Hi Marzanna,

 I can barely see in your screenshot that your polygon mirror is from a CAD file with a *.IGS extension. The first step when you work with CAD files is to figure out where the origin is within the CAD file. I’ve written about this in the case of CAD assembly, but it applies to CAD parts as well:

If you don’t know where the origin in that part is, then it might be tricky to position by trial and error, like you tried. But if you know where the part stands with respect to the origin, then know that OpticStudio will conveniently use the same origin as well, and it should be easier to locate.

If you share that file with us, we could try to figure out where the origin is and see how to position it according to your needs.

On that note, is a CAD object the only way to make such a prism? I feel like its an overkill and might add some overhead when you’ll be doing raytracing. There’s a user-defined object called “HalfCylinder” that comes with the OpticStudio installation file:

That could be another option: either make a user-defined object or use two “HalfCylinder”. I’ll think about it.

Take care,

David

Hi,

This is embarrassing. I was trying to attach Zip file and got an error message

File size is

 and its contents

Is there any other way to attach the file?

Regards,

Marzanna

Hi Marzanna,

If you’ve created that object with the Part Designer, then it is likely that the origin is the centre of one of the two polygonal faces.

I will try to answer your question as it is, but I’m still not convinced as to why you need a non-sequential CAD for this application. On that same note, have you had a look at this article?

Anyway, going back to you original question. I created a Polygon with the Part Designer using that command line in Script Mode:

POLYGON NewObjectName, 16, 1.0, 1.0

I save the object as *.ZPO and inserted it in the Non-Sequential Component Editor using a CAD Part: Zemax Part Designer object. I then mapped all the side faces to a single face (using the CAD tab of the Object settings) and made it reflective. To help visualize the situation, I added a Source Ray with a Z Position = -2.0:

As you can see, the ray is striking the wrong surface. To solve the problem, I applied a Tilt About Y of 90 degree and a X Position of -0.5. I also applied a Tilt About X of 5 degree because otherwise the ray was striking an edge on the side:

Now, here’s the tricky part. The entrance port in mixed-mode will coincide with the local axis of the polygon, which is at the centre of one of its two polygonal faces. Therefore, your entrance port will be in the X-Y plane that slices this prism into two equal parts, meaning that the rays from the sequential source will be seen as appearing from inside the prism, if that makes sense. To circumvent this problem, I used a Z Position of 2.0 so that the entrance port is well clear of the polygon.

In mixed-mode, you have the column Draw Ports? that helps visualizing the Entrance and Exit ports:

In my example, the small orange circle where the rays stop is the Entrance port. Then the problem is the Exit port. Because your rays are reflected from the prism, I had to reposition the Exit port using a Exit Loc Y = 0.4, and Exit Loc Z = -2.0:

The main issue is that you don’t want the Exit port (larger orange surface where the rays terminate in my screenshot above) to overlap with the Entrance port otherwise, the rays in the overlaping regions will simply not see the CAD object.

I’m attaching my example to this reply for your reference. If you want to share a CAD object, simply create an archive (File..Create Archive) of your file (the CAD will be embedded in the archive), zip it, and upload it here.

Let me know if this is clear, and take care,

David

Hi @Marzanna !

You can create a Part Designer with a pro version but you will have to export it as a STEP to use it. Only the premium version allows Part Designer objects.