Optical Prisms

Right Angle Prism, N-BK7 Right Angle Prism, UV Fused Silica Uncoated Right Angle Prism Overview: Right-Angle Prisms can be used to deviate a light path by 90° or 180°, depending on which surface is used as the input for the light source. Due to total internal reflection (TIR), when the input light is incident on one of the prism's legs, it undergoes TIR at the glass/air boundary of the hypotenuse and exits via the other prism leg. This shows how the right-angle prism can be

Anamorphic Prism Pair, Converts Elliptical Beam to Circular Overview: An anamorphic prism pair is used to expand a laser beam in one dimension. This makes it ideal for converting the elliptical beam shape of laser diodes into a nearly circular one. An average throughput of 95% can be achieved if the prism pairs are oriented such that the incident light enters the prism pair at Brewster's angle and each surface has the appropriate AR coating for the wavelength of the incident

Penta Prism, 90 Degrees Deviation Prism, Right-Handed Image Prism Overview: A Penta Prism is a five-sided reflecting prism used to deviate a beam of light by a constant 90°, even if the entry beam is not at 90° to the prism. The beam reflects inside the prism twice, allowing the transmission of an image through a right angle without inverting it (that is, without changing the image's handedness) as an ordinary right-angle prism or mirror would. The reflections inside the

Wedge Prisms, Laser Beam Steering Prisms, Risley prisms Overview: Wedge prisms also known as Risley prisms are prisms with a small angle between the input and output surfaces. The wedge prisms deflect light toward its thicker portion through a beam deviation ranging from 1° to 10°. For a small angle α between the prism surfaces, the obtained beam deflection angle is approximately (n − 1) α, where n is the refractive index of the prism. For a typical glass prism, where the

Corner Cube Retroreflectors, Retroreflector Prisms, 180° Reflector Overview: Corner Cube Retroreflectors are designed to reflect any ray or beam entering the prism face, regardless of the orientation of the prism, back onto itself. The 180deg reflection is independent of entrance beam angle which makes it outstanding in the applications where precision alignment is impossible or time consuming. Corner Cube Retroreflectors are available with the dihedral surfaces either

Dove Prism, Rotating Image Overview: A Dove prism is used to rotate, invert, or retroreflect an image, depending upon the prism's rotation angle and the surface through which the light enters the prism. Image Rotation A beam of light travelling parallel to the longitudinal axis, entering one of the sloped faces of the prism undergoes total internal reflection from the inside of the longest (bottom) face and emerges from the opposite sloped face. Images passing through the

Brewster Prism, Brewster Angle Dispersing Prisms For Ultrashort Pulses Overview: Brewster Prism is one kind of Dispersing Prism. They are designed to have an apex angle such that a p-polarized ray incident at Brewster’s angle will pass through the prism parallel to the base at minimum deviation, and exit also at Brewster’s angle. In this case surface reflection losses are negligible. Brewster Prisms are often used in situations where surface reflection losses cannot be

Equilateral Prism, Dispersing Prisms, Wavelength Seperation Overview: Equilateral dispersing prisms have three equal length sides. They are used for wavelength separation applications such as refracting white light into a rainbow pattern effect. Depending on the material used equilateral dispersion prisms can be used over a wide range of wavelengths. We offer UV Fused silica prisms for use in the ultra-violet wavelength, N-BK7 and other high index materials like SF11 are used

Rhomboid Prism, Lateral Displacement Of Beam Overview: Rhomboid prisms are commonly used to displace a laser beam without changing its direction. In imaging applications, rhomboid prisms will displace the optical axis without inverting the image. The lateral displacement is equal to the length of the prism (specified by dimension D). Star Optic can offer high tolerance angles better than 5 arcseconds and total beam deviation that keep the output beam parallel to the input