A tunable liquid crystal (LC) device includes an LC layer between a pair of reflectors forming an optical cavity. The reflectors include conductive layers for applying an electrical signal to the LC layer. One of the conductive layers may include an array of conductive pixels for spatially selective control of the effective refractive index of the LC layer. The phase delay introduced by the LC layer may be greatly increased or magnified by placing the LC layer into the optical cavity. This enables a substantial reduction of the LC layer thickness, which in its turn enables very tight pitches of the LC pixels, with a reduced inter-pixel crosstalk caused by fringing electric fields, as well as faster switching times. A tight-pitch, fast LC device may be used as a configurable hologram or a spatial light modulator.

There is disclosed herein an image projector arranged to project an image onto a display plane. The image projector comprises a processing engine, a display device, an optical element and a light source. The processing engine is arranged to output a computer-generated diffractive pattern comprising a hologram of an image for projection and a lens function corresponding to a lens having a first optical power. The display device is arranged to display the computer-generated diffractive pattern. The optical element is disposed between the display device to the display plane. The optical element has second optical power. The light source is arranged to provide off-axis illumination of the display device in order to spatially-modulated light in accordance with the hologram and lens function. The lens function of the computer-generated diffractive pattern and the optical element collectively perform a hologram transform of the hologram such that a reconstruction of the image is formed on the display plane. The display device is tilted with respect to the optical element by a first angle greater than zero. The display plane is tilted with respect to the optical element by a second angle greater than zero. The second angle is less than the first angle.

The invention relates to a display device, in particular a head-mounted display or a head-up display, for representing a two-dimensional and/or three-dimensional scene. The display device comprises a spatial light modulator device having pixels, and a beam offset device. The spatial light modulator device is illuminatable with light. The beam offset device is configured to be controllable in such a way that the light modulated by the pixels of the spatial light modulator device is laterally displaceable by less than one pixel extent.

There is provided a head-up display having an eye-box comprising a driver monitoring system, picture generating unit and optical system. The driver monitoring system is arranged to illuminate and monitor a driver. The driver monitoring system comprises a first display channel. The picture generating unit is arranged to display a picture on a replay plane. The picture generating unit comprises a second display channel Each display channel comprises a light source, spatial light modulator and controller. Each light source is arranged to emit light. Each spatial light modulator is arranged to receive light from the respective light source and output spatially-modulated light in accordance with a computer-generated hologram displayed on the spatial light modulator to form a respective light pattern on the replay plane. Each controller is arranged to output the computer-generated hologram to the spatial light modulator. The optical system is arranged to relay each light pattern from the replay plane. The optical system comprises an input, output and at least one mirror. The input is arranged to receive light of each light pattern. The output is arranged to output light of each light pattern. The at least one mirror is arranged to guide light from the input to the output along an optical path. The light pattern formed by the first display channel is an infrared light pattern. Each light pattern is a holographic reconstruction.

A method for rendering a light field comprises projecting rays from a viewpoint positioned at a first side of a spatial light modulator (SLM) to a clipping plane positioned at an opposing side of the SLM to form an elemental view frustum within a three-dimensional scene and rendering objects within the elemental view frustum to generate components of a first elemental image for the first elemental region. The SLM may include a tiled array of non-overlapping elemental regions and a top edge and a bottom edge of a first elemental region of the non-overlapping elemental regions are intersected by the rays to form the elemental view frustum. Furthermore, the light field may include the first elemental image and additional elemental images corresponding to the array of elemental regions and each one of the additional elemental images is rendered using an additional elemental view frustum.

An exposure device for recording a hologram. The exposure device includes at least one modulation unit, which is designed to generate a modulation beam representing a reference beam and/or an object beam by impressing a modulation representing at least one holographic element of the hologram onto a laser beam. The exposure device also includes at least one reduction unit, which is designed to generate a modified modulation beam using the modulation beam, the modified modulation beam having a smaller beam diameter than the modulation beam. The exposure device further includes at least one objective lens unit, which is designed to direct the modified modulation beam through an immersion medium onto a recording material in order to record the hologram by exposing the recording material to the modified modulation beam.

A phase modulation data generating unit according to the present disclosure includes: a first calculating section; and a storage section. The first calculating section calculates basic phase modulation pattern data on the basis of a partial illumination image pattern that makes it possible to generate an intended illumination image pattern having a desired luminance distribution. The basic phase modulation pattern data makes it possible for a light phase modulation device to reconstruct the partial illumination image pattern. The storage section stores the basic phase modulation pattern data calculated by the first calculating section.

The invention relates to a light modulation device for a display for representing two- and/or three-dimensional image content or image sequences. The light modulation device comprises a light modulator and a controller. The phase and/or the amplitude of a light wave field, which is substantially collimated, can be varied by means of the light modulator depending on the location of the light modulator. The light modulator can be actuated by means of the control device. According to the invention, in the direction of propagation of the light wave field, at least one diffracting unit is arranged downstream of the light modulator. The diffracting unit has a variable diffracting structure. By means of the diffracting structure, the light wave field varied by the light modulator can be diffracted in a variable and predeterminable manner. Further, the present invention relates to a display and a method for producing a light modulation device.

A spatial light modulator (SLM) includes a first liquid crystal panel and a second liquid crystal panel that are oppositely configured, and a polarization adjustment part configured between the first liquid crystal panel and the second liquid crystal panel. An alignment direction of the first liquid crystal panel is parallel to an alignment direction of the second liquid crystal panel. The first liquid crystal panel is configured to perform a phase modulation on incident linear-polarized light. The polarization adjustment part is configured to rotate, by a preset angle, a polarization direction of linear-polarized light exited from the first liquid crystal panel. The second liquid crystal panel is configured to adjust a polarization state of linear-polarized light exited from the polarization adjustment part to adjust an amplitude of exited light.

An optical system includes a plurality of internal apertures, a plurality of external optical assemblies and a telescope assembly positioned between the plurality of internal apertures and the plurality of external optical assemblies. Each internal aperture is operable to receive a corresponding aperture-specific optical signal. Each external optical assembly corresponds to one of the internal apertures, and each external optical assembly is operable to direct the aperture-specific optical signal of the corresponding internal aperture in a corresponding external direction. The external direction for each external optical assembly is independently controllable and the telescope assembly defines a shared optical train arranged to direct the aperture-specific optical signals between each internal aperture and the corresponding external optical assembly.