Abstract

One useful method in the design of axially symmetric optical systems is to specify the configuration of the system up to the final surface and then to choose the curvature of this surface so that the resulting system possesses any specified focal length. By surrendering the curvature of the final surface as a free parameter, the dimensionality of the design space is reduced by one. We discuss the generalization of such a procedure for asymmetric systems. The imposition of constraints on the first-order imagery of asymmetric systems can significantly reduce the dimensionality of the design space. For example, the design space associated with systems composed of three spherical mirrors is reduced from ten to four when such systems are required to possess the first-order imaging properties of some axially symmetric system.

© 1991 Optical Society of America