THE CONCISE MACLEOD
The Concise Macleod contains a subset of the tools in the Core of the Essential Macleod. It is intended largely for those users who wish to verify coating design performance rather than actively design coatings or for those who are studying the subject and need a calculation tool to back up what they learn from the literature. It considers just one surface of a semi-infinite substrate on which can be deposited an optical coating. The Concise Macleod shares its file formats, materials, style and appearance with the Essential Macleod. The two programs are completely compatible.
Features
Price: $700 (download edition)
Runs on Microsoft Windows 11 and 10 (both 64 bit and 32 bit).
Appearance
Has a true Multiple Document Interface following precisely the recommended practice for Windows programs. Its appearance is exactly that of the Essential Macleod.
Performance Calculations
The Concise Macleod provides a comprehensive set of performance calculations. In addition to the usual Reflectance and Transmittance calculations, the package also includes Density, Absorptance, Ellipsometric parameters, Ultrafast parameters (Group Delay, Group Delay Dispersion, Third Order Dispersion). Color calculations are also available. Tolerancing calculations judge the sensitivity of a design to minor thickness changes.
Color Calculations
Color calculations are provided for the most popular color spaces. A selection of sources is pre-defined, and the user may define others as necessary. The CIE 1931 and 1964 color matching functions are included, but, again, any others may be user defined. Color parameters may also be specified as targets for refinement. Color parameters can be calculated for imported transmittance or reflectance data as a function of wavelength.
Refinement
The Concise Macleod is supplied with the fast and stable Nonlinear Simplex refinement technique. This well-proven rapidly reaches very satisfactory performance for thin-film coatings. Refinement targets may be defined in terms of any of the calculated performance parameters including color. Target linking allows more complex merit functions. Layers in the design may be locked so that they are not changed during refinement. Refinement may be in terms of layer thickness, material packing density, or both.
User Defined Units
Units can often be a problem for users, but not in the Concise Macleod where virtually any consistent set of units for the independent variables may be used. Electron-volts or Gigahertz or wavenumbers for frequency and Angstroms or nanometres or microns or even micro-inches for wavelength are possible. Changing from one unit system to another is simple.
Adaptive Plotting
The Concise Macleod features adaptive plotting for performance calculations. This automatically adjusts the plotting interval so that fringes are faithfully followed. The magnitude of the fringes would be lost without the adaptive plotting process. Plot features are completely editable. Plot templates can change the style of the plot from display to publication to report with a few mouse clicks. Plots can be readily exported, either through the clip board in various formats, or as jpegs or in the form of numerical data.
Active Plots
Active plots are also available in the Concise Macleod. Active plots immediately adjust themselves to show the effect of changes in design parameters so that the effect of, for example, a gradual change in the packing density of a particular layer, or a change in angle of incidence, can be easily followed.
Tolerancing
Tolerances can be assessed by introducing he Concise Macleod's tolerancing capability allows you to investigate the sensitivity of a design to manufacturing errors. Alternative designs may be compared and the best design selected. Although designs may be similar, their sensitivity to errors may not and this will be shown up by the tolerancing feature.
Materials
Real materials exhibit dispersion of their optical constants, that is the optical constants vary with wavelength. Realistic calculations of properties must include such variations. Each material is stored as a table of refractive index and extinction coefficient values as a function of wavelength. This permits any dispersion to be modeled. Powerful editing tools including spline interpolation are provided together with import/export facilities that are easy to use.

Material behavior is not always ideal and optical constants often depend on the particular coating machine and on the deposition parameters. Operating conditions also affect material properties. For example, the operating performance of a cooled infra-red filter may be substantially different from its performance at room temperature. Multiple materials databases are therefore provided. Designs may easily be moved from one materials database to another facilitating the investigation of temperature and coating machine effects. Multiple materials databases have other advantages. For example, they permit materials data belonging to a client to be completely isolated and protected.
Admittance Diagrams
Admittance diagrams help in understanding how a design works. They can be looked on as a complete visual record of the way in which the various layers build the performance of a coating by transforming the admittance, or the complex amplitude coefficient, from the rear through to the front of the system.
Importing and Exporting Data
The clipboard is fully supported for importing and exporting data and is the recommended method for sharing data with other applications. Many other techniques are available. There are also special facilities for certain designated applications for optical design including ZEMAX, Code V, and FRED.
Limits
There are virtually no limits to parameters such as the number of layers in a design and the number of wavelength points in a material except the inherent capacity of the computer and the patience of the user.
Ordering Information

All products and services may be ordered directly from Thin Film Center or from any of our agents. For your convenience we accept payment by American Express, Mastercard and Visa. Please contact us, or our agents for pricing information.

Thin Film Center Inc
2745 E Via Rotunda, Tucson, AZ
85716-5227, USA
Telephone: +1 520 322 6171
Email: info@thinfilmcenter.com