is an Engraving Lens possible?

I've been looking into Laser lenses and I noticed with engraving lenses, they normally try to focus a smudge into a dot. I've also noticed the 445nm lasers produce a bar, rather than a dot.

Is it possible to turn that bar into a dot, even it its only got a range of a couple of millimeters? I'm just imagining a wedge shaped crystal squishing the bar into a tiny square, but I don't really know what I'm talking about.

If you have safety glasses that absorb 445, and I presume your yob laser is focusable, sit down somewhere say on a wood picnic table, put on your safety glasses and aim it at the the table and focus the beam in as best you can....$5 bucks says while looking through your glasses you'll see a faint square and a yellow burning dot the size of a pin tip.

Take a look at this thread:

http://laserpointerforums.com/f65/there-something-wrong-my-beam-spot-59400.html

What you're talking about are corrective optics. Is it doable... yes. Would you really want to spend a ton of money on it... I doubt it.

You can use an anamorphic prism pair to correct the beam, but it will cost you around 50$

Anamorphic Prism Pair

$50 isn't so bad, I think the hard part is getting someone who knows what they are doing to make a lens attachment out of it.

I've seen My Yob laser beam on the other side of ultra white printer paper - which doesn't burn at all, but you can see the tiny blue bar, it's about 3mm x 1mm in my rough estimation - I only have English rulers in this house. I would characterize it as smaller than most ants.

I understand it's supposed to be a bar and not a dot, which is why I was wondering if I could make it a dot, because I then might be able to do some wood burn design and stenciling. I suppose I can use it like a calligraphy brush right now, but I think It would be cool if I could do some pin point stuff on my leather work - like making my own brand or something.

It doesn't matter if it is a bar. The "bar" burns a "dot" into material.

Cyparagon has it right - the hole will start in the center, and will only then continue to fill out the whole "bar".

I am cnc wood engraving with a 445 @ 1.06 amps, and getting individual lines at 0.005 inch spacing. I have not tried to engrave closer yet as I am new to this and still experimenting with the cnc velocity.

Regards,
John