Magnification Of Prisms: An Apparent Anomaly And Its Explanation

The magnification of a single prism or a series of prisms is normally considered in a situation when collimated light is incident, which is equivalent to placing the object at a very large distance from the prism system. This is the usual situation considered and described in most of the literature....

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Optical Engineering 1984-02, Vol.23 (1), p.230183-230183
Main Authors: Murty, M. V. R. K, Moya-Cessa, Jesus R
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Exact sciences and technology
Fundamental areas of phenomenology (including applications)
Optical elements, devices, and systems
Optics
Physics
Reflectors, beam splitters, and deflectors
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:The magnification of a single prism or a series of prisms is normally considered in a situation when collimated light is incident, which is equivalent to placing the object at a very large distance from the prism system. This is the usual situation considered and described in most of the literature. In such cases, the magnification is referred to as the anamorphic magnification of the prism system in collimated light. However, when the object is at a finite distance, the apparent magnification is quite different and sometimes is just the reciprocal of what it would be if the object were at infinity. These situations are analyzed for the case of Brewster prisms, and the results can be checked visually very easily in ordinary white-light illumination because of the mutual cancellation of the dispersion of the Brewster prisms.
ISSN:0091-3286
1560-2303
DOI:10.1117/12.7973258