In this paper, a novel optical device for measuring the deformation of liquid free surface, is presented. The device employs a laser beam, which can be focused on any chosen location on the free surface, The key measurement is of the intensity of the beam reflected from a location on the free surface where the deformation exhibits a local extremum, The optics of the device is so designed its to measure a maximum intensity when the distance between the focusing lens and the selected point on the free surface is equal to the focal length, thus enabling a height measurement. The device is tested in ferrofluid pools where the height of the spikes of the normal field instability is measured. The simplicity of the suggested technique enables the fabrication of a quite cheap device for measuring surface deformation of nontransparent liquids, which provides good accuracy and reproducibility. (c) 2005 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.