RPS Imaging Science Group

A modified Dialyte system from Wise & Hodgson (EOS reference below)

From the very earliest days of optical instruments the problems of chromatic aberration have been recognized. Judicious choice of material types in combination in compound elements in camera lenses and telescope and microscope objectives have largely solved these issues but at the expense of cost, size and weight. There are work-arounds. There is an early optical design called the Dialyte – see R Blakley, Dialyte-refractor design for self-correcting lateral color”, Opt. Eng. 42(2) 400–404 (2003). I was involved in the evolution of this a few years ago that resulted in a paper at the European Optical Society Topical Meeting on Advanced Imaging Techniques, Lille, France in September 2007 “Adapting novel consumer astronomical telescope designs for professional imaging”. However, all these designs involve compromise.
Some of these compromises are being revisited in an alternative approach. Workers at Samsung are using electronic imaging techniques to digitally remove or correct for chromatic aberration effects and have written a paper or this. They presented their work at the IS&T/SPIE 21st Annual Electronic Imaging Symposium earlier this year but the paper can currently be found under www.imaging.org/pubs/reporter/.
This current edition of The Reporter also has a review of this meeting. After my election as IS&T Conference VP I hope to connect more closely with this community. I have not yet done one of these meetings but they look good!