After seeing the "lumographic lens" video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oiDqUkmozlM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oiDqUkmozlM) I managed to dig up some int

After seeing the "lumographic lens" video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oiDqUkmozlM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oiDqUkmozlM) I managed to dig up some interesting research on what is basically a method of milling a "lens" to project an image at an arbitrary focal point using light convergence for "white" and divergence for "dark. https://cdfg.mit.edu/publications/fabricating-microgeometry-custom-surface-reflectance https://cdfg.mit.edu/publications/fabricating-microgeometry-... https://cdfg.mit.edu/publications/goal-based-caustics https://cdfg.mit.edu/publications/goal-based-caustics https://cs.dartmouth.edu/~wjarosz/publications/papas11goal.mp4 https://cs.dartmouth.edu/~wjarosz/publications/papas11goal.m... https://cdfg.mit.edu/publications/ https://cdfg.mit.edu/publications/ in general has a considerable amount of interesting publications regarding computational design and fabrication of neat optical effects. As does https://web.archive.org/web/20140623052716/http://lgg.epfl.ch/caustics/ https://web.archive.org/web/20140623052716/http://lgg.epfl.c... >Caustics are captivating light patterns created by materials bundling or diverting light by refraction or reflection. We know caustics as random side effects, appearing, for example, at the bottom of a swimming pool. In this work we show that it is possible to control caustic patterns to form almost any desired shape by optimizing the geometry of the reflective or refractive surface generating the caustic. We demonstrate how this surprising result offers a new perspective on light control and the use of caustics as an inspiring design element. Several produced prototypes illustrate that physical realizations of such optimized geometry are feasible. Now redirects to https://www.epfl.ch/labs/gcm/publications/ https://www.epfl.ch/labs/gcm/publications/