Tech Notes

HOW TO SET UP A SEQUENCE OF OPTICAL AXES

               HOW TO SET UP A SEQUENCE OF OPTICAL AXES
                            (c) 2015      M.Lampton
                               STELLAR SOFTWARE
 

    The easy way is to use coordinate breaks.  A "CB" is a pair of
    plano surfaces in in your optical system, named CBin and CBout.
    The job of CBin is to interrupt the ray trace and capture the
    local coordinates {x,y,z,u,v,w} of each ray.   The job of CBout
    is to restart the ray trace at its surface, using the coordinates
    that were captured by CBin.

ROTATION SEQUENCES AND EULER ANGLES

                   ROTATION SEQUENCES AND EULER ANGLES
                        (c) 1993, 2009  M.Lampton
                             STELLAR SOFTWARE

     The orientation of an object in three dimensions can be
     described an a variety of ways.  One such description as
     follows: take an arbitrary point P that is not the origin, and
     write its coordinates (x,y,z) in a frame of reference fixed in
     the object.  Also, write its coordinates (X,Y,Z) in a lab frame
     of coordinates having the same center.  The matrix M that