What Is Comatic Aberration?
In Optics, the Coma, or Comatic Aberration, in an Optical System Refers to Aberration Inherent to Certain Optical Designs or Due to Imperfection in the Lens or...
In optics, the coma, or comatic aberration, in an optical system refers to aberration inherent to certain optical designs or due to imperfection in the lens or other components that results in off-axis point sources such as stars appearing distorted, appearing to have a tail like a comet.
What causes comatic aberration?
The distinct shape displayed by images with comatic aberration is a result of refraction differences by light rays passing through the various lens zones as the incident angle increases.
How do you fix comatic aberration?
Stopping down the lens allows aperture blades to block light rays coming from the outer edges of spherical lenses, which essentially reduces comatic aberration. For example, if a lens shows heavy coma at f/1.4, stopping down the lens to something like f/2.0 or f/2.8 can dramatically improve its coma performance.
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