Accurate polarimeter with multicapture fitting for plastic lens evaluation

Due to their manufacturing process, plastic injection molded lenses do not achieve a constant density throughout their volume. This change of density introduces tensions in the material, inducing local birefringence, which in turn is translated into a variation of the ordinary and extraordinary refractive indices that can be expressed as a retardation phase plane using the Jones matrix notation. The detection and measurement of the value of the retardation of the phase plane are therefore very useful ways to evaluate the quality of plastic lenses. We introduce a polariscopic device to obtain two-dimensional maps of the tension distribution in the bulk of a lens, based on detection of the local birefringence. In addition to a description of the device and the mathematical approach used, a set of initial measurements is presented that confirms the validity of the developed system for the testing of the uniformity of plastic lenses. (C) 2016 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE)