The optics encyclopedia behind the canvas

Real-world physics and formulas for each component, paired with exactly how OpticalSetup models it — including where the simulation simplifies reality. Open any page straight into the live canvas.

Annotations

Figure frameSets the exact export crop on the canvas; its border and handles never appear in the exported figure. Beam probeReads the nearby traced beam without intercepting it, showing a selected spectrum, wavelength, power, polarization, pulse duration, or intensity-over-time view. HighlightAdds a coloured background region behind part of the setup, without affecting any rays. Text labelAdds formatted Markdown notes to the canvas, with headings, lists and clickable links.

Sources

CW LaserEmits a steady, collimated beam with a chosen wavelength and power, for tracing continuous illumination through an optical setup. Pulsed LaserEmits a train of short laser pulses with adjustable duration and repetition rate, for exploring bandwidth, dispersion, and arrival timing. Supercontinuum laserEmits a pulsed beam across a configurable spectral band, for exploring wavelength separation, filtering, and broadband illumination in one setup. LEDEmits a collimated beam of incoherent light with a single-colour or two-band white LED spectrum, for illumination, filtering, and colour separation. Point sourceEmits light in all directions with a monochromatic, broadband, or gas-discharge spectrum, for exploring collection and collimation by nearby optics. ObjectPlaces an arrow, letter, or tree as an imaging object, with an optional ray fan and computed paraxial image for lens demonstrations.

Mirrors

MirrorReflects light from a flat surface with adjustable size and reflectivity, for folding beam paths and controlling the power sent onward. Convex mirrorDiverges light from a real convex spherical surface, including its spherical aberration. Concave mirrorFocuses light from a real concave spherical surface, including its spherical aberration. Parabolic mirrorReflects light from an exact parabola, collimating a source at its focus without spherical aberration. Conic mirrorReflects from an exact conic surface — sphere, parabola, ellipse or hyperbola — with an optional real central opening. Galvo mirrorSteers reflected light with a fixed or animated mechanical mirror angle, for exploring scan geometry with a slowed preview at high drive frequencies. Polygon scannerTraces reflection from every facet of a rotating regular polygon. RetroreflectorReturns light antiparallel through a right-angle mirror pair, with optional translation that lengthens the round-trip optical path for mechanical delay demonstrations.

Lenses

Ideal lenses

Thin convex lensFocuses light with a positive thin-lens focal length, providing a simple paraxial model for collimation, image formation, and beam relays. Thin concave lensSpreads light with a negative thin-lens focal length, for exploring virtual foci, beam expansion, and the behavior of diverging optical systems. Conjugated thin lens pairCombines two thin lenses separated by their focal lengths, for changing beam diameter and comparing the geometry of afocal optical relays. ObjectiveFocuses light through an equivalent lens and pupil model, with adjustable working distance, numerical aperture, immersion medium, and generic objective presets.

Real lenses

Thick spherical lensRefracts light through two separated spherical or flat glass surfaces, exposing the effects of thickness, spherical aberration, chromatic focus, and dispersion. Lens groupTraces an editable sequence of glass surfaces and air gaps, for exploring compound lenses, achromatic doublets, aperture stops, and material dispersion. Aspheric lensRefracts light through conic and polynomial lens surfaces, so changing the surface shape directly changes ray intersections, focusing, and spherical aberration.

Metalenses

MetalensFocuses light through a flat phase-gradient model with adjustable efficiency, using either diffractive chromatic focusing or an idealized achromatic band.

Fibers

Optical fiberGuides light along a drawn path between connectorized ends, with configurable acceptance, propagation loss, group delay, and an output cone at each end. Bare fiberGuides light along a drawn path with exposed, flat-cleaved ends, using the same acceptance, loss, delay, and output controls as connectorized fiber.

Filters & Splitters

BeamsplitterDivides incident light into transmitted and reflected paths with an adjustable splitting ratio, for building beam pickoffs, interferometers, and parallel optical branches. FilterTransmits a selected wavelength band, blocks one band as a notch, or attenuates light as a neutral-density filter, to isolate spectral signals and control beam power. Dichroic mirrorSplits light by wavelength around an adjustable cutoff, transmitting one spectral region and reflecting another for excitation routing and emission collection. Etalon (Fabry–Pérot)Uses repeated reflections between closely spaced coatings to produce periodic transmission resonances, with angle tuning and configurable spectral resolution and free spectral range. VIPA (Virtually Imaged Phased Array)Produces spatially offset leakage beams through repeated reflections inside a tilted plate, providing a geometric model of the walk-off used in VIPA dispersers.

Dispersive elements

Freeform glassRefracts light through an editable outline of straight edges and circular arcs, with a constant refractive index or wavelength-dependent catalogue glass. Diffraction gratingSeparates light into selected diffraction orders using the grating equation, with adjustable groove density, order efficiency, and a choice of spectral illumination. PrismRefracts light at its triangular glass boundaries, separating wavelengths through material dispersion and adding pulse dispersion according to the traced path. DiffuserSpreads incident light into an adjustable angular fan, a qualitative model for comparing illumination coverage and the light collected downstream. Glass rodRefracts light through a glass rod with adjustable dimensions and material, including total internal reflection and pulse dispersion along the traced path.

Polarization

PolarizerSelects a linear polarization direction and attenuates light according to its input state, for exploring Malus’s law and polarization-dependent optical transmission. Half-wave plateApplies half-wave retardance around an adjustable fast axis, for rotating linear polarization and controlling how light divides at a polarizing beamsplitter. Quarter-wave plateApplies quarter-wave retardance around an adjustable fast axis, for converting input polarization between linear, elliptical, and circular states in an optical setup. Polarizing beamsplitterSeparates orthogonal polarizations of light into transmitted and reflected beams. Optical isolatorPasses light along its forward direction and blocks reverse propagation, providing an idealized way to isolate a source from returning optical paths.

Beam Block

SlitPasses light through an adjustable gap and blocks everything outside it. Beam dumpAbsorbs any light that reaches it, terminating an unwanted beam. Invisible blockerStops rays inside an adjustable rectangular region while remaining hidden in exported figures, for controlling beam endpoints without adding visible hardware.

Wavefront Shaping

Spatial light modulatorReflects light through configurable lens-array, grating, steering, and speckle functions, offering a qualitative model of spatial wavefront shaping and beam routing. MetasurfaceTransmits light through a patterned layer with lens-array, grating, steering, or speckle functions, representing a fixed optical pattern with optional zero-order light. Digital micromirror deviceRoutes light through a configurable binary micromirror pattern into ON and optional OFF orders, for exploring spatial switching and reflected beam selection. Deformable mirrorReflects light with adjustable tip, tilt, and paraxial defocus, providing a simple model for steering a beam and changing its wavefront curvature.

Detectors

PhotodetectorMeasures the relative intensity of light reaching its active surface. CameraRecords a one-dimensional intensity profile across its pixels, including interference from coherent beams. Photomultiplier (PMT)Amplifies weak incident light with adjustable gain, dark floor, and saturation, for exploring qualitative signal, noise floor and saturation in fluorescence and other low-light setups. Power meterReports optical power from the configured source watts and traced losses, for comparing how filters, splitters, and apertures affect power at the sensor. Wavefront detectorEstimates beam convergence from ray angle versus position, reporting whether light is collimated, converging, or diverging and the corresponding full cone angle. PolarimeterReports the polarization of arriving light using normalized Stokes parameters and a visual state display, for comparing linear, elliptical, circular, and unpolarized illumination. SpectrometerReports the wavelength range, centre wavelength, and bandwidth of arriving light, with a plotted spectrum for comparing sources and spectral filtering. AutocorrelatorCalculates an intensity autocorrelation and infers pulse duration using a selected pulse-shape assumption, for examining temporal broadening and the limits of duration estimates. General detectorCollects light at one sensor face and reports multiple beam properties, combining power, spectrum, polarization, wavefront, and pulse information in one instrument. Detector screenShows the live readings of a linked detector on the canvas, with sensor-specific views and a data cable that never changes optical propagation. Human eyeFocuses light through an adjustable pupil onto a modeled retina, for exploring how focal length and pupil size change the detected spot.

Modulators

ChopperPeriodically interrupts light with an adjustable frequency and duty cycle, showing gated pulse trains and a schematic chopped pattern for continuous beams.

Acousto-optic

Acousto-optic modulator (AOM)Deflects light into a first diffraction order with adjustable efficiency, optional zero order, and square, sine, or sawtooth modulation of the drive. Acousto-optic deflector (AOD)Steers diffracted light through a fixed or swept angle with wavelength-dependent deflection, for exploring angular scanning and optional zero-order beam routing. Acousto-optic tunable filterSelects spectral lines from incoming light, either simultaneously or sequentially, and routes the remaining spectrum toward a separately configurable deflected output.

Electro-optic

Electro-optic modulator (EOM)Changes polarization through voltage-controlled retardance, held fixed or switched periodically, so a downstream analyzer can convert the change into intensity modulation. Phase modulatorChanges optical path without changing polarization, making a driven phase shift visible as intensity modulation when placed in a supported interferometer.

Pulse Timing

Mechanical delay lineAdds an adjustable optical path to delay pulses, keeping the outgoing beam on its axis. Pulse CompressorAdds positive or negative group-delay dispersion to a pulse, shortening it when the correction cancels dispersion accumulated earlier in the setup.

Nonlinear Optics

CrystalConverts a chosen fraction of incident light into harmonic, parametric, mixed, supercontinuum, or custom output, with an option to retain the residual pump. OPOAn optical parametric oscillator packaged like a laser: a pump beam goes in at the back, a tunable signal and an optional idler come out of the front. OPAA seeded optical parametric amplifier in a box: a pump and a seed go in, the amplified signal, a new idler and the leftover pump come out.

Specimens

SampleRepresents an illuminated specimen with configurable transmission and stacked signal channels, including two-beam signals that appear only while both pulses reach the spot together. Sample on piezo stageMoves a mounted sample through static, lateral, depth or raster scans, and can record writing in resin. Phase objectAdds optical path across part of a beam without deflecting it, creating a spatial phase pattern that a supported interferometer can reveal.

Custom

Custom boxDraws a labelled enclosure that either blocks beams or lets them pass through.

Lab elements

Gas cellDraws a gas-cell housing for laboratory context, without any optical effect on the beam. Optical windowDraws an optical window as laboratory hardware, without any optical effect on the beam.