Skip to main content

Here's how Nikon makes the glass inside your camera lens

The glass inside a camera lens determines everything from the image’s focus to flares — Nikon’s Nikkor lens division recently shared an inside look at how the lenses are made, or more specifically, how the glass inside those lenses is crafted.

The glass originates from the Kikari Glass Company in Akita, Japan, which is located on the northern end of Japan’s main island of Honshu. The area is known for its clean air and water — and for the hospitality of its people.

Recommended Videos

The Kikari glass plant is one of only a few facilities producing optical glass, according to the video, and one of even fewer that complete the entire process of crafting every optical element themselves. The Nikkor plant doesn’t just design lens glass — the company also designs and assembles the equipment that it uses to make the glass.

The engineers and craftsmen at the plant adhere to strict specifications to keep quality consistent from one Nikkor lens to the next. Even at the very first stage of creating the glass, any imperfections will become obvious errors in the final product, so the plant uses strict regulations and repeated quality checks at multiple stages of the process.

The refractive index, or the shape of the lens that determines exactly how the light passes through, plays a significant role in the function of the final product. At the Kikari plant, the refractive index is guaranteed down to six decimal points to achieve that accuracy across multiple lenses.

“We are always working to maintain quality through precise measurement and careful inspection so that all users of Nikkor lenses are able to capture the perfect moment,” said Akiko Kimura, a member of the production division at Kikari Glass.

Manufacturing conditions at every step of the process can also play a role in the final product, leading the team to collaborate along each step of the process, with the glass craftsmen working closely with the design engineers, for example.

The video is the sixth installment in the Philosophy of Nikkor series exploring the company’s lens division.

Hillary K. Grigonis
Hillary never planned on becoming a photographer—and then she was handed a camera at her first writing job and she's been…
Fujifilm’s new Instax mini 41 offers more instant-print fun
Fujifilm's Instax mini 41 instant-print camera.

Fujifilm has just dropped the latest addition to the Instax instant-print family of cameras. 

The Instax mini 41 is an update on the four-year-old Instax mini 40, bringing with it a sleeker look and new features to ensure you don’t waste a single sheet of the photographic paper that you pop in the back. 

Read more
Space station meets aurora in this stunning time-lapse video
An aurora as seen from the ISS.

In his final days aboard the International Space Station (ISS), NASA astronaut Don Pettit has shared a time-lapse video (below) showing the orbital outpost flying above cities at night before passing over a stunning aurora, shimmering in the darkness.  

https://x.com/astro_Pettit/status/1909841414713704577

Read more
The new Polaroid Flip comes with sonar autofocus
The Polaroid Flip camera, launched in April 2025.

Polaroid has just unveiled a new camera for some instant analog fun.

The Flip comes with fewer features than Polaroid's pricier I-2 model, but is more advanced than the Go, Polaroid's most basic instant camera -- so it could hit the sweet spot for some folks looking for such a device.

Read more