Background
Hugo Adolf Steinheil was born on April 12, 1832, in Munich, Bayern, Germany.
Hugo Adolf Steinheil was born on April 12, 1832, in Munich, Bayern, Germany.
Along with his father, Hugo Steinheil helped establish the Optical Workshop of C. A. v. Steinheil in Munich in 1855, later known as C. A. Steinheil & Söhne. For ten years the business was devoted chiefly to astronomical optics, but in 1865 Carl and Hugo patented a distortion-free symmetrical Periskop objective (lens) for photographic use.
The younger Steinheil constructed an achromatic rectilinear Aplanat objective lens in 1866 and in that year took over the company from his father. He also constructed a wide-angle lens for cartographic work (1871), an Aplanat for celestial photography (1872), and an Antiplanat (1881).