Patent ID: 7903333

Claim:
A method for manufacturing an optical system, the method comprising: a) making polarization optical measurements of an optical subsystem to produce polarization optical measurement data; and b) manufacturing, based on the polarization optical measurement data, a polarization-modulating optical element, the polarization-modulating optical element causing, for light passing through the polarization-modulating element and due to stress-induced birefringence of the polarization-modulating optical element, a distribution of retardation between orthogonal states of polarization, the method of manufacturing the polarization-modulating optical element comprising: joining a non-plane surface of a first component with a plane surface of a second component to produce a mechanical stress that causes the stress-induced birefringence of the polarization-modulating optical element; and c) inserting the polarization-modulating optical element into the beam path of the subsystem such that a disturbance of the distribution of polarization in the subsystem which has been determined in a) is at least partially compensated by the polarization-modulating optical element, further comprising, prior to joining: calculating a height profile of the first component in order to obtain a predefined distribution of retardation; and forming the defined height profile on the first component.