a top salary in industry may be secured in these disciplines. This course will focus on lens design; however components of illumination optics may enter any project as needed.

Wide-angle miniature Fisheye Lens developed for a head-mounted camera

Prerequisite

• Geometrical Optics (OSE5203 or the equivalent)
• graduate standing or
• consent of the instructor

Course Description

The lectures include an introduction to optical system design, methods of lens design, optimization, paraxial layout, achomatization methods, Petzval curvature, 3rd and higher order optical aberrations, image quality metrics, and tolerance analysis.

The course is also taught with hands-on computer sessions in lens design. The hands-on sessions begin with learning the basic principles of laying out first order configurations and continue on to design singlets, doublets, triplets, Tessar, Double-Gauss lenses, catadioptric optics, and Petzval lenses. Students will then work on a project of their choice, starting with learning how to prepare a comprehensive specification sheet before engaging in the design, and then applying some of the learned concepts to their projects.

Various software packages (i.e. CODE V and LightTools from Optical Research Associates, ASAP from BRO Corporation, OSLO by Sinclair Optics) are available at no cost for students’ education. Use of other software packages is welcome, while not currently provided by the respective companies free of cost.

Textbook

• "Fundamental of Optical Design" by Michael Kidger, SPIE Press 2002

Course Outline

1. Introduction to Lens Design
2. Methods of Lens Design
   1. What Defines a Good Lens Designer Today?
   2. Merit Functions
   3. Optimization Techniques
   4. Setting up a Specification Table prior to the Design and Tolerancing phases
   5. A Proposed Design Process
   6. Techniques to Improve a Design
   7. Introduction to Image Quality Criteria
   8. Tolerancing as Part of the Design Process
3. Collineation Framework/Paraxial Layout (“Matrix methods”)
4. Paraxial Chromatism
   1. Optical Glasses - Recent updates in glasses
   2. Catalog Representations
   3. Methods of achromatization
5. Petzval Curvature
6. Review of 3rd and Higher-order Optical Aberrations
   1. Introduction
   2. Aberration Theory / Use in Lens Design – Ray fans
7. Image Quality Metrics
8. Tolerancing Methods and Applications