Abstract

The requirement that an asymmetric system possess specific first-order imaging properties can be used to reduce the number of degrees of freedom associated with a given design problem. To illustrate this, asymmetric systems composed of three spherical mirrors and possessing the first-order imaging properties of some axially symmetric system are considered here. In general, ten entities must be specified to describe the configuration of asymmetric systems composed of three spherical mirrors. Requiring that the system possess the first-order imaging properties of some axially symmetric system reduces the number of degrees of freedom to four. It is also shown that all such pseudosymmetric systems composed of three spherical mirrors fall into four distinct families. Simple conditions that guarantee the formation of a real image of the object at infinity are derived for each of these families.

© 1992 Optical Society of America

First-order layout of asymmetric systems: sharp imagery of a single plane object

Bryan D. Stone and G. W. Forbes
J. Opt. Soc. Am. A 9(5) 832-843 (1992)

Foundations of first-order layout for asymmetric systems: an application of Hamilton’s methods

Bryan D. Stone and G. W. Forbes
J. Opt. Soc. Am. A 9(1) 96-109 (1992)

Foundations of second-order layout for asymmetric systems

Bryan D. Stone and G. W. Forbes
J. Opt. Soc. Am. A 9(11) 2067-2082 (1992)

Forms of the characteristic function for asymmetric systems that form sharp images to first order

Bryan D. Stone and G. W. Forbes
J. Opt. Soc. Am. A 9(5) 820-831 (1992)

Characterization of first-order optical properties for asymmetric systems

Bryan D. Stone and G. W. Forbes
J. Opt. Soc. Am. A 9(3) 478-489 (1992)