Athermal Systems
An athermalized optical system maintains its focus and image quality despite variations in temperature. A system which has not been athermalized may experience image degradation or defocus when used over an extended temperature range. This is caused by mechanical displacements from thermal expansion and the dependence of refractive index on temperature. Passive athermalization is accomplished by using lens materials optimized to reduce thermal effects, and also by choosing multiple housing materials with different coefficients of expansion to correctly position the optical elements as the temperature changes through its range. An actively athermalized system uses a motorized focus to correct for errors due to the change in temperature.
|
Beam Expanders
An optical system which expands the diameter of a radiation beam. These are normally afocal systems which accept a collimated beam and deliver a collimated beam with a larger diameter. StingRay can
manufacture custom-magnification expanders to meet your exact needs.
|
Broadband
Broadband systems allow the user to see across multiple parts of the
spectrum without changing lenses. They can be both a time and
cost-saver, as there is no need to carry around or interchange multiple
lenses. Stingray has unique expertise in designing and assembling
top-quality broadband systems. See our technical papers for more
information.
|
Catadioptric Systems
Catadioptric systems employ a blend of reflective and refractive
elements to achieve optimal performance and sophistication when space
is at a premium. Stingray has experience designing for all sorts of
space constraints. Whether you've got two inches or two meters, we've
got the system that fits.
|
Collimators
A lens system designed to relay an image created by a resistive array or other thermal image creation device and relay it into another system. The output of these systems is normally a collimated beam and they are often used to test other optical systems. Sometimes refered to as scene projectors.
|
Cryogenic Systems
Systems designed to be used at low temperatures are refered to as cryogenic systems. They require special design consideration and expertise due to the depenance of index of refraction on temperature and the need to mount optics to withstand the cooling process.
|
Macro Lenses
A lens that is designed to produce
optimum definition at a object when it is imaged at a
magnification of approximately 1:1.
|
Microscopes
An instrument which magnifies its object into a larger image. Alternatively, they may be used to minimize an object into a smaller image.
|
Motorized Systems
A system which uses one or more motors to controls its focus, FOV, or aperture stop. Athemalized systems may be achieved by motorizing the focus of the assembly in order to compensate for changes in focus due to thermal considerations. We also have experience using motorized filter wheelstocontrol wavelength regions.
|
Multi-Spectral Systems
A system whoes design wavelength range spans more than one of the standard ranges. For example, VNIR spans across the visible and near infrared spectrum while UV-VIS spans the ultraviolet and visible spectrums.
|
Panoramic Systems
Lens system that are capable of producing a 360 degree image are
difficult to design, manufacture, and test. StingRay has the
capabilities and experience to do all three.
|
Reflective Systems
Reflective systems are composed entirely of mirrored optical elements. These systems posses the advantage that chromatic aberrations are completely eliminated over the entire range that the mirrors reflect in. In many cases they are also very well behaved over a wide range of temperatures. The disadvantage of reflective systems is their size, which tends to be slightly larger than refractive systems.
|
Refractive Systems
Refractive systems are composed entirely of refracting optical elements, such as lenses and windows. The optical aberrations in these systems can be corrected far more than reflective systems because it is possible to use more surfaces in a smaller area to accomplish the corrections. In most cases chromatic aberrations can be corrected for by using multiple lens materials which can optimized to reduce the chromatic effects of the materials.
|
Scene Projectors
A lens system designed to relay an image created by a resistive array or other thermal image creation device and relay it into another system. The output of these systems is normally a collimated beam and they are often used to test other optical systems. Sometimes refered to as collimators.
|
Telescopes
An optical device made up of lenses or mirrors, usually with a
magnification greater than unity, which takes a collimated input beam and either creates an image at a finite conjugate or outputs a collimated beam with a smaller diameter and higher divergance.
|
|
UAV Lens Solutions
Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) are critical to modern warfare. Critical to the UAV itself is its ability to image its surroundings. StingRay Optics has extensive experience creating and delivering these lenses, and offers a wide range of options for UAV optics in terms of wavelength range, focal length, and volume/mass requirements.
|
Wide Angle Lens/Fisheye Lens
A lens whose effective focal length is considerably shorter than the diagonal dimension of the image it forms. These systems make it possible to view much more of a scene at the expense of increased barrel distortion. Although the image formed is sharp and in focus, the magnification changes the farther away from the center of the image you go. This sharp yet distorted image can allow the user to see far larger of an area than an undistorted system could.
|
Zoom Systems
An optical system of variable focal length, the focal plane remaining a
fixed position. The result of this is a system which allows the user to magnify their image smoothly from one size to another. A zoom system may be either motoried or manual.
|
