A liquid crystal display (LCD) device including a circular backlight that illuminates an LCD panel. The backlight is disposed behind the LCD panel and includes a light guide and an array of light emitting diodes (LEDs). The light guide includes a circular top surface, a circular bottom surface, and a connecting surface between the top and bottom surface. The array of LEDs are disposed along the connecting side surface of the light guide in a circular arrangement to emit light into in first directions toward a center of the light guide. The light guide receives the light from the array of LEDs in the first directions and directs the light in a second direction toward the LCD panel from the circular top surface. The backlight can include brightness enhancement films (BEFS), such as first BEF having concentric circular stripe prisms, and a second BEF having radial stripe prisms.

A liquid crystal display (LCD) device including a circular backlight that illuminates an LCD panel. The backlight is disposed behind the LCD panel and includes a light guide and an array of light emitting diodes (LEDs). The light guide includes a circular top surface, a circular bottom surface, and a connecting surface between the top and bottom surface. The array of LEDs are disposed along the connecting side surface of the light guide in a circular arrangement to emit light into in first directions toward a center of the light guide. The light guide receives the light from the array of LEDs in the first directions and directs the light in a second direction toward the LCD panel from the circular top surface. The backlight can include brightness enhancement films (BEFS), such as first BEF having concentric circular stripe prisms, and a second BEF having radial stripe prisms.

The invention provides an LCD device, whose polarizers comprising: a plurality of polarizing units disposed corresponding to the first, second and third sub-pixels and arranged in an array; each polarizing unit being a multilayer film structure, comprising a transparent body, and a plurality of first film layers and a plurality of second film layers interleaved into a stack disposed on the body. By achieving polarization through multilayer film structure and each polarizing unit only needing to satisfy polarization conditions for light of the wavelength range of light emitted by corresponding sub-pixel, the invention can reduce material selection difficulty and production difficult for multilayer structure and improve LCD contrast.

A hybrid polarizer includes an absorbing element having a first major surface and a second major surface. The hybrid polarizer also includes a first birefringent reflective polarizer disposed on the first major surface of the absorbing element, the first birefringent reflective polarizer having a first pass axis and a first block axis. The hybrid polarizer further includes a second birefringent reflective polarizer disposed on the second major surface of the absorbing element, the second reflective polarizer having a second pass axis and a second block axis.

A hybrid polarizer includes an absorbing element having a first major surface and a second major surface. The hybrid polarizer also includes a first birefringent reflective polarizer disposed on the first major surface of the absorbing element, the first birefringent reflective polarizer having a first pass axis and a first block axis. The hybrid polarizer further includes a second birefringent reflective polarizer disposed on the second major surface of the absorbing element, the second reflective polarizer having a second pass axis and a second block axis.

A polarizer includes a first laminated structure having a first layer with a first refractive index and a second layer with a second refractive index, wherein the first and second refractive indices are different from each other. A buffer layer is disposed on the first laminated structure. A second laminated structure in the polarizer has a third layer with a third refractive index and a fourth layer with a fourth refractive index, wherein the third and fourth refractive indices are different from each other.

The invention provides an LCD device, with both the upper polarizer and the lower polarizer having a multi-layer film structure, and comprising a plurality of stacked polarizing film units, with each comprising at least two layers of material films with different refraction index. The backlight module emits light to shine onto the upper and lower polarizers at a tilt angle, and the light is reflected and refracted a plurality of times at the interfaces inside the multi-layer film structure, and the S-polarized light and P-polarized light are separated completely to form linearly polarized light. Only the P-polarized light can pass. Compared to the conventional absorbing polymer polarizer, the upper and lower polarizers use a multi-layer film structure and the backlight module emitting light at a specific angle, so that the upper and lower polarizers provide high temperature stability, high humidity stability and high reliability, and simple to manufacture.

A hybrid polarizer includes an absorbing element having a first major surface and a second major surface. The hybrid polarizer also includes a first birefringent reflective polarizer disposed on the first major surface of the absorbing element, the first birefringent reflective polarizer having a first pass axis and a first block axis. The hybrid polarizer further includes a second birefringent reflective polarizer disposed on the second major surface of the absorbing element, the second reflective polarizer having a second pass axis and a second block axis.

A coextruded multilayered thermoplastic article including: a first layer with a first surface texture, wherein the first layer comprises a first transparent thermoplastic polymer having a first stress optical coefficient (C.sub.m1) measured at 20 C. above the glass transition temperature of the first polymer; a second layer located comprising a second transparent thermoplastic polymer having a second stress optical coefficient (C.sub.m2) measured at 20 C. above the glass transition temperature of the second matrix; wherein a relation between the first stress optical coefficient and the second stress optical coefficient is C.sub.m2>4(C.sub.m1) (Formula A) wherein the thickness of the first layer measured from the highest peaks of the first surface texture to the second side of the first layer is greater than 1.5 times Rz of the first surface texture but less than or equal to 75% of the total thickness of the article.

An image display mirror for a vehicle includes a first polarizing plate arranged so as to be rotatable in a plane, a half mirror having a reflection axis and configured to reflect polarized light, and an image display apparatus in the stated order from a viewer side, in which: the first polarizing plate has a polarizer; a rotation of the first polarizing plate changes an angle of an absorption axis of the polarizer relative to a reflection axis of the half mirror when an image is not displayed on the image display apparatus and when the image is displayed thereon; when the image is not displayed, the absorption axis of the polarizer and the reflection axis of the half mirror are perpendicular to each other; and when the image is displayed, the absorption axis of the polarizer and the reflection axis of the half mirror are parallel to each other.