An ophthalmic surgical system for treating eye tissue including cutting an eye's lens capsule and segmenting a lens nucleus and lens cortex within the lens capsule; the system comprising: a light source (10, LS) for generating a beam of light, a delivery system for focusing the beam onto the eye tissue, an image device for generating an image of the eye tissue including the lens capsule, lens cortex and lens nucleus from which a target portion of the eye tissue can be identified, and a controller for controlling the light source and the delivery system such that the light beam is focused at multiple focal points in the eye tissue at multiple depths within the eye tissue, wherein the light source includes a laser generating a beam of short pulsed laser light to be focused into the eye tissue to produce dielectric breakdown at the focal point, and the delivery system includes at least one moving optical element under the control of the controller for deflecting the light beam in a pattern and for changing the depths of the focal points in the eye tissue; the image device includes an optical coherence tomography device; and the controller is adapted to determine parameters including the upper and lower axial limits of the focal planes for cutting the lens capsule and segmentation of the lens cortex and lens nucleus based on the generated image of the eye tissue, and is adapted to cause the scanning of the pattern to occur at the identified target portion of the eye tissue such that the light beam is focused at multiple focal points in the eye tissue at multiple depths within the eye tissue to segment the lens cortex and the lens nucleus into fragments and cut the lens capsule. a light source (10, LS) for generating a beam of light, a delivery system for focusing the beam onto the eye tissue, an image device for generating an image of the eye tissue including the lens capsule, lens cortex and lens nucleus from which a target portion of the eye tissue can be identified, and a controller for controlling the light source and the delivery system such that the light beam is focused at multiple focal points in the eye tissue at multiple depths within the eye tissue, wherein the light source includes a laser generating a beam of short pulsed laser light to be focused into the eye tissue to produce dielectric breakdown at the focal point, and the delivery system includes at least one moving optical element under the control of the controller for deflecting the light beam in a pattern and for changing the depths of the focal points in the eye tissue; the image device includes an optical coherence tomography device; and the controller is adapted to determine parameters including the upper and lower axial limits of the focal planes for cutting the lens capsule and segmentation of the lens cortex and lens nucleus based on the generated image of the eye tissue, and is adapted to cause the scanning of the pattern to occur at the identified target portion of the eye tissue such that the light beam is focused at multiple focal points in the eye tissue at multiple depths within the eye tissue to segment the lens cortex and the lens nucleus into fragments and cut the lens capsule.