Free Optics Simulation Programs

Question

I'm having an extremely difficult time finding an optics program that is easy to use and offers accurate physics simulations. I'm not asking for much, I just want to be able to simulate a laser going through a beam splitter and then be able to drag and drop mirrors and angle them to be able to see where the laser beams end up. I want to intersect two laser beams that underwent beam splitting and redirect the beams...

Does anyone know of any free software that can do this?

Answer 1

For record: It looks like this topic really interests some people: http://markmail.org/message/nic7xrgf5uzed5c4

Newport was obviously thinking in the same direction: http://www.newport.com/content/default.aspx?id=880. However I think it's not exactly what you need.

Having background in both optical engineering and experimental optics, I can say that real experiments and setups are usually designed with a piece of paper if they are simple or with the professional software if they are not. Real systems very quickly stop being a bunch of mirrors. This is, probably, why nobody is seriously considering creation of such a tool.

In labs, we are usually trying to align all beams parallel or under 90 degrees to each other---not only for ease of work but also because otherwise polarisation effects start being a problem.

Answer 2

There is OSLO - it's free (educational for a limited number of surfaces)

But like all optical design software it's not like playing with LEGO blocks, you have to know a fair amount about optics to enter surfaces and interpret the results.

I don't know of a drag-drop simple optics design package - the problem is that anyone who needs one generally needs the detail.