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Thread: Zernike polynomials describing spectacle lens aberrations

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    Zernike polynomials describing spectacle lens aberrations

    Benefits, if any, of using Zernike Polynomials to describe spectacle lens aberrations?

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    holy mackeral...using a lot of poly-sylabic verbiage here...

    anyway...I suspect it would be helpful, assuming you could do something about them...the lens aberrations, I mean.

    Welcome to Optiboard, BTW.

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    Master OptiBoarder Darryl Meister's Avatar
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    Benefits, if any, of using Zernike Polynomials to describe spectacle lens aberrations?
    It really depends upon your application. When dealing with an aberrated wavefront that varies in complex ways, for instance, representing the aberrations with Zernike polynomials may be more useful. When dealing with a centered, rotationally-symmetrical optical lens, on the other hand, Seidel aberration polynomials are probably more practical.

    Consequently, for single-vision lenses, Seidel polynomials (or at least quantities described in terms of Seidel aberrations) will often suffice. For progressive lenses, on the other hand, which have refracting surfaces that have non-zero third derivatives, Zernike polynomials will provide more quantitative information, particularly if you want to examine some of the more subtle optical errors.

    Another important distinction is the fact Seidel aberrations have field-dependent terms that evaluate lens aberrations such as oblique astigmatism and curvature of the field as a function of viewing angle or lens position. Zernike aberrations, on the other hand, must be calculated separately for each angle of view along the principal ray.

    I actually wrote a pretty lengthy article on the subject, Wavefront Aberrations and Spectacle Lenses, for Dispensing Optics in the UK two or three years ago. This provides an intermediate-level discussion of these topics.

    Best regards,
    Darryl
    Darryl J. Meister, ABOM

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    Master OptiBoarder Darryl Meister's Avatar
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    It really depends upon your application.
    I should add that, when attempting to estimate image quality in the presence of high-order aberrations such as coma, spherical aberration, and trefoil, Zernike polynomials are particularly convenient and are becoming increasingly common.

    Best regards,
    Darryl
    Darryl J. Meister, ABOM

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