I'm wondering why the shape of such lens is designed in this way, and is there any advantage to have a lens that bend parallel lights in complex ways?
LeslieTrue
@Sicheng-Pan, here's my understanding of designing a lens. Given the surface function(or say, all shape parameters of the lens) and refractive index, we can calculate the convergence point/line for any group of parallel rays even if the shape of the surface is not an ideal sphere. Hence, we can design lenses with any possible shapes if we need.
ld184
How can a manufacturer deal with abberations with different lenses used in conjection with each other?
rheask8246
Really cool application to astronomy again! So there are two main types of optical telescopes: refractive and reflective telescopes. Refractive telescopes have lenses, and therefore have this issue where, as light travels through the atmosphere, the image becomes blurred due to aberrations in the lens. There are even errors in the color due to chromatic aberrations. Today, there are complex dynamic optical aberration-corrective systems to counter this effect. Reflective telescopes avoid this problem as they have mirrors instead of lenses!
I'm wondering why the shape of such lens is designed in this way, and is there any advantage to have a lens that bend parallel lights in complex ways?
@Sicheng-Pan, here's my understanding of designing a lens. Given the surface function(or say, all shape parameters of the lens) and refractive index, we can calculate the convergence point/line for any group of parallel rays even if the shape of the surface is not an ideal sphere. Hence, we can design lenses with any possible shapes if we need.
How can a manufacturer deal with abberations with different lenses used in conjection with each other?
Really cool application to astronomy again! So there are two main types of optical telescopes: refractive and reflective telescopes. Refractive telescopes have lenses, and therefore have this issue where, as light travels through the atmosphere, the image becomes blurred due to aberrations in the lens. There are even errors in the color due to chromatic aberrations. Today, there are complex dynamic optical aberration-corrective systems to counter this effect. Reflective telescopes avoid this problem as they have mirrors instead of lenses!