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5 - Ray Tracing

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 September 2019

José Sasián
José Sasián
Affiliation:
University of Arizona
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Summary

Ray tracing originated in optics to determine the path of light. However, ray tracing is used in modern technology by many fields, such as acoustics and computer graphics. Ray tracing is at the heart of optical design. Most optical calculations are done by tracing rays of light and, therefore, for competent lens design, it is important to have an understanding about how ray tracing is performed. This chapter provides an introduction to ray tracing, to ray tracing pitfalls, and to some useful ray tracing techniques.

Type
Chapter
Information
Introduction to Lens Design , pp. 44 - 53
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2019

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References

Further Reading

Allen, W. A., Snyder, J. “Ray tracing through uncentered and aspheric surfaces,” Journal of the Optical Society of America, 42(4) (1952), 243–49.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Feder, D. P. “Optical calculations with automatic computing machinery,” Journal of the Optical Society of America, 41(9) (1951), 630–35.Google Scholar
Ford, P. W. “New ray tracing scheme,” Journal of the Optical Society of America, 50 (1960), 528–33.Google Scholar
Freniere, Edward R., Tourtellott, John. “Brief history of generalized ray tracing,” Proceedings of SPIE 3130, Lens Design, Illumination, and Optomechanical Modeling (1997); doi: 10.1117/12.284059.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Liping, Z., Minxtan, W., Guofan, J., Weizhen, Y. “Ray tracing through arbitrary DOE based on Fermat’s principle,” SPIE, 3130 (1997), 238–44.Google Scholar
Sasián, J. M., Lerner, S. A., Lin, T. Y., Laughlin, L. “Ray and Van Citter-Zernike characterization of spatial coherence,” Applied Optics, 40(7) (2001), 1037–43.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Spencer, G. H., Murty, M. V. R. K. “General ray-tracing procedure,” Journal of the Optical Society of America, 52 (1962), 672–78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sweatt, W. C. “Describing holographic optical elements as lenses,” Journal of the Optical Society of America, 67 (1977), 803–8.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wang, Y., McDonald, J. “Ray tracing and wave aberration calculation for diffractive optical elements,” Optical Engineering, 35(7) (1996), 2021–26.Google Scholar

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  • Ray Tracing
  • José Sasián, University of Arizona
  • Book: Introduction to Lens Design
  • Online publication: 23 September 2019
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108625388.006
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Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

  • Ray Tracing
  • José Sasián, University of Arizona
  • Book: Introduction to Lens Design
  • Online publication: 23 September 2019
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108625388.006
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Ray Tracing
  • José Sasián, University of Arizona
  • Book: Introduction to Lens Design
  • Online publication: 23 September 2019
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108625388.006
Available formats
×