Il cromatismo dei prismi dipende, è vero, dall'accuratezza di lavorazione delle superfici, ma è comunque un effetto fisiologico anche se il prisma fosse perfetto. L'effetto finale in termini di colore spurio percepito dipende dall'obiettivo con cui viene usato:
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For common crowns, the p-v wavefront error of s.a. induced by a prism is closely approximated by 1.3t/F^4, in units of 550nm wavelength, for "t" the glass thickness and F the focal ratio number. For an f/5 system and 26mm glass thickness it gives 0.054 waves of overcorrection. How it will affect any particular system depends on its inherent correction. If it is perfect, you'll hardly notice antyhing. If it is, say, 1/8 wave p-v undercorrected, it will make it 1/14 wave. And if it is 1/8 wave overcorrected, it will make it 1/5.6 wave.
Focal shift of non-optimized wavelengths vs. green is closely approximated by it/2.3, with "i" being the index differential vs. green. In an achromat, it would bring the red C-line (i~-0.0044) slightly closer to the green, and push the blue F-line (i~0.0037) nearly as much farther away, without appreciable effect on the overall chromatic correction. Likewise, the violet end gets slightly more defocused (less than 15% in 80mm f/5 achromat, changing inversely to the FD product, D being the aperture diameter), and the deep red slightly better.
Prism diagonal can have appreciable effect on chromatic correction of small, fast apochromats, which depends on the optimum arrangement of spherochromatic curves. Whether the effect will be beneficial or detrimental depends, again, on the systems inherent state of correction.
per chi volesse approfondire su CN ci sono diverse discussioni in proposito.