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In this article, a Shack–Hartmann wavefront sensor is combined with a mechatronic positioning system to overcome the limited dynamic range of the Shack–Hartmann sensor (SHS) by repositioning and reorienting the SHS. Feedback loops to ensure a tangential orientation of the wavefront sensor in every measurement position and a measurement strategy that compensates for tip and tilt between wavefront and sensor are described and implemented. A framework that estimates the admissible measurement trajectories by relating the positioning errors caused by misalignments of the stages to the parameters of the wavefront sensor is developed. It is demonstrated that the setup is capable of directly measuring a highly divergent optical wavefront by combining wavefront data and positioning data acquired along the wavefront generated by a microscope objective with numerical aperture (NA) of 0.45. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]