What is ball lens?
Ball lenses are great optical components for improving signal coupling between fibers, emitters, and detectors. Ball lenses are manufactured from a single substrate of glass and can focus or collimate light, depending upon the geometry of the input source.
How are ball lenses made?
A Ball Lens consists of a highly transparent spherical ball, usually made of solid glass (fused silica) or another optical material with index of refraction less than 2. A single ball lens is used to couple a laser beam to an optical fiber, while two ball lenses are used to couple two optical fibers.
What are spherical lenses?
Spherical lenses—also sometimes referred to as singlets—are optical lenses that feature a spherical surface with a radius of curvature that is consistent across the entire lens. They are constructed such that the light entering them diverges or converges, depending on the lens design.
How does a spherical lens work?
A “spherical lens” is a lens whose surface has the shape of (part of) the surface of a sphere. With the lens opened wide the image is dominated by light passing through the lens far from the center; consequently, it’s the edge rays which you’ve adjusted the lens to bring to a sharp focus. …
What size lens ball is best?
80mm
An 80mm size is a good option for most photographers. The balls I’ve been photographing with are 100 or even 120mm in diameter. Those balls are weightier, which would put a lot of people off carrying them around. The image inside the larger balls is better in quality, though.
Can you use a lens ball with an iPhone?
When shooting be sure to have the focus on the ball so that the image is crisp. When using an iPhone, just tap your screen where the ball is to lock in focus.
What are the two types of spherical lenses?
Spherical lenses are of two types: Convex lens and Concave lens. Convex lenses are types of lenses that have thick central portions and thin periphery. Concave lenses are types of lenses that have thin central portions and thick periphery.
What is difference between cylindrical and spherical lens?
What’s the difference between Cylindrical Lenses and Spherical Lenses? Simply put, cylindrical lenses are made from a flat sheet of polycarbonate, and have a flattened look in the frame. Spherical lenses are a rounded lens for a 3D look .
What is the difference between anamorphic and spherical lenses?
Spherical lenses project images onto the sensor without affecting their aspect ratio. Anamorphic lenses, on the other hand, project a version of the image that is compressed along the longer dimension (usually by a factor of two).
Is the Lensball worth it?
Is the Lensball worth the extra cash? The Lensball case is useful, and the quality of glass also means the image in the ball will be crisper. The branding and support from the community of Lensball photographers are fantastic. But those with regular crystal balls can contribute to these groups as well.
Which Lensball is best?
The 80mm medium sized Lensball, in my opinion, is the best choice as it offers a big surface area for focus and isn’t too heavy or too small. But it’s your choice in the end as you might be a photographer and need a larger one or just using a phone so the smaller one might be best.
What are the applications of Ballball lenses?
Ball lenses are used particularly as beam collimators for optical fibers ( fiber collimators) and for fiber-to-fiber coupling. They are also suitable for miniature optics with applications like barcode scanning, as objective lenses in endoscopy and for optical sensors .
What is the best ball lens for laser-to-fiber coupling?
You would need an N-BK7 ball lens with a diameter greater than 6mm (≈ 2mm/0.33) to couple a 2mm laser source into a 0.22 NA fiber optic. One can easily try different indices of refraction in order to find the best ball lens for a laser-to-fiber coupling application.
What size ball lens do I need for a laser source?
The ball lens is placed at its back focal length from the fiber as shown in Figure 3. From Figure 2, the NA of an N-BK7 ball lens is about 0.22 for d/D ≈ 0.3 to 0.35. Equation 3 yields d/D ≈ 0.33 for NA = 0.22. You would need an N-BK7 ball lens with a diameter greater than 6mm (≈ 2mm/0.33) to couple a 2mm laser source into a 0.22 NA fiber optic.
What is the NA of a ball lens?
The NA of the ball lens must be less than or equal to the NA of the fiber optic in order to couple all of the light. The ball lens is placed at its back focal length from the fiber as shown in Figure 3. From Figure 2, the NA of an N-BK7 ball lens is about 0.22 for d/D ≈ 0.3 to 0.35.