Paraxial analysis of zoom lens composed of three

tunable-focus elements with fixed position of

image-space focal point and object-image
distance
Antonin Miks* and Jiri Novak
Czech Technical University in Prague, Faculty of Civil Engineering, Department of Physics, Thakurova 7, 16629
Prague, Czech Republic
*
miks@fsv.cvut.cz

Abstract: This work performs a paraxial analysis of three-component zoom

lens with a fixed position of image-space focal point and a distance between
object and image points, which is composed of three tunable-focus
elements. Formulas for the calculation of paraxial parameters of such
optical systems are derived and the calculation is presented on examples.
©2014 Optical Society of America
OCIS codes: (080.2468) First-order optics; (080.2740) Geometric optical design; (080.3630)
Lenses; (110.1080) Active or adaptive optics; (080.3620) Lens system design; (220.3630)
Lenses.

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#217630 - $15.00 USD Received 23 Jul 2014; revised 16 Oct 2014; accepted 17 Oct 2014; published 23 Oct 2014
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1. Introduction
Zoom lenses, which enable to change focal length and magnification of the optical system,
find many applications in different areas and various papers [1–23] are dedicated to their
optical design. The change of a focal length or a transverse magnification can be achieved by
the change of the position of individual elements of the optical system. The position of the
image plane is required to be fixed during the change of the focal length in order the image
was sharp in the whole range of the focal length change. If it is required that the image should

#217630 - $15.00 USD Received 23 Jul 2014; revised 16 Oct 2014; accepted 17 Oct 2014; published 23 Oct 2014
(C) 2014 OSA 3 November 2014 | Vol. 22, No. 22 | DOI:10.1364/OE.22.027056 | OPTICS EXPRESS 27057
be located at a specific constant distance from the object for a given range of magnification,
then the position of the image-space focal point of the classical zoom lens is not fixed and
changes its position during the magnification change. A very precise optomechanical design
is needed for the movement of individual elements of the classical zoom lens. Individual
elements of such a zoom lens do not enable to change its basic optical parameters, for
example, its focal length. On the other hand, refractive fluidic lenses with a variable focal
length [24–39] became in last years a promising technology for future optical and
microoptical systems, especially due to a possibility for a size reduction, lower complexity
and costs, better robustness, and faster adjustment of optical parameters of such systems.
These lenses can be also used in the zoom lens optical design, where individual elements stay
in fixed position and the complicated mechanical design of conventional zoom lenses can be
eliminated. The change of the focal length of individual elements can be realized by different
physical principles, which are described in detail in [24,25], and we will not deal with them in
this work. As it is well known [40–53], paraxial parameters of the optical systems are
fundamental for the primary design of any type of optical systems and therefore our work is
devoted to this issue. This is important even more for the design of zoom lens systems,
because using paraxial parameters of the optical system (i.e. focal lengths, distances between
individual elements, f-numbers, etc.) one can deduce how complex the individual elements
should be and how complicated will be to correct aberrations and design the mechanical
construction of the zoom lens system in further stages of the optical design process. The
paraxial analysis also provides an excellent insight into the tolerance sensitivity and
manufacturability of the underlying design form.
In recent work [40] the problem of the calculation of paraxial parameters of zoom lenses
with a fixed distance between object and image points and a fixed position of the image-space
focal point is solved using conventional fix-focus elements, where the change of the
magnification of the zoom lens is performed by the change of distances between individual
elements of the optical system. The aim of this work is to analyze and calculate paraxial
parameters of zoom lenses with a fixed distance between object and image points and a fixed
position of the image-space focal point, which are composed of optical tunable-focus
elements. Thus, it is an entirely different problem than the method described in [40]. Further,
formulas for the calculation of paraxial parameters are derived for such type of zoom lenses.
The advantage of these optical systems is the fact that complicated the mechanical design is
not needed as in conventional zoom lenses with fix focus elements. Due to the fact that active
optical elements with tunable optical parameters [24,25] are commercially available [53,54]
and started to be used in the design of optical systems, it is important to analyze properties of
different optical systems composed of such optical elements. Our work represents a
theoretical contribution to the optical design using active elements with tunable focal length.
As far as we know the analysis of such type of the zoom lenses that are composed of optical
tunable-focus elements was not published yet.
2. Paraxial imaging properties of three-component zoom lens
Consider a three-component zoom lens in air composed of tunable-focus lenses (Fig. 1) with
optical powers φ1 , φ 2 , φ3 and fixed distances d1, d2 between components of the zoom lens.
We can write for such zoom lens with thin lenses the following formulas using Gaussian
brackets [41,42]
α = 1 − d 2 (φ1 + φ 2 − φ1φ 2 d1 ) − φ1d1 , (1)

β = d1 + d 2 − φ 2 d1d 2 , (2)

γ = −φ = −(φ1 + φ 2 + φ3 ) + φ1φ 2 d1 + φ 2 φ3 d 2 + φ1φ3 (d1 + d 2 ) − φ1φ 2 φ3 d1d 2 , (3)

δ = 1 − d1 (φ 2 + φ3 ) − d 2 φ3 + d1d 2 φ 2 φ3 . (4)

#217630 - $15.00 USD Received 23 Jul 2014; revised 16 Oct 2014; accepted 17 Oct 2014; published 23 Oct 2014
(C) 2014 OSA 3 November 2014 | Vol. 22, No. 22 | DOI:10.1364/OE.22.027056 | OPTICS EXPRESS 27058
Then, it holds for basic paraxial parameters [41,42]
β−αs 1
φ = − γ, sF = δ / γ, sF′ ′ = −α / γ, s ′ = − , m= , (5)
δ−γs δ − sγ

where s is the distance of the object from the first element of the optical system, s ′ is the
distance of the image from the last element of the optical system, φ is the optical power, and
m is the transverse magnification of the optical system. Consider an optical system presented
in Fig. 1, where ξ is the object plane, ξ' is the image plane and m is the transverse
magnification of the optical system. The distance L = AA′ between planes ξ and ξ' (Fig. 1)
can be expressed as

L = AA′ = − s + d1 + d 2 + s ′ (6)

and mutual distance D = AF ′ between points A and F ′ (image-space focal point) can be
expressed as

D = AF ′ = − s + d1 + d 2 + sF′ ′ , (7)

where sF is the position of the object focal point and sF′ ′ is the position of the image focal
point. In further analysis we require that the distances L = AA′ and D = AF ′ remain constant
during the change of magnification m.

Fig. 1. Three-element zoom lens composed of tunable-focus lenses.

By substitution of Eqs. (1)-(5) into Eqs. (6) and (7) one obtains after a tedious derivation
the following formulas for the calculation of optical powers φ1 , φ 2 and φ3

 m[d 2 ( sF′ ′ − s ′) + d1msF′ ′ ] 

1
φ1 = 1 + ,
d1
 s ′( sF′ ′ − s ′) − m 2 sF′ ′ s 
1  s ′ msF′ ′ s 
φ2 =  d1 + d 2 + − ′ , (8)
d1d 2  m sF ′ − s ′ 
1  m[d1 ( sF′ ′ − s ′) − d 2 ms ] + d 2 ( sF′ ′ − s ′) 
φ3 = 1 + .
d2  s ′( sF′ ′ − s ′) − m 2 sF′ ′ s 

#217630 - $15.00 USD Received 23 Jul 2014; revised 16 Oct 2014; accepted 17 Oct 2014; published 23 Oct 2014
(C) 2014 OSA 3 November 2014 | Vol. 22, No. 22 | DOI:10.1364/OE.22.027056 | OPTICS EXPRESS 27059
In case that the image-space focal point F ′ or the image point A′ lies inside the optical
system ( sF′ ′ < 0 , s ′ < 0 ), then one needs to put another optical system with the fixed focal
length behind the zoom system, which images points F ′ and A′ as points F ′′ and A′′ that
are located behind the system [40]. Zoom lenses with the fixed distance between object and
image points and the fixed position of image-space focal point may find, for example, their
applications in optical systems for information processing [55–57], where it is possible to
affect the amplitude, phase and polarization using the spatial filter, which is positioned in the
fixed focal plane of the zoom lens. It is possible to place the spatial filter in the plane, which
pass through the point F ′ (or F ′′ ), and the image will lie in the plane, which passes through
the point A′ (or A′′ ). The position of points A′ (or A′′ ) and F ′ (or F ′′ ) is fixed and does not
change during the change of magnification.
The next step of the lens calculation is the determination of the parameters (radii of
curvature, index of refraction, etc.) of individual elements of the zoom lens in order to
minimize aberrations [43–51]. This problem, which is described in detail in [3,44–51], is not
the aim of our work and we will not deal with aberration compensation of the zoom lens.
3. Example of calculation zoom lens parameters
We present an example of the calculation of basic parameters of the three-component zoom
lens with the fixed distance between object and image points and the fixed position of the
image-space focal point, where the change of the focal length is performed using the elements
with continuously variable focal length. The result of the calculation for different values m of
the transverse magnification is presented for a variant of the zoom lens in Table 1. Figure 2
presents the graph of optical power φ1 , φ 2 , φ3 (in diopters) of individual elements of the
zoom lens with respect to the transverse magnification m, evaluated for the optical system
with parameters given in Table 1. As one can see from Fig. 2, the change of optical power is
continuous for all three elements. Table 1 also presents incidence heights h of the aperture
rays and incidence heights h of the principal rays [43–47] on individual elements of the
zoom lens in dependence on the transverse magnification m. The calculation is performed for
the image size y ′ = 5 mm. The f-number [43,45–47] of the zoom lens in the object space is F
= 4 for all values of the transverse magnification m ∈ −5, − 2 . For clarity, the calculation is
performed for two positions of the entrance pupil. Namely, the first case corresponds to the
position identical with the first element of the zoom lens ( h1 = 0 ) and the second case
corresponds to the position of the entrance pupil at infinity ( h3∞ = y ′sF′ / mf ′ ), i.e. for the
telecentric path of the chief ray in the object space (denoted by the superscript ∞ ). The
effective f-number F of the individual optical element, i.e. the f-number for a given value of
the transverse magnification m of the zoom lens can be approximately ( sin α ≈ tan α )
calculated from the formula: Fi = 0.5 di / (hi − hi +1 ) , where i = 0,1, 2,3 and d 0 = − s , d3 = s ′ ,
h0 = h4 = 0 . One obtains two f-numbers for each optical element. The first f-number is given
for the space in front of the element and the second one is given for the space behind the
element. As one can calculate simply from Table 1, the minimum effective f-number for the
first element is F1min = 2.04 , for the second element F2 min = 2.04 and for the third
element F2 min = 3.69 . Thus, these individual elements can be realized in the form of the
doublet or triplet [37,49–51] in the further steps of the design process. All linear dimensions
in Table 1 are given in millimeters.

#217630 - $15.00 USD Received 23 Jul 2014; revised 16 Oct 2014; accepted 17 Oct 2014; published 23 Oct 2014
(C) 2014 OSA 3 November 2014 | Vol. 22, No. 22 | DOI:10.1364/OE.22.027056 | OPTICS EXPRESS 27060
 Table 1. Parameters of Zoom Lens and Incidence heights of the Aperture and Principal
Rays

s = −20 , s ′ = 150 , sF′ = 10 , d1 = 30 , d 2 = 45 , h1 = 2.5 , h1 = 0 , h3∞ = y ′sF′ / mf ′ = 0.357

m −2.0 −3.0 −4.0 −5.0
f′ 70.000 46.667 35.000 28.000

f1′ 94.688 −240.00 −43.771 −20.870

f 2′ 472.500 46.098 31.240 25.890

f 3′ 62.690 180.00 −112.82 −33.962

h2 9.844 7.963 6.563 5.458

h3 3.750 4.688 6.250 9.375

1.500 1.875 2.500 3.750
h2
1.143 1.987 3.810 9.018
h3
1.000 1.250 1.667 2.500
h1∞
2.437 2.107 1.875 1.708
h2∞

Fig. 2. Powers of individual lenses

4. Conclusion
We presented a theoretical analysis of paraxial optical properties of the three-component
zoom lens with the fixed distance between object and image points and the fixed position of
the image-space focal point, which is composed of three tunable-focus elements. Formulas
(Eq. (8) for the calculation of paraxial parameters of such zoom lenses were derived. The
procedure of the calculation of parameters of zoom lenses was presented on examples. The
derived formulas can be used in the initial stage of the optical design of such zoom lenses
with tunable-focus elements. Zoom lenses with the fixed distance between object and image
points and the fixed position of image-space focal point may find, for example, their
applications in optical systems for information processing [55–57], where it is possible to
affect the amplitude, phase and polarization using the spatial filter, which is positioned in the

#217630 - $15.00 USD Received 23 Jul 2014; revised 16 Oct 2014; accepted 17 Oct 2014; published 23 Oct 2014
(C) 2014 OSA 3 November 2014 | Vol. 22, No. 22 | DOI:10.1364/OE.22.027056 | OPTICS EXPRESS 27061
fixed focal plane of the zoom lens. The advantage of the proposed solution, i.e. the zoom lens
with the fixed distance between object and image points and the fixed position of the image-
space focal point, is the fact that one can affect, for example, Fourier spectra of objects [55–
57], which are characterized by the different spatial structure, with just one spatial filter. The
position of the image-space focal point does not change with the change of focal length or the
transverse magnification of the zoom lens and the position of the investigated object stays
also fixed. The problem of influence of aberrations of optical system was not studied in our
work. We focused on the calculation of the paraxial parameters of the zoom system because
the paraxial parameters are fundamental parameters for design of the any optical systems.
Those, which are interested in the influence of aberrations on the transformed beam and
design parameters (radii, thickness and refractive indices of glasses) of individual elements
from the point of view of the theory of aberrations, can find detailed information, e.g. in Refs
[3,44–51].
Acknowledgment
This work has been supported by Czech Science Foundation from the grant 13-31765S.

#217630 - $15.00 USD Received 23 Jul 2014; revised 16 Oct 2014; accepted 17 Oct 2014; published 23 Oct 2014
(C) 2014 OSA 3 November 2014 | Vol. 22, No. 22 | DOI:10.1364/OE.22.027056 | OPTICS EXPRESS 27062