During this week's Photonics West, Imagine Optic (Orsay, France) unveiled its SL-Sys neo 76, which it calls "a turnkey solution for high-resolution, wavefront characterization of miniature optics." The new release follows the launch of the neo 32 at Photonics West 2008. The neo 76 is designed for industrial R&D situations requiring the ability to perform total, high-resolution characterization of miniature optical components and assemblies.
In a single, fully automated and "user parameterized" procedure, the device enables users to retrieve large amounts of information about the characterized component. Measurement data includes wavefront aberrations, back focal length (BFL), effective focal length (EFL), chromatism, field curvature, distortion, vignetting, relative illumination as a function of the field, 3D MTF and the MTF through-focus for all measured points in the field, as well the best focal plane.
Imagine Optic is known as a manufacturer of Shack-Hartmann wavefront metrology and adaptive optics solutions. "We built the device following extensive market research into the needs of optical component manufacturers for high-performance characterization solutions that would help them cut R&D costs by streamlining the development of new products and decrease their time to market," notes Xavier Levecq, Imagine Optic's cofounder and Vice President of Marketing. "The SL-Sys family of products go beyond what simple pass/fail systems can do by providing detailed information on optical defects that enables users to not only identify that a problem exists, but to understand its origin."
"The patented technology at the heart of the SL-Sys neo, notably its HASO wavefront sensor and its multi-axis rotation and translation stages, enables it to provide measurements that no other system on the market can," boasts Guillaume Dovillaire, Technical Director and COO at Imagine Optic. "Developing a product that can measure the entire field of view and the effective focal length (EFL) of any convergent optical component or assembly with pupil diameters ranging from 1-12 mm, without any limitation imposed by the component's numerical aperture (NA), was a real challenge."
Imagine Optic is demonstrating the SL-Sys neo 76 at Photonics West on stand 527. For more product information please visit Imagine Optics' website.
