10 Questions You Should to Know about Custom Optical Prisms

Two random questions (ELI5)

1) At LensCrafters when a person picks out a large frame, an aviator for example, and cutout won't accommodate the 70mm finished lens, they would place the OC wherever necessary to make it work. Is this typical practice for large frames? If prism is prescribed to "pull" a lazy eye, wouldn't unprescribed prism be harmful? Or at the very least make it more difficult to see as the prescription gets stronger?


2) LensCrafters also does personalized progressive lenses (vertex distance, frame wrap, ect) so you get like -1.46 Sphere Power + 2.47 Add power, but they didn't do it for single vision. Do any places do this for single vision? And if not i assume there's a reason? Is it because most optometrists only measure in quarter diopters anyway so going from -2 to -1.95 could actually be worse because you were measured at -2.08 which was rounded down to -2? But once you get up to a higher RX like -7 it seems like where the lens sits would be a lot more significant and this would be viable. Unwanted prism can be an issue. It would depend on the prescription, how much movement did they manually de-center a lens to create cutout, material, etc. Lower prescriptions can allow you to move a lens a bit more without creating any noticeable issues with prism.

As far LensCrafters not selling digital single vision lenses, they did have that option with the Ray Ban Authentic lens program for clear and sunglasses. I do not know if they are still offering this in their stores now.

As far as issues with the customized Rx, I can't see this as being the issue. If a patient is given an Rx of say -2.00 and the lens comes out with a reading of -2.06, it's very unlikely that a patient would notice a difference.

I think it's more of LC ditching the idea because they didn't execute the selling of a digital lens well enough by restricting it to the Ray Ban line and not offering it as a full scale option. Last I knew only two LC stores were being tested with equipment to produce digital lenses on site instead of ordering through their special order labs The thing I still don't though is with regards to the customized lenses. When a doctor writes you a prescription and decides between -1 and -1.25 neither of those are EXACTLY what you need. For example let's say you needed -1.1 and the doctor wrote you an RX for -1. You then go to get optimized lenses which based on where it's sitting on your face they knock the power down to -0.95 (farther away from your eye's actual need of a -1.1) I understand that the person probably wont even perceive the difference between a -1 and a -0.95 but this shows my two points.

1) Until doctors start prescribing RX's in 1/8 or 1/16th diopters these customized lenses may actually be farther away from what your eye actually needs

2) For most prescriptions -2.5 to -2.46 is going to be nearly identical and possibly worse for the patient making it seem kinda gimmicky until you have someone with a strong RX

Please correct me if i'm wrong on either of these two assumptions A couple of years back, there was a very long, sometimes heated discussion when the ANSI board changed the Z80 tolerances for lens power in the higher powers, essentially loosening the tolerances by about an eighth of a diopter if I remember correctly. The gist of the discussion was that the eye cannot distinguish an optical difference of 0.06 diopters, and at the higher powers, there is so much other "stuff" going on that the additional "blur" isn't going to matter.

My point was that with all the new-fangled digital technology, any lab with that capability should be able to dial in the power to within 0.06 diopters, no matter the overall power in any axis. Several posters agreed with me, but the majority opinion (as I remember it) was "it doesn't matter".

I know that when I work glass, provided I cut a special tool for it, I can hit a given power to within +/- 0.04 D which is about the tolerance of my lap cutter.

What seems preposterous to me though, is that they claim to be able to make these "customized" lenses, yet have to decenter an uncut out of tolerance to make it fit into a large frame. I think there is a fundamental disconnect here between whoever is making the decisions and the Z80 (current edition) standards. Unwanted prism is always an issue for me, and no, it is not normal to place an OC wherever it will work for the cutout. Now there are times when it is pretty much a moot point, like if the power along the 180 is near plano (e.g. -2.00 -200 x90) in both eyes. Same lens at axis 180 kicks in a full prism diopter of prism for each 5 mm of error. Double the Rx and even 2.5 mm gives you a 1 P.D. My tolerance for horizontal prism is pretty low; I'll accept .25 in each eye but that's about it. And yes, prism causes (and fixes when Rx'd correctly) some binocularity issues. But even a one eye'd person deserves near zero prism in the primary gaze, because of prism distortion. Yesterday I had a one eye'd guy who I convinced to go smaller on the lens size because of how much thicker I'd have to make his +3.00 lenses with the size he (and his wife) wanted. He went for the smaller lens.

As for power accuracy, I used to Rx in .12 steps, but some software designer made that difficult or impossible in orders, and of course the .12 interval stock lenses are ancient history, never mind the capacity of modern surfacers to get finer than that. When I refract, I shoot for the closest .25, but often am unsure between two adjacent "clicks" and would prefer to go in between them with a .12, and may start doing it again.

I feel the same way about CL manufacturers, who for some brilliant reason decided that .5 D. was close enough above + or -6. Maybe that's just bean counting gone wrong.

I also Rx cyl in 1 degree increments. Like marksmanship, you feel better when you hit the bull's eye in the center than you do when it's on the edge of that center ring. Both are ok for the score, but you have more confidence when you can hit the center.

The RP Photonics Buyer's Guide contains 146 suppliers for custom optics. Among them:

Jiuyuan supply professional and honest service.

Perkins Precision Developments

Perkins Precision Developments (PPD) specializes in a variety of custom optics, including wedge windows, curved and plano HEL mirrors, spherical lenses, right angle prisms, plate polarizers, beam splitter cube assemblies, and Brewster windows. They employ Ion Beam Sputtering coating technology to accommodate complex spectral designs and high-power systems such as Nd:YAG and fiber lasers, where minimizing losses from absorption and scatter is crucial.

All custom optics are manufactured and coated in-house, supported by a technical staff with over 100 cumulative years of experience in the photonics industry.

Avantier

We have over 50 years of expertise in custom optics and custom optical component manufacturing of lenses, prisms, windows, wafers, and custom-shaped substrates using materials such as UV grade fused silica, industrial grade fused silica, IR grade fused silica, filter glass, germanium, silicon, ZnSe, and more.

UltraFast Innovations

UltraFast Innovations (UFI®) offers numerous types of optical elements in customized forms &#; for example, ultrafast low-dispersion or dispersive mirrors, ultrahigh reflection mirrors, input and output coupler mirrors, spectral filters, and mirrors for the extreme ultraviolet (XUV) and soft X-rays.

Workshop of Photonics

WOP offers custom-made space variant retarders &#; adapted to the specific end-user needs. Space-variant retarders (SVR) fabrication is based on the inscription of self-organized nanogratings inside fused silica glass using a femtosecond laser.

Main features:

• wavelength range from 200 nm to  nm
• high damage threshold: 63.4 J/cm2 at  nm, 10 ns and 2.2 J/cm2 at  nm, 212 fs &#; suitable for high LIDT applications and high-power lasers
• 94% transmission at  nm (no AR coating)
• aperture size from 1 mm to 15 mm
• reliable and resistant surface &#; the structure is inside the bulk piece
• custom-designed fast axis and retardance patterns

Shalom EO

Hangzhou Shalom EO is an expert supplier and manufacturer of various types of custom optics including lenses, windows, mirrors, prisms, laser optics, super-polished optics, sapphire optics, and infrared optics with a wide operation wavelength range from UV, VIS, to IR.

A vast selection of shapes, dimensions, coatings, and other specifications of the optical components can be tailored to meet customers&#; specific requirements.

With cutting-edge production technologies (like IAD e-beam coating, super-polishing, and Kyropoulos sapphire growth method), Shalom EO's engineers and production line are competent at and committed to endowing our optical components with optimized optical excellence. All the optics will go through in-process inspections during the production course and further tests in our class  clean room before despatch to ensure the parameters of optical components meet or exceed the published specifications. Utilizing top-tier metrological instruments such as Zygo interferometers, and PerkinElmer Lambda + spectroscopes, Shalom EO secures the persistent reliable quality of our optical components.

Knight Optical

Knight Optical's main area of expertise is its custom capabilities. We work closely with our customers on their bespoke specifications to ensure they receive both a high-quality product and service &#; something Knight Optical prides itself on. Customisation includes substrates, dimensions, tolerances, and coatings of the optical components.

DPM Photonics

Custom precision optics has been an integral part of Photonic Devices' business for over 20 years; DPM Photonics has been their partners for many years. This extensive experience with custom products enables efficient design generation and very reasonable turn-around times, while keeping non-recurring charges low.

Whether the need is a slight modification of an existing product or an entirely new design, Photonic Devices welcomes the opportunity to review customer needs and provide enabling products. Let us put our experience to work for you.

Laserton

Laserton has a wide range of stock optics, but can also produce custom optics covering a wide range of requirements. This ranges from sample to bulk production, with best quality at competitive prices.

Edmund Optics

From design to prototype to production, Edmund Optics manufactures over 2 million optical components every year, manufactures over 175.000 optical assemblies including imaging lenses, laser beam expanders or microscope objectives and provides in-house expertise and metrology to support your custom manufacturing. Edmund Optics&#; engineers can design and manufacture fully-custom components, build-to-print following customer-supplied designs, and quickly modify any of our thousands of off-the-shelf optics sold in our Marketplace.

IRD Glass

IRD has a strong presence in the laser OEM market, providing many types of custom components such as cavity reflectors for the solid-state laser industry, HLDT/HR steering mirrors, splatter shields, precision spacers and tooling, beamsplitters, custom corner cubes, filters. IRD Glass and IRD Ceramics work with all types of materials, from fused silica to sapphire, from filter glass to chalcogenides, doped glass to crystals.

Contact us to discuss your requirements of Custom Optical Prisms. Our experienced sales team can help you identify the options that best suit your needs.

LightMachinery

LightMachinery offers a wide range of custom optics. We work closely with our customers to really understand and define the parameters that are important to the functionality of the optical component.

The experience of the people at LightMachinery with tight tolerance optics is unique in breadth and scope. If you are looking for high quality optics then look no further. Our team of professionals is always ready to push the envelope of optical quality or make a quick piece for an R & D prototype. No job is too big or too small. Start by filling out our contact form and telling us about your project and your requirements, we can help refine the specification and provide feedback on price and delivery.

Ecoptik

Ecoptik offers most optical components in customized forms concerning dimensions, geometrical shapes, materials, anti-reflection coatings etc.

Universe Kogaku

Universe Kogaku offers comprehensive project design cycle assistance by qualified lens application engineers. We provide your optimal lens solution by addressing all of your design considerations &#; from specs, to budget, to timetables &#; realizing that optics are not a stand-alone component. We understand electrical and mechanical requirements and integrate our lenses into your system with this in mind. Through this approach, custom lens designs from Universe can often reduce system cost by eliminating the need for other design components or modifications.

Complete custom design capabilities from concept to prototype to production provide ideal solutions for unique designs. We have full plastic optics capability for both lenses and barrels. Our facility contains the best in lens manufacturing and inspection equipment including a spectrophotometer, video MTF bench, laser interferometer, optical collimator bench, in-house single and multi-layer coating, full computer-aided lens and coating design and much more.

EKSMA OPTICS

EKSMA Optics offers customized laser mirrors, lenses, windows, prisms, filters waveplates and other polarizing optics. We have a wide range of optical materials and coatings. EKSMA Optics in-house precision polishing and IBS coating facilities allow us to take full control over whole manufacturing process and provide you services starting from optical design to final quality control.

OPTOMAN

OPTOMAN manufactures a range of application-optimized custom laser optics. To achieve highest possible accuracy, repeatability and quality we employ ion-beam sputtering (IBS) technology. Custom-tailored IBS-coated optics, with spectral range from 193 nm up to  nm and size range from 3 mm up to 420 mm, feature high LIDT, precise spectral accuracy, durability and environmental stability.

Some of the special custom optics we do for our clients include: knife-edge coated optics, 100% coated aperture components, segmented coatings, coatings on multi-surface prisms, coatings on micro lens assemblies, fast axis collimators, fibers, end caps and large diameter wafers.

Thorlabs

Thorlabs manufactures both custom optics and full custom optical assemblies. Our QuickTurn&#; Optics capabilities for both optical lenses and full assemblies allow us to turn new ideas into reality within a fraction of typical industry lead times. At Thorlabs, we can help you tackle and solve complex optical design challenges and can transition a product seamlessly from early concept planning all the way to volume manufacturing.

Shanghai Optics

Shanghai Optics relies on over 55 years of design and manufacturing experience and advanced metrology to provide our customer with world-class lens design and manufacturing services. Our engineering team can provide various types of lens design and assembly, covering all aspects of imaging and illumination design, from LED to gas discharge lamp illumination system design, as well as the design of the overall opto-instrument components and customized optical modules.

Artifex Engineering

Artifex Engineering is an independent optics supplier with close relationships to several optical manufacturers. We have more than 20 years experience in precision optics applications and a solid understanding of the optical manufacturing process. We supply high quality industrial and medical optical components at extremely competitive B2B pricing, standard or customized. Please contact us to discuss your applications requirements. Visit our product page for more information. We look forward to your inquiry.

AMS Technologies

Off-the-shelf optics doesn&#;t match your project&#;s requirements, and you are looking for a customized solution? Together with our suppliers, the optics experts at AMS Techno­logies are happy to enable design and production of custom optics exactly tailored to your specifications. Our capabilities range from custom spherical or cylindrical optical lenses, prisms and beamsplitters, to optical windows, filters, mirrors, and custom freeform optics. Contact us now to discuss your customized optics solution in detail!

LASEROPTIK

LASEROPTIK does not only offer a large selection of from-stock optics, but also custom optics designed according to your specifications. You can send us your substrates or choose from the large LASEROPTIK substrate stock.

With our online portal named LOOP, you can configure and buy your laser optics online: choose your coating, select a substrate and create your own optic!

For urgent jobs, we offer LASEROPTIK EXPRESS, being able to produce many optics even within 24 hours.

If you are looking for more details, kindly visit Custom Spherical Lenses.

Sinoptix