An apparatus and method for the three-dimensional representation of scenes comprising an illumination device and a spatial light modulation device for modulating incident light. A hologram is encoded into the spatial light modulation device and the hologram is composed of individual sub-holograms, in which an object point of an object of the scene to be reconstructed by the hologram is encoded in each case. The spatial light modulation device is illuminated with substantially coherent light by the illumination device in at least one illumination section. An amplitude distribution and a phase distribution for representing the scene and amplitude values and phase values derived therefrom are determined for encoding the spatial light modulation device. The amplitude of the light incident on the spatial light modulation device in the respective illumination section is set based on at least one parameter at least determined from the amplitude values in this illumination section.