Patent ID: 6934014

Claim:
An apparatus having at least one light source which has or have a number of individual light sources, and having an optical arrangement, which, by superimposition, produces a focused working beam with a high area coverage from the emitted beams from the individual light sources, with at least two individual light sources having an emission area with axes which are of different length and are at right angles to one another, wherein a) at least two individual light sources form at least one individual light source group which is arranged coaxially with respect to the optical axis of an astigmatic optical element to which the emitted beams from the individual light sources are applied, with b) in each case one axis of the emission area of an individual light source being located on a meridional plane, which is defined by the center point of the emission area of the astigmatic optical element, and the other axis of the emission area being located on the corresponding sagittal plane of the astigmatic optical element, c) and in that the astigmatic optical element has different imaging characteristics in the meridional and sagittal planes which are associated with the emission areas of the respective individual light sources, such that each emitted beam from the individual light sources has a cross-sectional area with axes of essentially the same length in the beam path downstream from the astigmatic optical element in at least one compensating plane which is at right angles to the optical axis of the astigmatic optical element, and d) all the emitted beams are guided by beam-guiding components in a working plane which is formed either by the compensating plane or by an imaging plane which is common to all the focused beams.