Lens designs

In the talk I gave at the Short Course at SfN 2014, I briefly discussed the process of optical system design. A common strategy is to start with a published design, or at least a general scheme (series of lens types), and then make modifications to fit the target application. Finding these published designs can be tedious. The patent literature and journal publications rarely come with downloadable files, and so the parameters have to be manually entered. Major design houses will have databases of designs in digital form, but not all of us work in such an environment. Dan Reiley’s Lens-designs.com has a bunch of Zemax and OSLO files available under the MIT license. Camera lenses, microscope objectives, and more…