I would like to use the Tolerancing feature on a system with a mirror that has a decentered aperture, to simulate an off-axis parabolic mirror. When tolerancing I would like to tilt that mirror using TETX or TSTX. Will these operands tilt the mirror around the off-axis mirror vertex or around the local axis? Thank you for your time!

Does anyone have the design specifications for each of the elements of the 1840 Petzval lens?

Hello everyone, I am trying to create Emission Specturm for Photoluminescence simulation. I noticed that we are required to provide  'Normalized power /relative power of emission wavelengthes' to build the Emission Specturm. I am new in this field and would like to check:  This normalized power is normalized with respect to which power? Is it normalized with respect to the Excitation light's power? Hope someone here can help to provide explanation soon. Thank you very much!

Hi fellows, When I insert a real lens to focus a light in a system, Is it a good practice to set its focal length to a variable for optimization purposes? In this image below, surface 2 contains the focal length of the lens in the 'thickness' which is the space to the detector where light is focused. If I optimize this variable and get a nice result, how do I approach this real lens in the market if I am looking for off-the-shelf lenses? Or should I request the manufacturer to make it for me to suit my design?   Thank you very much. Naif

I will be sending Support a (proprietary) .ZAR file demonstrating these two issues I just encountered in OpticStudio 20.3 (haven't tried this before, so I don't know if these are new or not). Meanwhile, has anybody else encountered either of these 2 effects (in order of decreasing seriousness): (1) For a concave mirror, I wanted to use a pickup solve from a Thickness (in this case object thickness on Surface 0) to the Radius of the mirror (Surface 1).  I wanted to set R = -2H where H is the Object Thickness in order to approximately collimate the light (i.e. set the focal length of the mirror to equal the object thickness, make it concave to the left using a negative Radius). Using a Solve Type: Pickup, I set From Surface: 0 (object) , Scale Factor: -2 (to make Radius = -2*H) and From Column: Thickness. The Radius came out 1/2 the thickness, not 2x !!  To get what I needed, I had to set Scale Factor: -0.5 ...only then will Radius = -2.0*H. ??!! Could this have anythin

Hello, I am trying to design an eyewear lens for color vision deficiency. So, which type of lens is best to differentiate the red and green light.  

In OpticStudio 20.3 we implemented new CAD libraries that significantly improved the performance of systems containing imported CAD object. Unfortunately some important information regarding these changes was not included in the 20.3 Help Files documentation. We will be including updated documetation in the next service pack, but in the meantime we'll add the relevent content to this thread to illustrate where behaviour has changed.

Hello, I am trying to set up a model where an LED is inside a plastic cylinder.  I would like to know the light distribution pattern that is exiting the outer surface of the plastic cylinder.  My thought would be to use a cylinder detector sized a small amount over the OD of the plastic cylinder, but this type of detector is not available.    Any thoughts on how to do this?  

I was running very simple code in python:  TheMFE=TheSystem.MFE TheMFE.GetOperandAt(1).Value But I got error message:  AttributeError: '<win32com.gen_py.ZOSAPI_Interfaces.IMFERow instance at 0x1627391037392>' object has no attribute 'Value' l confirmed that the Property 'Value' exits when I checked ZOS-API Syntax Help: I also want to config DataType setting as StrehlRation for RMSField analysis, but I cannot make the enumeration correct with python. 

For the DISA optimization operand, what do the User Defined Values A, B, C, and D do?  And does this operand output distortion coefficients or just relative distortion between field angles?

I tried adding a new coating to the coating library using your Coatings Tool, now the Coating Catalog is empty, and I can't display my lens design because I get the error message that the coating doesn't exist.

how to convert toroidal surface to extended polynomial surface without degrating optical performance by using zpl or zos-apl? thanks.

What is the structure of a command in the ZOS-API? How do I read the ZOS-API help documentation?

Does anyone else have problems saving ZOS lens files across a VPN?  It takes minutes to save a file.  The same VPN works fine (a few seconds) for large MS application files and Z13 lens files.  Other people using the same corporate VPN have the same issue.  ZOS seems to work fine across a LAN, BTW..

I'm currently the sole OpticStudio user and have built a large database of design files. Everything is currently in the default user documents directory. We are adding a new user that will need to access and contribute to the designs. Are there best practices or recommendations on how to manage Zemax files for multiple users? Ideally, we would have version control. Thank you, John

Hi everyone, Can you guys help me. I think to use Grid Sag as the method to import wavefront aberration in my optical system in advance. I had made some practical into my system using the Grid sag but I have 2 problems that I would like to ask and learn. I had attached the file below. Firstly, I had imported some Dat file(in Zemax/Objects/Grid Files) to use as my grid sag in my system, but only ‘ Random_Grid_Minus` has been shown in the surface sag analyzing data. I want to ask, if you guys know why it happen? Secondly, when I imported the `Random_Grid_Minus` into my system, I cannot see any change happen in the image that I analyzed. For example, I analyze the data in the spot diagram before I import the grid sag and after I import the grid sag. Why there is no any change in the data? Can anyone help me? Maybe there is something that I did not realized or maybe I don’t have the right knowledge about it.  I would love to know and learn. Thank you.

Hello All, I am trying to couple the 50-watt laser diode to multimode fiber. But the given diode is 10 watt. Therefore  5 diodes (each of 10 watts) are needed to achieve the 50-watt power.  Can we simulate this system using sequential mode? Thank you

Hi all, I am using Opticstudio to simulate hybrid (diffractive&refractive) systems. I know there are diffractive surfaces like Binary 2 to use. But my problem is that my diffractive components are wavelength-selective. One component (diffractive lens) only responds to one single wavelength. So how can I achieve this in Opticstudio? Lots of thanks! Jasper

Dear All, I am interested in desiging an optical design for an instrument that will have a slit width of 20µm (with a 3mm length). Now, how can this be defined for the system? Thank you very much. Naif

I would like to run batch raytracing of several nonsequential files. How can I automatically do that? Is there a way to open .zmx file within ZPL? Any other way? Batch file should do a sequence: open .zmx file, run raytrace,exit raytrace, save detector view as bmp, close file, open next .zmx file... Thank you.

How I can model a source with Batwing radiation pattern?

Question: I know the image sensor has 1280x960 pixels with 5 um pixel pitch. The system effective focal length is 10 mm. What is the Field of View of my system and how do I enter the field definition in the OpticStudio Field Data Editor?   Answer: Knowing the X and Y pixel numbers and pixel size, we can calculate the image size. The ratio between the half diagonal length and the effective focal length is tangent of angle θ which is the Half Field of View (HFOV) angle. In this case, the HFOV angle is calculated to be 21.8 degrees. If you would like to use Angle as the field definition in your system, you can click open the Field Data Editor, and in Fields Wizard, choose Distribution: Equal-area Y Fields and enter Max Field Y as 21.8 degrees. 

I am working in NSC and I want to put a boundary on the angle of the rays reaching a detector. I know that there are various ways to do this in sequential mode, but is it something feasible in NSC? Thank you in advance, Michele

Hi,  I am generating FFT PSFs in OpticStudio. The question now is how do I get the pixelwise PSF. OpticStudio just outputs a PSF in a certain Samplesize, but what does this 'Samplesize' acutally mean? Furthermore it gives you a 'Pupil grid size' and 'Image grid size' what exactly do these two parameters mean?   Thank you 

I have possibly a rather elementary question. Is it possible to export to a txt file (ASCII) the ray coordinates (or cosine directors) shown on a 'Standard Spot Diagram' or 'Footprint Diagram' ? The 'Text' tabs only offer a summary of the overall ray tracing but not the rays themselves. The closes thing I found is in 'Extended Scene Analysis --> Geometric Image Analysis' but has a completely different purpose, so not sure why it cannot be done for standard analysis tools... this is a big obstacle for more complex optical analysis. Many thanks!