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Analytical approximation for standard ray-tracing textures

Open phoebe-p opened this issue 1 year ago • 0 comments

For common surfaces such as (obviously) a planar surface, regular pyramids, or V-grooves, the possible ray paths are limited, specifically at normal incidence but even at small non-normal angles of incidence. Using TMM calculations with local angles of incidences for the different faces in the surface is much faster than ray-tracing and for many cases will be just as accurate, or give a good approximation for e.g. optimising anti-reflection coatings. This could be implemented for internal surfaces as well, but would be most relevant for the front surface, since there is usually a range of wavelengths where light does not reach the back surface at all.

To do:

  • [ ] Add functions for (semi-)analytical ray-tracing
  • [ ] Add relevant user options for controlling this behaviour
  • [ ] Add tests
  • [ ] Add documentation, specifying for which interfaces this method has been checked and is accurate (depending on angle of incidence!)
  • [ ] Quantify when this is a good substitute for Monte-Carlo ray-tracing simulations

phoebe-p avatar Jan 28 '24 23:01 phoebe-p