This article explains:

• Modifying system settings, including System Aperture, Lens Units, Fields and Wavelengths
• Entering lens prescription data
• Using solves to enforce design contraints
• Analyzing system performance prior to optimization
• Determining degrees of freedom and setting variables
• Setting up a default merit function
• Optimizing and analyzing final design performance

The Quick Adjust tool is invaluable during early system setup, letting you easily adjust important surface data to achieve a variety of conditions. This article describes how to use it, and its related feature, the Slider.

This article explains:

• How to enter and edit non-sequential objects in the non-sequential editor
• How to draw rays on the layout plots to get a qualitative feel for the optical system performance
• How to trace large numbers of rays to get quantitative data on system performance

The lens file representing the final system is included as zipped file, which can be downloaded from the last page of this article.

This article outlines the procedure for modeling a mixed mode system in ZEMAX, which utilizes both sequential surfaces and non-sequential objects in the same lens file.  The following topics are discussed in detail.

• Inserting/Creating a non-sequential group within an otherwise sequential design.
• Defining entry and exit port locations, shapes, and sizes.
• Common mistakes and considerations.

Updated December 2009 This article provides an overview of the entire process of tolerancing a lens. It is the first article you should read in the Tolerancing category if you are new to tolerancing.

This article explains:

• What coordinate break surfaces are, and how they work
• How to use the Global Vertex report to check your work
• Why coordinate break surfaces usually come in pairs
• Why coordinate break surfaces have to be co-located
• How to do all this the easy, simple, fun way

The article is accompanied by a ZIP archive containing the sample ZEMAX files used. This can be downloaded from the final page of the article.

This article explains:

• what an afocal system is
• how to optimize such systems
• how to get data from afocal systems in angular units
• how to handle cylindrical systems
• how to handle systems with multiple focal and afocal spaces

The article includes a zip archive containing sample files, which can be downloaded from the link on the last page of this article.